Festive Frolics

On Christmas Eve Colin, Cherry and Hannah went out to see Kinky Boots at the Playhouse. Very good. Christmas Day at home with less staying over - Max in Canada.

On Boxing Day Colin, Cherry and Les headed to Beecraigs. Colin did the 1 lap version of the Boxing Day Handicap race in warm weather for the time of year. Pretty decent run with the course well marked this time.

On Friday Colin & Cherry took the train to Dundee to visit new V&A Dundee. We went round the Ocean Liners exhibit and the permanent collection. It was extremely busy and not particularly good.

On Saturday Colin took part in the ELO Festive Frolic which was at Levenhall, Musselburgh. Still nice weather and a nice easy location for orienteering. The planning for the score course didn't go well though and arrived back about 6 minutes late for lots of penalty points.

The Run in to Christmas

On Monday night went out for the evening with Frank, Warren and Ian in Edinburgh City Centre. Started with a walk to Salisbury Crags with Ian before meeting Warren at around 4 pm at Brewhemia when the drinking started. Walked through the Princes Street Christmas market with half pint in hand and got to the Angels Share at 5.30 pm to meet Frank. We had dinner a Thai dinner at Chaophraya before continuing the pub crawl which fizzled out just after 11 pm. Nice to see the boys again especially Frank who we don't see much of (living in Singapore).

After a busy day on Board meetings by phone we headed to have a Christmas dinner at Jamie's Italian with Max before he headed off to Canada for his Christmas in Calgary.

On Thursday Colin has a wander around an exhibition at the National Library. Small but quite interesting.

On Friday night we had a family out visit to the Filmhouse to see The Muppets Christmas Carol and a quick Nandos afterwards.

On Saturday Colin ran in the Kirk Craigs Hill Race in Tillicoultry. Tough but fun.

Cold

My final business trip to London of the year at the start of the week and a Christmas dinner in lovely surroundings but with slightly disappointing food.

I felt my throat slightly raw the next morning and unfortunately had picked up a cold after a day spent in Board rooms with so many other people. Still suffering on Monday morning 5 days later. Have managed a few easy walks and lots of Board paper reading over the past few days. Stopped off for dinner at David Bann with Cherry on one of the strolls.

Hopefully better soon.

Hermitage Trail Race 10 K

Early start on Sunday morning for a new 10 k race around the trails of the Hermitage and Blackford Hill. A very familiar area but a good one with a nice route picking up the best of the trails. It was slightly congested at the start and I was happy to start at a fairly modest pace over the first kilometer. Time wasn't great but it was a hilly course with lots of mud and twists and turns so it is hard to judge the effort. Time was almost exactly 1 hour. Felt pretty strong at the end which is always nice.

Richard, Thomas, Nicola & Zoe Visiting

The Weston's arrived on Friday afternoon and Max & Hannah returned later in the evening. We had dinner in together on Friday and enjoyed playing Pictionary.

On Saturday the youngsters went into town and up Calton Hill whilst Richard and Cherry had a walk about town. Colin unfortunately had work to do. In the evening we went to the Old Bell Inn for dinner. We didn't get the Christmas Dinner we hoped for but it was a reasonable pub meal.

On Sunday Cherry and Richard went to the Castle. The youngsters went to Fountainpark for bowling and pool. Later we all went for a Room Escape adventure at Summerhall.

Newhailles Trail Race

A short trip on Sunday morning to Newhailles House on the outskirts of Edinburgh for the inaugural trail race in and beyond the grounds of this National Trust property. A very well organised event and a pleasant course with a nice mixture of path, trail and field to get round. No particular aims for the event and deliberately avoided looking at the watch as I went round. Felt pretty good with no issues in knees or heels. Hoka Speedgoats were a good choice of footwear. Faded a little over the last 1/2 km but managed a decent push over the last 100m to avoid being passed. Definitely worth doing again.

SOSOL Dalkeith Park

Some glorious weather on Sunday for a trip to Dalkeith Country Park for a SOSOL event. Huge numbers of cars turned out and the park looking quite different with a lot of investment having been done in the restaurant and new adventure playpark. The Orienteering was the quickest and easiest green course I've ever done getting round in just over 30 minutes and coming in second place. Enjoyed a short walk afterwards with Cherry.

