Lovin' it.

The first full working week is over, thank goodness. It's always a thought knuckling back down to the dull repetition of work but in order to enjoy your free time, you got to make some bucks somehow!

The great thing about the end of the week is of course the weekend and this weekend was made all the better as the weather was fabulous. Cold, but fabulous.

Of course when the weather is good it makes the thought of going out and exercising so much easier and enjoyable. When the winter mornings are still dark and the urge to hibernate under the duvet is strong,  it is amazing to see a beautiful  blue sky take hold of the day. Even if there is no blue sky if it's dry and not blowing a gale, you've got to jump at the chance to get out and enjoy the few hours before darkness comes in again.

Saturday morning was one of those cold and very crisp mornings and having not run since the beginning of the week it was a great opportunity to head off the pavements and into the hills, or at least closer to them. The small amount of pavement and roads that i did go on were incredibly slippy with black ice, but thankfully I did not become a cropper. No speed records were made, but a successful 8ish miles were completed.

Sunday was mountain biking day. Yippee! Although the blue skies had been swapped for clouds it was dry, but still very cold and frosty.

The decision to head to Glentress and tackle the black route was made. I was especially looking forward to this trip as I recently treated myself to a drop seat (Rock Shock Reverb). This is a fancy seat post that you can lower and raise with the push of a button. This may seem a slightly pointless gadget to some people, but to me it is absolutely amazing. I like a high seat for climbing the hills but like it quite low for the downhills and on a varied trail this can be quite tedious and time consuming to do manually, but with this gadget you can do it on the move. It made me so happy it was beyond ridiculous.

Getting to the top of the black route is quite a leg and lung buster and is broken up with some technical downhills, but all the puffing and panting is worth it, not only for the views but for the great downhill at the end. To come down, we took the direct route that followed mostly red and then blue trail markers, and apart from having a few frozen gear problems it was a great run.

To top off a rather splendid January weekend, we stopped in at the Whistle Stop Cafe in Innerleithen. They have a gluten free menu that delights an especially hungry and slightly chilly me. A bowl of chips, a piece of carrot cake and a latte, blissful.

Now that, in my book, is a great weekend.

Morning run.

Morning bike ride.

Peace x

All photos by Caroline Harvey.

Wheelie good fun.

I love my outdoor activities and since being introduced to mountain biking about 6 months ago I have fallen in love with it. I loved my cycling anyway, but sometimes I am not prepared to fight with the traffic and am less inclined to do winter road cycling. With mountain biking however there is thankfully no traffic and I'm more prepared to get wet, cold and dirty.

At first I was very apprehensive of the downhills and feared the stones and tree roots that could be found on the trails. Now, although not as daring as I may have been about 25 years ago, I have gained in confidence and can tackle most trails, even some black routes!

The uphills are always hard and I usually huff and puff my way up to the top, hoping that at some point the ups will get easier. They never do! Although my times have improved, so I must be getting fitter. The feeling of getting to the top is always great though and the thigh burn is worth it when you get to whizz all the way back down to the bottom.

I have been lucky enough in these few months of taking up the sport to have visited several of Scotland's trail centres. They have all been very different in technical difficulty, layout, size etc but one thing they have all had in common is that they are all manmade trails.

I had an extra day off this weekend and was very much looking forward to heading down to Glentress for a good burn round the red route, but sadly the storms we had mid week stopped all my fun. I decided to check the website before leaving but it had not been updated for a few days, so texted the forrest Ranger to find out the extent of any damage that the winds may have caused. He promptly replied saying that the trails were being checked, so sadly the centre was closed until all reports were in.

Gutted, what to do now? It was a gorgeous day and I did not want to waste my precious day off. So jumping on my bike I started out on a route that would take me along the Water of Leith and then up to the reservoirs at the base of the Pentland hills.

It was an extremely cold day and I found that the ground was completely frozen, even where it was exposed to the sunshine. As I was puffing my way up the steep Currie Kirk road I thought that it might be a good idea to actually go over the Pentlands and follow the trail that I normally run.

 I have walked and run around these hills for many years and have always cursed the people that use it as a mountain bike trail, as the bikes have gradually eroded many of the paths and caused huge ruts in the ground that make it extremely hard to run over.

I reasoned this time that the ground was frozen so hard that my one trip round was not going to cause any further damage. Most of the paths were actually covered with ice, so much of the time my wheels didn't actually touch the earth!

I have to admit that it is a very good route to have on your doorstep, especially when you don't pass another soul the whole way round, but the extent of the damage caused by the number of people that use the hills is evident (walkers and runners included). There is extensive path building underway on the way over to Glencorse. At the moment it looks like a huge digger has just run up and over the hill and left this big ugly scar. I presume that the plan is to cover this in large chuckie stones, which is a shame because this is not very enjoyable for anyone to walk/run/cycle on.

I think it's always a shame when this happens, but it is inevitable when specific paths are so well used. It is great that so many people go out and enjoy this fantastic area of countryside that is literally a stones throw from the city, but when large paths are built it slightly ruins the look and feel of the hillside.

A gorgeous winter day out.

Huge path dug out of the hillside.

Very frozen big path.

My proposed Sunday ride with Beth in Carron Valley was also called off due to a storm damaged trail, so wanting to get out and keep up my mtb fitness I had an early morning ride up the Water of Leith. However with the temps being back above freezing the path is now very wet and muddy and I got rather filthy. I knew that I was getting splashed from my front wheel as I could see my very dirty jacket, legs and shoes but did not realise just how filthy my face was. I did get a few strange looks from some dog walkers and people in the garage forecourt when I took my bike for a power wash.

