Alan's gang

 

20th August

On Tuesday evenings I (sometimes) do a hard training session with Alan. He also coaches on a one-to-one basis with a few folk from club. I occasionally wonder if Mary is paying his coaching fees to get me out and breathing hard on a Tuesday, but have never asked because I know a good deal, and don't need to see the teeth of the gift horse. I enjoy the Tuesday evenings, not always at the time, but more afterwards. And it helps my parkrun times go in the right direction. 

A few Sundays ago Alan organised a day out with some of the individuals he coaches. Not everyone made it along but six of us went for a jolly round the Lomonds. He sent me a note of the route he had found on a Carnethy webpage doing East and West Lomond and a circuit of about 12 miles round and over the peaks. I recognised a lot of it but also was slightly dazed by the passage of time and poor memory. Was that the Devil's Burden relay route? Or the Lomonds of Fife hill race route? Are they similar? The mists of time had robbed me of any answers and I hoped it would become clear when we ran. (Spoiler alert, it didn't!)

I looked at the route and went onto the Suunto website where you can input routes onto a map. Most of the off-road trails correspond to even small trods and singletracks around the hills. Mostly. There were some parts where there were no obvious lines so I joined them up manually, hopeful I was not guiding us across swamps and high barbed fences. Alan also had the route on his phone for navigation which he got out when doubt crept in!

I left it a little late leaving home and had to cycle like a maniac to get to Alan's on time. Four of us were going in his car and with a bit of effort I just got there on time! We drove to East Lomond car park which I was well familiar with. The last 1.5 miles up to the top of the hill was used every Tour of Fife on the Friday night as the Up Hell Time Trial. An unrelenting climb that never levels off for a yard, ascending to the pylons and aerials of East Lomond. A gruelling 12 minutes of heavy breathing. Much easier in a car. Not sure if the Tour of Fife still continues these days - 5 consecutive days of racing in various venues across Fife.

top of West Lomond

So it was all going far too smoothly. The paths were fairly obvious and my Suunto sat-nav was working well. And then not so much. On reflection I think the Carnethy route went onto such small singletracks that we went off route. Or maybe there was meant to be some heather bashing? We certainly did some. And found ourselves in about the right area but without any obvious paths. We could see some people in the distance on a main path and so headed for them, which took us back onto solid ground. However we had spent so long walking over heather and wading through bracken that it seemed about right to take a straightish line from the halfway point heading back to East Lomond, rather than following the edge of the cicuit to the top of Bishop Hill (near that golf ball structure).

imperfect route finding but fun anyway

taking the low road back to East Lomond

There was one last hurdle, a triple strand barbed wire topped stone wall to cross. We could find no way round and eventually committed to climbing it. With Alan going first and catching us as we jumped down from the wobbly summit! With all of us safely across we then had a pleasant couple of miles back round Ballo Reservoir and gradual climb back up to East Lomond car park.

11miles in 3hrs

We then drove to the Pillars of Hercules Cafe along the Falkland~Strathmiglo road. I have never been there before (although driven past many times) and was impressed by the quality of food and snacks served there. The place is staffed by (perhaps hungover) students on a Sunday so the service was not as prompt as it might have been and the queue was leisurely. But if you are in no hurry it is a lovely venue with tables set out next to a delightful garden, between wooden shacks. Very relaxed. Highly recommended. We sat there chatting and enjoying the warm weather. I got up to photograph the butterflies attending the well planted garden, but also to stand back from our table to take a couple of group shots of our gang. It was a perfect finale to our day. Big thanks to Alan for organising and inviting me along.

red admiral

large whites

peacock