Tinto Hill Race

It had been a long time since my last hill race in the summer of 2017 and Tinto was a tough winter race to make a comeback on. The race had a 2 pm start and the weather was cold but not freezing and damp but not yet raining. Lots of pre-race nerves and frequent trips to the freshly felled pile of logs for a pee. Confidence was low and that feeling of what am I doing here on such a dreich afternoon was strong. But soon we were off and the heart rate pounding as the long ascent commenced. Gentle at first then getting steeper and rougher. Lots of muddy puddles. A few moments of respite on the way up when the slope briefly eases and then the question is can you summon the will power to force a running pace again. Strength, lung capacity and above all will power are needed on the way up. On the way down strength, core stability, courage and perhaps a bit of madness are the secrets of success. I'm running in Hoka Speedgoats with thick solid soles with lots of bounce but not quite the studs of the traditional fell shoe - they work a dream on this terrain letting me flow down the hill at speed aiming the feet at solid rocky ground of which there is plenty. Yes - I'm loving this - this is my sport. Total concentration and maximum effort as I push through a rapid 2 miles of downhill and race through to the finish in a time similar to what I was achieving 8 years ago but not quite the best results of a decade ago.

SOSOL - Dechmont Law

A glorious day out in Livingstone. Helped with the event parking before a good run round the Green course. Pretty straightforward navigation wise. 6th of around 60 runners.

Mid Week Pentlands Cycle and Run

With some nice weather I enjoyed a cycle out to the Pentlands followed by a run in the hills of about 7 miles taking in the summits of Caerketton, Allermuir and Capelaw. Felt on pretty good form.

Beinn Mhanach

The hotel offered an early breakfast starting from 7 am which allowed me to get to the hills nice and early. Temperates had dropped sharply and it was zero degrees in the morning and the hills which had been snow capped yesterday where fully covered in snow/frost in the morning.

I used the mountain bike for the approach down the Auch valley which allowed me to make good speed over what would have been a long slog by foot. There were many river crossings along the way which were all just about manageable on the bike but did mean getting feet very wet and cold. 

I stopped at a bridge at the foot of the hill and headed straight up the snowy grassy slopes. It was a long hard slog with the legs a little bit tired after yesterday. The summit was cold and windy and not somewhere to hang about. It would have been nice to do the other two munros as per the original plan but they looked too snow covered for me to attempt safely so I headed back the way I came and was back to the car before midday.

After a cup of tea at Tyndrum I decided to make the most of the good weather and did a cycle ride from Strathyre to Callander where I stopped for a coffee before heading back.

Beinn Dorain and Beinn an Dothaidh

A reasonably early start and drive up to Bridge of Orchy for some munro bagging on what was forecast to be several days of glorious weather.

It was fairly pleasant at the foot of the hill near Bridge of Orchy station but started raining about half way up to the col. I sensibly stopped and put on the waterproofs. At the col I decided to head left towards Beinn an Dothaidh. It remained pretty wet and cloudy with poor visibility on the way to the summit with some difficulty finding the right route to the summit and then being clear on whether I'd actually found the true summit. In the end visited everything that looked like a peak. Things then started to clear a little and were looking a lot better when I got to the col again.

From there it was a pleasant ascent at the start towards Beinn Dorain but I stayed on the lower northern path which started to get a little bit hairy towards the end with a lot of snow on the ground. I left the path near the end and headed straight up to reach the summit ridge which was a lot more pleasant.

The descent was pretty straightforward but the rain started again at the end.

Stayed overnight at the Muthu Ben Doran which was cheap and pretty decent. Had dinner at the Tyndrum Inn.

Pentlands Run with Max

Max and Colin headed out for a run in the Pentlands on a pleasant Sunday evening. A challenging route was planned but proved a little much for Max who hasn't been running much in recent weeks. We cut things a little short as it would be a bit tight to do the full route before the sun set. Very pleasant run with lovely views of the hills and the city.

Walk around Kinghorn, Fife

Cherry, Colin and Max had a day out visiting the organic area on the old mining works at Kinghorn. Really should have been a summer visit as it didn't look its best in the cold grey morning light. The sun came out later and we walked to the top of the Binn for views over Burntisland and towards the Bridges.

Rebus - Long Shadows at the Kings Theatre

Cherry and Colin went to the Kings Theatre to see a Rebus play. Pretty good.

SOL - near Calvine

A lovely autumn day and the A9 was looking delightful with the trees turning red and orange and the low but bright autumn sun shining bright. Another Scottish O League outing on the Short Blue course. As always these are pretty challenging but managed to get round reasonably cleanly. There was just one control where I was lucky to find it having run pretty aimlessly or a long leg in broadly the right direction but definitely losing contact of where I was on the map. Around 75 minutes out of the course.

Budapest

We chose to fly BA via Heathrow to enjoy a more relaxed flight time rather than the 6 am direct Jet2 flight. The plan worked reasonably well although the travel was a bit of a drag for a relatively short weekend break away. We got into Budapest around 7 pm on Friday evening and got to the very nice Corinthia Hotel which had a lovely large room.

We headed out in the evening for a wander and a search for dinner. Arrived at some lively areas and had a drink at an outdoor vegan bar/eatery and then onwards till we found a trendy italian restaurant for a very nice salmon (Colin) and steak (Cherry).

