Diary - Day 12

I awoke to find that our tent was as I suspected quite waterproof. Unfortunately the campsite wasn't and we had to pack everything away in the wet which is never particulalry enjoyable. We cycled on into Carlisle and out the other side on a national cycle route towards Longtown. The weather was frankly miserable again and the wind was starting to blow as we headed towards Gretna. We spent most of the day travelling north or north-west and today was the day that a week of strong north-easterlies started blowing. This was not good news.

In Longtown and Gretna we tried to stop twice at cafes only to find them closed for some reason, but found one eventually that was open. Weirdly it seemed to be an old woman's house with the front-room made into a cafe of sorts. We stopped long enough to get her chairs wet and to eat a nasty microwaved sausage and bacon sarney before heading out into the drizzle once more.


The rest of the day was spent mostly on the B7076 which runs alongside the M74. It was certainly enjoyable for it's lack of traffic and the fact that it is a fairly quick route with undulations rather than steep hills. Unfortunately the wind was keeping the speed down and the weather in general, although it didn't rain too much, keeping enjoyment pretty low. The first half of the stretch along this road was not the greatest scenery, although it would be decent enough on a clear day. It picked up a little after we stopped for a late lunch in Moffat.

Moffat itself seemed a pretty vibrant place and we stopped for lunch in a large cafe with a few screaming kids nearby. The only reason we ended up here was that we had tried to pick up food in a service station a few miles back but I refused to pay the ludicrous prices on food there; £3.50 for packaged sarnies and the like. We were pretty hungry by the time we did sit down for food halfway through the afternoon and tucked in happily.

The first bouns of our detour was that the A701 and then the B719 out of Moffat back to the motorway took us through the most interesting countryside of the day, albeit it up and over a sizeable hill. This was certainly prefferable to the crappy route we had been following and it was a shame to return, although the descent where we were able to look down on the motorway from well above was quite interesting. For that short period the wind became a side issue as it smashed itself against hills rather than having a free run into us.



The second bonus was that Sam found a fiver in the town centre making him richer than he was before by infinity percent.

Eventually we left the motorway route and headed across country towards Lanark. The weather had picked up slightly in the afternoon and the wind had dropped a little as well so the last few miles through some pretty countryside was quite enjoyable except for the fact that we were cream-crackered. Unfortunately when we arrived in Lanark there was a nasty hill to climb in order to get into the town. We would climb this same hill again a couple of weeks later - noticeably I was unable to stay with Sam up this climb due to the slowness of his ascending and my own impatience, whereas when we returned I was able to follow him up so there must have been strides made in fitness. The cross/head-wind had taken it out of us today and we had decided to head for the youth hostel in New Lanark.



Bit of a surprise when we located the hostel. New Lanark is a world heritage site and it is worth visiting if you are going to be in the area. The village is actually the brainchild of 18th century entrepreneur Robert Owen who built a large cotton mill as well as the village itself to accomodate his workers. It has been well restored and looks fantastic (regardless of the weather). There is also some excellent waterfalls close by. The youth hostel is one of the old living areas and was nice enough that we chose to come back to it later on the trip - the only place we visited twice.


We needed feeding after showering and sorting out our stuff. A Wetherspoons at the top of the hill seemed like a sensible idea. Yes, I know it's a bit of sacrilege on a tour involving quality ales and breweries to end up in a Wetherspoons but we also had a budget to think about and you can't beat these chain pubs for filling up quickly for cheap. Three courses were ploughed through and a variety of cheap beers and ciders indulged as well (including an Exmoor Gold, brewed 10 miles from Sam's house and drunk by him 500 miles from home). Feeling stuffed and happy we rolled out of the pub at about 9:30. On the step as we exited was a tenner, crisp and lonely, and the race was on to pick it up. Unfortunately for me Sam was about a foot ahead and my ability to bend was inhibited by the swelling of my stomach. Another financial victory for young Sam and he now stood £15 in profit after 10 hours in Scotland, a pretty good ratio really.

An hour later we were heading for bed, tired and happy.