The Alternative John Muir Way
March 2006

	“ There’s no way we’ll get all these bikes into that van, let alone all the rucsacs and food.” The great Dutch expert, Willie M. van-Stuffer was directed to deal with the problem. Within ten minutes, all the bikes, rucsacs and food were in, looking like a rear-end impact of the Tour de France with a village grocery delivery.			Twenty five runners set off for the dunes on the 32 mile Alternative John Muir duathlon. On the shoreline the surf was up on the bead of beaches from Aberlady to Yellowcraig and beyond, with a giant swell grown on a fortnight of north-easterlies (the surf was to get even more impressive around Tantallon). Before Yellowcraig, the sun was out and some were complaining of the heat.
It’s just west of Yellowcraig that the line of the official John Muir Way was screwed up by an accidental alliance between council and developers of the new Archerfield estate. Buyers of the 157 holiday homes, cottages and luxury flats are promised exclusive access to their fenced ghetto and use of two custom-built golf courses, raising two fingers to the new Land Reform Bill.			The boundary of the development (by Caledonian Heritable) will abut onto the high tide line, with a six foot high fence given planning approval by the council (to protect the shore and SSSI - !). But, we’re on the unofficial John Muir Way – so we ignore all this nonsense and carry on.
	At the nine-mile rendezvous with the sag wagon at North Berwick, the none-too-well co-ordinated team was by now elongated over about a mile of shoreline, with the determined mile-eaters totally out of touch with the dolphin-watchers to the rear. A very brief (particularly for the dolphin-watchers) regroup for drink and food had us on the way to the headlands and cliffs of the Tantallon area, with runners scattered vertically over 200ft of crags and steep grass slopes as well as horizontally over a couple of miles of coastline again.			The cliff top traverse past Tantallon Castle provided airy views down onto the Ravensheugh handicap waterjumps – rendered not sensible by trains of giant waves crashing into the base of the cliffs. The fulmars were enjoying the spring sunshine guarding their newly commandeered ledges below the crest of the cliffs.
Boulder hopping to Ravensheugh, the air was smoking with sea spray in the sunshine. Here the gang split up even further.			Bikes were collected (by some) with two alternative mountain bike routes and two alternative runners’ routes to East Linton, one along the Tyne estuary and river, the other through the mixed woodland of the Binning plantation.
	All converged on Preston Mill at 20 miles, with a late lunch and re-group. Lunch was protracted, and we left at 4pm with the sun descending towards the horizon and 12 miles remaining.			The mountain bikers (plus Murdo) followed the riverside path to Hailes Castle. The runners were now depleted into a more select ultra-runners group. Some took the direct ascent of Pencraig Hill through the handily out-of-use archery range.
The route convergence after Pencraig Hill provided an interesting study of mountain bike as optional aid or handicap as we traversed stubble, mud, tussock and tarmac. The runners were lining up to humiliate the bikers.			It was touch and go all the way past Barnes Castle to the Hopetoun Monument across the open grazing of the Garleton Hills. This section provided interesting navigating problems through dense bands of broom.
	After a very dark and spiral ascent of the tower, some attempted to demonstrate extreme bike handling skills on the steep descent to the sag wagon.			Serious injury was averted, with spectacular falls and accidental stunt riding. Here, at 28 miles, the remaining runners were beginning to look ragged, but determined to do the distance
. The bikers were off like bats out of hell down the road, chasing the now-setting sun back to Aberlady.			All finished as it was going dark, and it started pouring down after eight hours of sunshine and balmy Azores air that had been promised a week earlier – very jammy! Much thanks to Tom Harley for provision of the sag wagon and Barbel Burns for the long and handsome lunch.