Saturday was a wander by foot around the Pest side of the town going through the main shopping area and on to the market.

We went out on a boat trip at 12.30 which took us along the river and dropped us a Margaret Island for a pleasant walk around this green and pleasant little island.

We walked back towards the Parliament and various other sights making it a pretty long day out on our feet.

We headed to the hotel pool and spa both evenings for a swim and sauna.

On Sunday the weather was fabulous for a trip to the Buda side of town. We got the funicular to the top and had a very pleasant walk around town enjoying the sights and views.

From the bottom we got a taxi to the Citadella hill to get some more views from on high.

On Monday we headed to the City Park north of our hotel for a final look at some more sights prior to getting a taxi to the airport for our 13.15 flight home.

SOL 3 & Highland Wildlife Park

The orienteering was located right beside the wildlife park so Colin dropped Cherry off at the zoo for the morning while he did the orienteering. Orienteering was generally quite straightforward apart from 2 controls that weren't. A large valley crossing provided to be too steep to attempt safely and resulted in a very long detour and some back and forth looking for a safe route. Then control 9 of 15 just couldn't be found and I eventually gave up and we had arranged a meeting time at the zoo and it felt as if I could be out all day looking for the darn flag.

Nice lunch and shopping stop at House of Bruar on the way back.

Meall Cuaich

With a trip up North on Sunday and good weather forecast for Saturday we decided to make a weekend of it and booked at night at one of the few remaining hotels in Kingussie, The Osprey, and headed off in the car on Saturday morning.

Colin headed up for a quick ascent of Meall Cuaich which was a very pleasant and relatively easy Munro. The weather mainly stayed fine and I was feeling in pretty good shape and managed a fast pace up and down.

Cherry did the 5 miles walk on the flat approach and along the side of Loch Cuaich.

A very nice dinner in the evening at the Cafe Bistro restaurant.

Peebles Duathlon

An early start on Sunday to head down to Peebles for my second outing at the Peebles Duathlon. A very nice low key event with only around 50 competitors. Start was at 9 am with a 3 mile run on a circuit round the river Tweed. This year was a very fast transition onto the mountain bike with flat pedals and no need to change shoes - saved at least 5 minutes over the 2 transitions as a result. The MTB ride seemed to go pretty well and didn't feel it was slowing my down very much compared to a road bike. Bike ride was 12 miles which is quite a nice distance for pushing hard. Final 3 mile run started with legs feeling very strange after the bike but gradually loosening up. Run pace was steady until the very end where I managed a short sprint to pass the man in front. Nice event and well worth repeating.

SOSOL Windy Hill

With my bike season finished the orienteering season has restarted and my attempts on the South of Scotland and Scottish orienteering leagues. Sunday morning was a trip to Muirshiel Country Park and an area around Windy Hill. The weather started surprisingly nice but by half way the hill was living up to its name with strong winds and rain. Navigation wasn't easy but is never that difficult on open moorland and hills although I did mess up badly on the penultimate control. Came 5th on the green course which was reasonably good.

Had my bike with me and went for a short ride but it was still windy and I was feeling cold from damp clothing so after about a mile headed back to the car. 

Tour O The Borders

Last big cycle ride of the year on Sunday. A VERY early start with a 5 am alarm call and drive to Peebles for a ride that departed Peebles at 7.08 am (for my Wave 7).

The weather turned out to be rather worse than forecast with a fair bit of light rain and quite strong winds on the way round. I started off at pretty steady pace on the familiar route past Cademuir and Stobo. Feeling fine but without the energy to push the pace at all.

First stop for pies and cake was on the main road shortly before Talla. The weather was about at it worst at this stage and thoughts were of taking the short route home. Talla climb was interupted by an ambulance vehicle which gave me an excuse to just off the bike. I'd probably have made it but any excuse was gladly accepted.

The ride towards Gordon Arms had a strong tail wind which was very good news as this section can be a real grind into a headwind. This positive section and an improvement in the weather meant I headed into the Long lane and turned right without any hesitation although it was soon followed by a long grind uphill into the wind and drizzle. The second food station came soon as was very welcome.

The rest of the climb wasn't too bad and then a nice downhill and a pleasant rolling section with a favourable wind. A really nice climb followed at a fairly steady 6% grade which I made up pretty comfortably and it was nice to see others off and pushing. The return to the Gordon arms after this was into the wind and fairly tough.

Paddy Slacks was very very easy and had a feed station half way and the last six miles were a familiar and I was fit enough to start pushing fairly hard for most of this and particularly at the end.

A very well organised event. Very nice to be riding on closed roads. Start time unpleasantly early. I don't really enjoy the grind of 6 hours in the saddle but got pleasure from the fast finish and the third climb.