Distance: 84.1 miles / 135.3 km
Elevation: 4,619 feet / 1,408 m
Time: 11 hours and 26 minutes (6 hours and 55 minutes cycling)
When I planned this series of rides, I was sure that today would be the poorest of the lot. So much so that when the owner of the B&B told me to ride some of the NC500 route instead, I considered it. The problems putting me off that idea were mostly logistical – I wouldn’t have been able to complete it on this trip. Getting a train back from the middle of nowhere didn’t really appeal to me.
Continuing the trend set yesterday afternoon, the weather was glorious yet again. Before I knew it I was out of the hustle and bustle of Inverness and heading for National Cycle route 7. Here I experienced my first views of the outskirts of the Cairngorms mountain range.
National Cycle Route 7
The NCN route 7 from Inverness to Glasgow is really top quality – almost all of it off road. Most of the route runs parallel to the A9, with some small deviations on to mostly traffic free roads. The east coast mainline also runs alongside the route fairly often.
Today I would be completing the more hillier segments of the route, before continuing to follow this trail tomorrow. The first of these peaks was the Slochd summit at 405m.
Carrbridge
I was pretty hungry after climbing over the Slochd. I had not planned my stops very well today, so was happy to come across Carrbridge. Whilst it was only a small place on Google Maps, there was quite a good variety of food options on offer here.
Carrbridge itself looked incredible, though I’m not convinced it’d cope with the demands of the traffic of today.
Instead of opting for some Golden Spurtle porridge, I settled on a beautiful chicken burger with an egg on top. Rather humorously, the egg slipped out of the butty the instant I picked it up. I was lucky that it fell only on my cycling shorts and not the floor; nevertheless both those and my jersey now had some rather fetching grease stains. I managed to sneakily put it back in there and I don’t think anyone noticed. Though everyone must surely know I’m a mucky pup now.
Views of the Cairngorms
The Cairngorms were increasingly dominating more of the horizon the further I cycled. Now the largest summits had a layer of snow on top, despite it being June. Later on in the year I would be attempting to cycle the Deloitte Ride Across Britain, and some of the days would be within those mountains.
Unfortunately I was getting increasingly frustrated by my cycling cleats. The stones of Loch Ness had really taken a lot out of their life, and they were starting to disengage ever more frequently. Luckily the town of Aviemore was fast approaching when they were at their worst, and was only a short diversion from my route. I was on my way again after a friendly man in a bike shop fitted some new ones for me.
As I approached Etteridge, I needed a wee and stopped. The instant I got off the bike I could hear a train approaching. It wasn’t just the regular East Coast trains I’d seen all day – I don’t know what it is even now. I was incredibly lucky to both see it on the route today, and be stopped and able to take a quick photograph of it.
All of a sudden, my pannier rack collapsed. I was pretty worried this would signal the end of my trip, but it had only started rattling a couple of minutes ago. I soon noticed that a screw had somehow become lost. Since I was in the middle of nowhere, I decided that looking for the lost screw would be faster (and easier) than abandoning my ride. Whilst I lost nearly an hour looking, I was incredibly lucky to locate it immediately after a cattle grid. Disaster definitely averted here.
The cycle path to Pitlochry
The majority of the route from Kingussie to Pitlochry is mostly off road with stunning views of the Cairngorms. Spanning over 35km, it might be the longest continuous cycle path I’ve ridden within the UK. The path is not steep but does ascend steadily.
The Drumochter Pass
The Drumochter Pass was the second big climb of the day. At 462m it would be the highest altitude I’d reach today. This is the highest point on the NCN in Scotland and also the highest point on the UK rail network. There was also a bloke from Rochdale up there.
After the climb, I was feeling pretty tired. Time was also getting on – I’d set off from Inverness over 9 hours ago! I’d booked a place to stay in Blair Atholl tonight, which was still 17 miles away. Thankfully the vast majority of the route would be downhill from here, following a valley.
I would go as far as to say that this has been one of the best days of my trip. Though I am sure the nice weather has played a part in that.
Tomorrow it’s more of route 7 and more of the Cairngorms!
River Garry
