We've talked about touring Scotland many times our little group and I but always seemed to head over the channel to Europe or latterly across to Ireland ( 3 years in succession) for a mini break, this year we were short of options so Scotland won.
Day 1 Friday 9th July ;
To Lockerbie, chosen as a as good a place as any to begin the tour properly and fairly equidistant between the 4 of us travelling from the South, Dave from North London, Oscar from Newbury and Sean and I met and set off from Cardiff, Johnny was setting off from Leeds area and would meet us at the hotel, at around 330 miles we made good progress and were at the hotel early afternoon having visited the memorial site on the way.
Sean and I stopped at a services for a refuel and a coffee
Nearing the Hotel, soft luggage and a tank bag-travelling light, sort of......
We visited the monument to the lost, very sobering
And enjoyed a meal, a few drinks and some banter at the hotel.
We stayed the Sure Hotel Best Western Lockerbie rooms were good, service was good as was the food, lots to recommend it but don't ask if they were "biker friendly" as I don't know what that means
Day 2;
Dave wanted to see the Falkirk wheel I wanted to see The Kelpies and the Forth Bridge, we were then headed to the Cairngorms as I had seen Johnny mention it on here recently and thought it worth a look.
Visit completed we rode the short distance to our next attraction The Kelpies, as we arrived a large group of patch club bikes were waved through the entrance, we tagged on with them, it later transpired that they had paid collectively and probably paid for us to park too As it was very busy and very hot we took a few pics and departed.
After a coffee stop, Starbucks of course, we all rode into the car park standing on the pegs-Not! We motored on to South Queensferry and were treated to a great view of "The Bridge"
That's a box well and truly ticked for me
We ate at the biker cafe nearby and whilst they were running out of options for food they served us with a very passable ham salad roll and only accepted what little cash/change I had in my pocket, great service biker mates
Onwards and upwards we pressed on up the ski area at Glenshee where another coffee stop was in order.
The route looked very inviting
The weather gods had been looking after us but it began to rain as we neared Balmoral, we stopped for a pic as one of us in particular is a fan of Her Maj and the fam
I swapped gloves to the wet weather versions we all zipped up and pressed on to the hotel at Tarland in biblical rain
We stayed at the Commercial hotel, bikes were stored around the back out of sight, the rooms were clean and comfortable and the food and ale were top notch, recommended
Day 3; We had a leisurely breakfast and waited for the rain to abate, which it didn't so we set off around 9.30 for what should be a day of around 180 miles we headed into the Cairngorms and went via Strathdon where we stopped for a pic or two the rain had now stopped
We were soon back on the road and what a road it was.........
We made a detour towards Loch Ness (as one does) the rain had returned but Nessie remained elusive.
Somehow we had lost Johnny temporarily so stopped here to wait and take in the view, probably the A837 between Lairg and Ledmore
We soon regrouped and pressed on to Ullapool where some of us ate
We bade farewell to Johnny who was staying nearby unable to get a room at our place The Summer Isles Hotel, we pressed on, the roads were great and largely free of traffic apart from the odd dawdling motorhome, the views became ever more spectacular so we stopped for a pic or two
We turned off the main road (I use the term loosely) and started along a single track road with passing places the 10 or so miles to our hotel for the night, we had been advised this would take around 45 mins and so it turned out !
What a beautiful and peaceful place this is, although I imagine it loses some of it's charm in the winter
Pretty soon we were checked in and showered and went in search of refreshments
It was around the time of our 3rd pint that a member of staff announced that the hotel wouldn't be showing the Euros final tonight as they didn't have a tv.......oh how I laughed I don't care a jot about football but poor Sean was distraught ! Luckily for him he has a mate with an i pad and I set it up at the dinner table and cheered the Italians the whole game
At about 22.45 I went outside to take a pic of the late sunset
To be continued..........
Day 1 Friday 9th July ;
To Lockerbie, chosen as a as good a place as any to begin the tour properly and fairly equidistant between the 4 of us travelling from the South, Dave from North London, Oscar from Newbury and Sean and I met and set off from Cardiff, Johnny was setting off from Leeds area and would meet us at the hotel, at around 330 miles we made good progress and were at the hotel early afternoon having visited the memorial site on the way.
Sean and I stopped at a services for a refuel and a coffee
Nearing the Hotel, soft luggage and a tank bag-travelling light, sort of......
We visited the monument to the lost, very sobering
And enjoyed a meal, a few drinks and some banter at the hotel.
We stayed the Sure Hotel Best Western Lockerbie rooms were good, service was good as was the food, lots to recommend it but don't ask if they were "biker friendly" as I don't know what that means
Day 2;
Dave wanted to see the Falkirk wheel I wanted to see The Kelpies and the Forth Bridge, we were then headed to the Cairngorms as I had seen Johnny mention it on here recently and thought it worth a look.
Visit completed we rode the short distance to our next attraction The Kelpies, as we arrived a large group of patch club bikes were waved through the entrance, we tagged on with them, it later transpired that they had paid collectively and probably paid for us to park too As it was very busy and very hot we took a few pics and departed.
After a coffee stop, Starbucks of course, we all rode into the car park standing on the pegs-Not! We motored on to South Queensferry and were treated to a great view of "The Bridge"
That's a box well and truly ticked for me
We ate at the biker cafe nearby and whilst they were running out of options for food they served us with a very passable ham salad roll and only accepted what little cash/change I had in my pocket, great service biker mates
Onwards and upwards we pressed on up the ski area at Glenshee where another coffee stop was in order.
The route looked very inviting
The weather gods had been looking after us but it began to rain as we neared Balmoral, we stopped for a pic as one of us in particular is a fan of Her Maj and the fam
I swapped gloves to the wet weather versions we all zipped up and pressed on to the hotel at Tarland in biblical rain
We stayed at the Commercial hotel, bikes were stored around the back out of sight, the rooms were clean and comfortable and the food and ale were top notch, recommended
Day 3; We had a leisurely breakfast and waited for the rain to abate, which it didn't so we set off around 9.30 for what should be a day of around 180 miles we headed into the Cairngorms and went via Strathdon where we stopped for a pic or two the rain had now stopped
We were soon back on the road and what a road it was.........
We made a detour towards Loch Ness (as one does) the rain had returned but Nessie remained elusive.
Somehow we had lost Johnny temporarily so stopped here to wait and take in the view, probably the A837 between Lairg and Ledmore
We soon regrouped and pressed on to Ullapool where some of us ate
We bade farewell to Johnny who was staying nearby unable to get a room at our place The Summer Isles Hotel, we pressed on, the roads were great and largely free of traffic apart from the odd dawdling motorhome, the views became ever more spectacular so we stopped for a pic or two
We turned off the main road (I use the term loosely) and started along a single track road with passing places the 10 or so miles to our hotel for the night, we had been advised this would take around 45 mins and so it turned out !
What a beautiful and peaceful place this is, although I imagine it loses some of it's charm in the winter
Pretty soon we were checked in and showered and went in search of refreshments
It was around the time of our 3rd pint that a member of staff announced that the hotel wouldn't be showing the Euros final tonight as they didn't have a tv.......oh how I laughed I don't care a jot about football but poor Sean was distraught ! Luckily for him he has a mate with an i pad and I set it up at the dinner table and cheered the Italians the whole game
At about 22.45 I went outside to take a pic of the late sunset
To be continued..........