Not my best look! I have a mud beard.

Hopefully the trail centres will be open again soon.

Peace x

Mmmm interesting having just googled to see who has responsibility of ownership for that part of the Pentlands, I have found  that it is actually the land owners that are making a larger access path up the hill for their vehicles. Maybe I shouldn't worry as much as I do about the erosion after all.

All photographs by Caroline Harvey.

The meaning of life.

As the years go on I have become less and less enamoured with birthdays, they seem to come round faster and faster and obviously as each one passes I get older and older. This year was no different and my age changed to the number that is now the same as the one on my front door and according to Douglas Adams is the meaning of life. That is yet to be seen but I definitely had the best birthday I have had in a long time.

The day was very dull as I had to work and it was a particularly boring kind of day but the evening was  wonderful. Scooting away from work on the dot of 5pm, I headed out to see my partner in crime and then onward to Glentress.

Since being introduced to mountain biking a few months ago, it is now one of my new favourite hobbies. So when asked what I would like to do for my birthday, I suggested that it would be great to go and do an evening ride followed by a lovely home cooked dinner, and that is exactly what I got.

The rainy weather that had plagued the whole day even disappeared and the night was clear and crisp with the stars and moon brightly shining in the sky. All geared up with my new birthday biking glasses and waterproof shorts, we headed out to trundle round a short version of the blue route. It takes just under the hour and is a great post work work out.

Feeling relaxed and happy to be out and about on such a beautiful evening, it was even more fabulous to get back to the van and have my already prepared birthday dinner. My wonderful chef did not let me down as a truly delicious lamb dhansak  was produced from the food flask, followed by chocolate and banana cake.

Once we had polished off our delectable dinner it was time to head home to get freshened up and settle in for the night with a lovely glass of wine. What more could a girl ask for, best birthday ever.

So very, very true.

Trueblood Tee, fangtastic.

Moonlight, bikes and food.

We returned back to the trails today for more fun, but this time on the red route which has a lung and leg burning climb but is worth it for the downs. It was slightly on the damp side so lots of mud on the paths and quite a fair amount on me by the end of the run. Great fun though, I like getting muddy! 

Peace x

All photographs by Caroline Harvey except the one of me which was taken by the equally muddy but lovely Mr T. x .

Tantrums and toe cleats.

In the last couple of weeks I have been introduced to the world of mountain biking. Now, I have always cursed the mountain bikers that chew up the paths in the Pentlands, but the biking I have been doing is on proper bike trails down at Glentress.

My first trip was on my very old and heavy fully rigid mountain bike that has only ever been used for commuting. It was hard work but I thoroughly enjoyed the thrill and excitement of it all. So this weekend we headed back and to do some more as plans to go away camping for a few days to the North West were thwarted by crappy wet weather.

So, on Friday evening we went back with my old bike, now sporting some actual MB tyres but also some clip in pedals, as I was finding it hard to keep my feet on the bike as it jumped around over the bumps. I thought that I would be able to manage the cleats ok as I have found them good and relatively easy to use on my road bike. However, testing out the pedals in the car park proved to be my first challenge and I fell over and winded myself on my own handle bars! Thankfully nobody was watching, but I felt rather foolish and initially thought I had ruined my weekend before it had even begun.

Not to be put off I jumped back on and began the journey up the hill, so far so good, a tad tricky at points but no more falls......until I tried to stop, didn't quite manage to undo in time and boom in the ditch. Pride starting to get slightly dented by this pointed, but no blood so all good. The rest of the evening was uneventful and again thoroughly enjoyable.

Saturday, up and away back down to Glentress, this time though we thought it might be good to try out one if the hire bikes and get a feel of the trails on a bike more suited to the terrain. Since I had quite liked using the toe cleats we swapped the pedals and off we went. Fairly soon though it became apparent that a new bike and toe cleats was possibly just a step too far for what essentially was my 3rd trip out. I had lost all confidence and hated having my feet confined. I tried to use that flat underside of the pedal but even that was proving difficult. A minor meltdown was on the verge of happening and I was finding that my cool and calm demeanour was melting away fast by the heat of my own annoyance.

Thankfully my co pilot was very laid back and reassurig about the whole thing so we cycled back down changed the pedals back to flats, had a gluten free chocolate brownie and a coffee before puffing our way back up the hill.

Result, happy Caroline was back, but fear had also creptd in. I hate adult fear it is so debilitating at times, you just want to wish yourself back to childhood when you feared nothing. So in order to try and recover some pride I faced my fears head on, and was given some tuition in the skills area going over bumps and rocks etc. It certainly helped and the rest of the day went by without a hitch, thankfully.

However, there is one further minor hurdle that I have to over come. I think the motion and the concentration of the downhill gives me slight motion sickness. It would be interesting to know if anyone else has ever experienced this or if it is just one of the weird things that happens to me. Not that this will hold me back as I purchased a new mountain bike today a long with some travel bands that I hope will help stop the motion sickness.

All in all a fantastic weekend of exercise, good food, nice drinks, great company and chat. Happy days. xx

Let the weekend begin.

A room with a view.

Taking a breather.

Grass and trees.

New bike baby.

Peace x

All photos by Caroline Harvey on instagram.