At 9:30 we meet up at the Weardale Café; Lindsey, me, Jo and Stevie (The Navigator). Jo’s bike has been misbehaving on the ride from Darlo so in a fit of paranoia Jo heads back home to scrounge a lift up with Andy. Is that really the sensible option?
So it’s just the three of us on the ride north, A68, A69, M74 and acute boredom by Locherbie. Time to play so we dive off the motorway and take the "old" road, the B7076, as far north as junction 12, it’s quieter, twistier, far more entertaining and most likely just as quick.
Then it’s the usual haul through Glasgow, over the Erskine Bridge and into the Little Thief at Dunbarton for a well deserved nosh-up. It’s at this point we find out the A82 is closed from Tarbet to Crianlarich, that’s the small wiggly bit by Loch Lomond. This means we will get detoured by about 40 miles, but I know the road and it will be top entertainment.
So we misbehave over the "Rest and be Thankful" and on to Inveraray treating all traffic as mobile chicanes, scratching’ round the twisty bits, gawping at the views on the straight bits and generally getting ourselves separated. The plan been to regroup at Inveraray and it is here that communal idiocy leads to us loosing Stevie. After waiting half an hour and many text messages and phone calls we conclude that somehow he has managed to pass us unseen and is now on his way to Cambletown. After one last phone call Lindsey and I set off again, after all he’s a grown lad, his bike is reliable and he’s a good rider. And he has a map. This does worry me slightly because he can still get lost in his own house, and let’s be brutally honest here, he’s a fuckin’ idiot.
After much inept navigation he made it
Ladezzz and Gentlemen I give you... MotoIdiot.
A right good thrapping later Lindsey and I are on the site and just starting to unpack when my phone rings. It’s Stevie and he’s at the Green Welly, huge relief all round, I was half expecting him say his bike is stuck in the sand on Dunaverty Bay.
It transpires he found out his mistake by the time he stopped for petrol at Lochgilphead, the man at the garage eventually pointed out which page of the map he was really on and from there he was away.
So it pub and beer. Many others arrive as we drink; Martin, Morag & John, Rob, Beth, Andy, Jo, Dav – it seems everyone must have drank quite a lot through the evening, by next morning many are reporting they couldn’t understand a word I had said to them. Disgraceful.
A combination of mysterious circumstances has lead to me suffering a strange virus; possibly brought on by nightcap whisky, possibly brought on by the preceding seven pints of Burtons Very Evil Bowel Basher Ale. I theorise there must be someone on the site who feels worse than me, I want to find them.
By midday I’m just about well enough to ride so we’re all off to Safeway at Fort Bill for breakfast in the hope of a cure for our ailments. Beth and Rob set their usual cracking pace up the A82, everyone else wobbles along in their wake, each hoping for a clear run along the loch and not to be stuck behind some coach belching out foul diesel fumes, and all the time hemmed in by double whites lines and paranoia.
Breakfast is wholesome and cheap (thank god for supermarket cafes), we meet up with Martin, John and Morag who, not wanting a second breakfast, head of towards Plockton where we can all have lunch.
There are many other bikes about today, it looks like they have all discovered Big Scotland but once we’re north of Invergarry most seem to disappear. Strange really as this where the fun really starts, still who am I to complain? The ride in the sunshine past Loch Garry is gorgeous, through Glen Shiel and past the Five Sisters is fast and spectacular, and Eilean Donan Castle visitors centre a chance to stop for a gawp and a bottle of water. Then on for the final fast, open bit to the Kyle and the slow twisty bit to Plockton.
A pub provides lunch, a seagull provides the entertainment, Scotland provides the backdrop and global warming (to which we have made our own little contribution) provides the warm early spring sunshine. I think it’s fait to say we’re all quite happy.
Plockton, feeding time.
The ride back does not evolve into a race, although some people are a little brisk, which means we all get separated again but manage to regroup at the A87/A887 junction. Well almost. First an unknown Yamaha flashes past the junction, then a rather familiar blue SV650. Shortly thereafter a collection of bikes turn off and pull up with us. Have we seen a guy on a YZF750 go past? Yes he was going towards Inverness followed by our Stevie. It seems each group of riders in the Highlands must have their own Idiot, perhaps not a Village Idiot but more of a Moto-Idiot. Eventually they both return causing much merriment and mirth amongst both parties. Although pretty knackered Stevie and I do the Kinlochleven loop before returning to the site.
The bikes are parked and we all head off to the pub early for food and beer, and not necessarily in that order. This turns out to be good move, the place is heaving and the bar staff implode under the weight of food orders leading to near riots when a halt is called on more orders. We eat and drink smugly before calling it a relatively early and sober night.
It’s another glorious day so a plan is hatched that starts with the Little Thief at Tyndrum for breakfast and gets sillier from there on in.
Leaving Tyndrum we head out on the Oban Road, which we all know is fun and sometimes policed, and then take the A819 just past Dalmally which is also but not – if that makes sense. We all kind of stick together, occasionally getting separated by the odd car but nobody gets lost and we all land Inveraray flushed with navigational success and adrenaline.
Tyre. Motorcycle type. Abused.
The distressing lack of a coffee dispensary sees us soon back on the road to Lochgilphead, it’s new to us all except for Young Stevie who fails to set a cracking pace as he’s most likely forgotten he has already been here. Lochgilphead sees us hunting out a café and wondering why John’s Triumph is leaking coolant, the search for a café is easily resolved but the leaking Daytona proves more difficult. Eventually we decide to carry on and see how long it takes to blow up.
The next bit is the A816 up to Oban and it’s a little bit naughty. It all sets off innocuously enough, all long straights and gentle bends through rolling countryside, but soon develops into an absolute roller-coaster of a ride through woods, hills and valleys. I bugger off big style to see what a GS can really do, soon everyone is out of sight apart from Martin who loves this kind of thing and refuses to give up the game. The man is a bloody lunatic to ride that fast on roads like that. Top entertainment.
John, distressed, asks his bike to please stop leaking.
All of which delivers us down to Oban harbour sporting huge grins, frazzled tyres and a healthy coating of bugs. A café is found for a right good feed, just in case the Clachaig Inn has gone critical again and we can’t get fed there.
The final run back round the coast is relatively sedate; Ballachulish, Glencoe, the Red Squirrel and the Clachaig Inn for some well deserved beer. Yum.
Home time. So after another Little Thief breakfast we bid our farewell to the Highlands and head south. For a bit of variety we take the A85 at Crianlarich towards Sterling, this is leads us across the country through Glen Dochart onto the A84 and after many happy (s)miles Callander. Now Callander is a nice place, in fact it's so nice everybody wants to be there which leads to the closure of part of the A84 south, a detour via some interesting back roads and absolute traffic chaos. Fortunately most of the queue is heading, albeit very slowly, north so we kinda breeze past it all with happy smiles and not a care in the world.
Then the fun is over as we circumnavigate Edinburgh, pause briefly at another Little Thief and scuttle off sideways onto the joy that is the A7. Oh what fun we have and, yes, I’m sorry, to all the car drivers and few biker who may have been a little surprised to be passed by a fully kitted GS at warp factor 9. Sorry. Very, very, sorry. Really I am, I’ll try not to let it happen again.
But the fun is soon over and although the A7 continues to wind it’s way across the country we need to go the other way and hop across onto the A68. This gently drifts us south till we reach Newcastle and the A1 for the final bit south and back to reality.
Andy wonders why his Truimph doesn't leak like Johns.
Rob (Ducati) ponders the wonders of a weatherproof airbox.
Beth asks where the next beer is coming from.
Jo breaks the bad news - Time to go home.