Bike is fixed will be home soon DV.

Bike fixed,new rear wheel aquired, have a cycle planned for this afternoon, afterwhich we get a train home. plan to update blog upon our return to the homestead. Thanks for reading, and visit Scotland and esp. Edinburgh if possible- its fab.

Hi all, in Edinburgh now

To all whom have never been and to whom I have not spoken to in the last few days, Edinburgh is a lovely city!
We had a major mishap with Dee's rear wheel axle this side of St. Andrews, as a result met a few super people that really tried to help us. We ended up taking train to Edinburgh from Leuchers. Spent a few days coming down the east coast, the weather was great and at times foggy, esp. over Dundee. We hope to get the bike fixed in the next few days and then we decide on our further progress. After passing through the Great Glen on the designated cycle route that was very hilly and lovely, though didnt really take us past Ness, we skirted Inverness and went through Nairn. That night we slept in someones garden and the following day arrived early in Findhorn.where we were impressed by the setup, and some of the houses were absolutely gorgeous. They have windmills that supply much of the power for the village and that impressed us too. we laft there at around 5pm and cycled to Port Gorden where we camped overlooking the sea. Dee says the town was Lovecraftian- whatever that means. We then cycled to Maud where we got the cyclepath to Dyce, close to Aberdeen, straight path, -old train line, no cars.Got there real early like 00.30 froze asses off that night cos we wernt bothered enough to put up tent in a park in Dyce. Aberdeen better 2nd time through, confusing town, quite pretty in places. Left Aberdeen and cycled to the seaside town of Stonehaven via a very arseways route- the N1 cyclepath, the day was too hot and I was a grumpy. Stayed 2 days in Stonehaven swam in outdoor heated seawater pool built in art neuveau style and ate deep fried mars bar- would be better without the batter (I think) Saw Dunnottar castle and took great pic of what we think may be a osprey or something else raptory. On our way to Forfar, we stopped at the house of a lovely man who lives in a Canadian WWII dorms for the soldiers, after 60 years this strange half barrel structure is still standing. We were chatting to them for around three hours!! They breed Jack Russel terriors. The following day we spent half of it scanning gravestones for ancestors, tedious process as the graveyard is massive,gave up 1/3 of the way through them- sorry. Perhaps another day we complete the job. So after Forfar the next big thing was cycling the Tay bridge that is +_ 11/2 miles long, on a dedicated cyclepath, we stopped the night in Tayport, then we went through St. Andrews, another nice, pretty town (wealthy) and had the upset. We have seen so many raptors; buzzards, eagles, Kestrels, even a flock of small raptors leaving a field. I also think we saw a barn owl on our night cycle. What a place for bird watchers and history enthusiasts!! Gonna go, thanks for reading!! hope to post pics. Remake, do we know you?

just saying hello

we are now soaked to the skin and drying out in a way nicer hostel inthe mittle of the great glen(lochness etc) really nice here it is.
the commitments is on the tellyso thats fine by me.
good atmosphere here.
there are loads of pics in the slideshow to your right.
rightclick to go see them bigified.

that is all
we are having fun, even in the rain

one week in and we are fine

Hi all, Zee here, we plan to post pics tomorrow, this is just to let you know what we have been up to. My fingers are numb from all the cycling so p[lease excuse spelling errors. We arrivid in scotland last friday and cycled like mad yokes till we got to Ardgossan (or something like that) where we took the ferry to Arran, This happened accidently, (I thought he wanted to go, he thought I did, both were indifferent). Arran is gorgeous, we stayed three nights, two of which we camped wild. we saw red squirrelsa and golden eagles and harriers and hares and black bunnies. the plant life there was fab too and we got some nice sunny weather, though it always seems to rain by by night. We left Arran on the Monday and cycled once again like mad yokes to Loughgilphead where we stayed in a camping place and did some badly needed l;aundry. we saw shaggy moos (highland cattle.)night time once again was very very rainy and windy. The following day we cycled to outside Connel that is built next to a tidal waterfall that apparently gets scary during spring tides, (it was normal fo us though) Anyway, camped wild outside a mussel farm on Lough Etive. The loughs here are salt water. Then we cycled to fort William, and stayed last night in The scottish youth hostel, something I am not in a hurry to do again, give me a tent any day!!. Any way hostel and the campsite we are at now are at the foot of the mighty Ben Nevis (or the foot of the mountain next to it) Spectacular!!!!! hope to do an easy mountain walk later and work some muscles other than those used for cycling. This place is lovely, this day is soft and drizzly. Love to everyone and apologies for not being in touch, internet access round here seems few and far in between. XXXXXX and from Dee too. till tomorrow when we hope to upload pics of this lovely country.

UP! UP! AND A STAY!!!!!

for a first day of travelling we didn't do too much. all packed up we walked to the train station and got a train to laytown where zee's sister collected her bike. now we are in the house for two days minding little baby David. Zee is all 'oh isn't he lovely!!!'. like i am not... mutter mutter cute and adorable mutter mutter mutter.....

the order of the day is cuteness and as such we must have requisite documents of cute!!! this is a family of cats that have recently been sitting outside the back porch of darels place!! they were feeding on their mum when zee spotted them and we snapped this. the mum was so tired looking but she's pretty cool looking, it looks like she has been on some navy seals mission or something with the stripes worked into her face as camoflage. mum-cat the commando of feeding time!
the first cycle went pretty well. only a warm up and getting used to the bikes with the panniers on.
it was only about half an hours cycle from laytown to bettystown and it went very smoothly. just have to remember to keep a lookout for potholes and things like that.