Sunday’s MTB circuit was a low-key contrast to last week’s Munrofest. Nine of us assembled at the reopened Pressmennan Wood parking clearing after the unnecessary toxic green algae close-down. We enjoyed breaking sunshine and a warm breeze on the long climb over Clint’s Dodd and rough descent to Whiteadder reservoir. This is soon (11 Sept) to be the scene of the Tour of Britain Stage 7 from Hawick to Edinburgh. A brief heavy downpour then delivered the 10% ration of rainfall that the forecast had promised. A steep re-ascent up Sprottylea Rigg took us over the shoulder of Spartleton Hill and back into the sunshine.
A fast rough descent delivered us to the labyrinthine gravelly network of Crystal Rigg windfarm. This needs careful navigation comparable to the Hampton Court maze because there’s only one continuous route through the middle to get you to the other side.
Passing the new switching station for the offshore Neart na Goithe windfarm we raced down the long descent off the plateau, scene of a recent amazing loaded convoy ascent that I had encountered a few weeks ago on its way to its plateau site where it’s assumed no-one will notice it.
There was no such heavy traffic today as we hurtled back down to the lowlands. We left the windfarm roads via a children’s birthday party at a remote hill farm. The children demonstrated their impressive model railway tearing through the grass on an elaborate layout.
A brief road section linked us to the enormous West to East glacial channel that used to drain the southern margin of the Forth valley glacier about 10,000 years ago. This is now a very pretty domain for pheasant rearing for early destruction for entertainment.
We passed the mysterious disappearing Knock Loch, sadly in its summer disappeared mode this time.
A beak shaped overhang is another legacy of this glacier scoured landscape.
40km + 800m ascent
Garry, Gio, Jamie T, Joanne T, Kathy H, Lorna, Richard W, Willie M, Keith.
Keith Burns