Sitting about in the sun

Today’s guest picture shows a bridge over the River Otter in Devon taken by my sister Mary who was visiting friends nearby.

We had another day of wall to wall sunshine today and we are getting used to having some good weather at last without having to worry about the next rain shower.  It is a bit unnerving but very enjoyable.

Being Sunday, after breakfast Mrs Tootlepedal went off to sing in the church choir  and I made a lamb stew for the slow cooker and then got the fairly speedy bike out and set out to make the best of a lovely day.

It was only nine degrees C at breakfast time so I didn’t rush my preparations but it was still chilly enough when I did set out to require a couple of layers of clothing.

Being Sunday, I was able to use the main road without being bothered by too much traffic so I pedalled north up the A7 to the neighbouring town of Hawick.  This is a trip that involves going gently uphill for ten miles and then gently downhill for the next twelve.  Today a light wind was behind me and it was as nice a cycling treat as I could wish.

I stopped to record the sun picking out the many needles on a monkey puzzle tree (Araucaria) at the top of the hill at Mosspaul.

The hotel there seems to have come back to life as a holiday let after a spell of closure as a hotel.

As you can see, there could hardly have been a bluer sky.

The twelve miles down the the hill to Hawick flashed by at twenty miles an hour, thanks to the favourable conditions.  It is possible to imagine when you have got a light wind behind you on a sunny day that your progress is entirely down to your own prowess but I knew that things were too good to last so I stopped at Hawick to eat a banana and a slice of fruity malt loaf at the Heritage Hub.

While I was nibbling, I walked about with my phone in camera mode.  There is a fine little cascade in the Slitrig burn just before it plunges into a tunnel under the Hub forecourt…

…and also under a statue of a man wrestling with a bull.  It commemorates the ‘turning of the bull’ by William Rule who saved the life of Robert the Bruce by this action.  From this came the family name of Turnbull.

My journey now turned to the south.

Things became a bit harder and there was no more swanning about at 20 miles an hour for the rest of the day.  The next thirty miles were into a wind which got brisker as the hours passed.

Still, the road from Hawick to Newcastleton is very scenic and although it goes over 1000ft at Whitrope summit, the climbs are steady and the views more than enough consolation for the effort of pedalling up hill.

Today saw the opening of part of the old Waverley railway line from Edinburgh to Carlisle.  The newly opened section, now called The Borders Railway only goes 35 miles from Edinburgh as far as Galashiels. My cycle route route was taking me down the still closed old section south of Hawick and there are (very faint) hopes that this too might reopen some day.

It would cross this fine viaduct at Shankend…

…and pass through the tunnel to Whitrope Summit where a team of enthusiasts have been painstakingly restoring a a few hundred yards of the old railway.  They had an open day today so I popped in as I went past.

The little railcar in the foreground was actually moving slowly up and down the track today.

They have an exhibition in an old railway carriage….

…but I have visited it before so I didn’t linger today.  I talked to one of the enthusiasts who was rather sad that more of the many hundreds of people who had gone to ride on the first trains on the new railway hadn’t also come south to see their effort.  They had had about twenty visitors.

I ate some more of the provisions that I was carrying with me and then set off down the hill to Newcastleton.  This should have been unalloyed pleasure as it is a steady descent with few uphill sections to interrupt the flow but the wind had got quite brisk by this time and I had to pedal hard just to get going downhill.  In the end I was only half a mile an hour faster going 10  miles downhill with a loss of 600ft in elevation than I had been climbing 10 miles uphill to Mosspaul with a gain of 600ft.

It was no wonder that I stopped to take a picture of a charming bridge north of Hermitage on my way.

The road I was on is one of my favourites…

…with a good surface and very little traffic and even into the stiff breeze, I enjoyed being on it.

When I got to Newcastleton, I stopped for my final snack and looked across the square at the two hotels on the village.

The Grapes and Liddesdale hotels

It makes you wonder what sort of community life led to having two hotels quite so close to each other.  Both had customers sitting outside today.

I was faced with a route choice when I had finished my snack.  I could either take on another 1000ft summit, crossing the hill road exposed to the full force of the wind in my face and go direct to Langholm (ten miles) or I could skulk along the Liddle valley down to Canonbie and then back up the Esk valley, hoping for some shelter from the wind and avoiding quite so much climbing.  I chose the latter but it is an undulating route and the shelter was not very forthcoming so my speed dropped even more before I got home.

Still, it was a more adventurous ride than I have been doing lately and at 60 miles and over 2000 ft of climbing,  I was pleased with my effort.

Those with time hanging heavy on their hands can click on the map to get details of the route and ride.

By coincidence, Mrs Tootlepedal was watching the Tour of Britain cycle race while I was out and I arrived home just in time to join her and see a fine sprint finish.  The Tour comes through our area on Tuesday and the professionals will be cycling up some of the route I used today…but probably a bit faster than me.  We hope to go and watch them.

After the race was over, we went out into the garden and I sieved a little compost and chased butterflies.

It is hard to believe that both the pictures below are of the same butterfly.

The Michaelmas daisies are a butterfly magnet and there were soon two of these pretty peacock butterflies to watch.

I took a pair of poppy parade pictures of course…

…and then went inside to do a little bird watching.  Chaffinches were arriving from all angles…..

…but refusing to show their faces so I gave up and watched the highlights of the Italian F1 motor race instead.

The lamb stew turned out very well and that rounded off a good day.  I am expecting to sleep quite well tonight.

I did find one co-operative chaffinch to act as flying bird of the day.