John here:
We’re in the heart of the Scottish Borders. In addition to just making it to our next stop, the highlight of the day’s agenda was going to be a revisit to the marvellous Great Tapestry of Scotland (described here on our visit last spring).
We had a beautiful ride south from Newcraighall on a one lane, hillside road that ran parallel to the Borders Railway which connects Edinburgh to Galashiels and Tweedbank. The railway was built in 1849, but closed in 1969 during the railway consolidations. Thankfully, with public pressure, the line was reopened Sept 9 2015 with Queen Elizabeth II on board celebrating the day she became the longest reigning monarch in British history. The road we were on, the ‘Stage Route’, no doubt predated the highway and the railway we looked down on at the bottom of the valley. There were many ups and downs, and twists and turns made for an entertaining and beautiful ride.
About an hour into the ride Patti discovered that her phone charger wasn’t working. Not a big deal, except that we use GPS on our phones and knowing where you are is a good idea. So…. fixed that. In a very picturesque setting.
We rode through many beautiful farms.
We checked in to the Kingsknowes Hotel in Galashiels at the end of our 53 kilometre ride. It’s a popular venue for weddings and, on this particular day, for funeral luncheons. There were spectacular gardens, and a greenhouse where funeral guests were obviously having some memorable discussions.
Once we dumped our panniers and cleaned up a bit we had planned to ride back into town for the repeat visit to The Great Tapestry of Scotland.
About 100m down the road my trike became unrideable; the pedals would not turn smoothly. We turned back fearing mechanical or electrical nightmares, but, as it turned out, the problem was simply that one of the plastic tubes guiding the chain had been chewed by the chain!!! The solution was to break the chain and remove the tube.
Easy.
BUT – unfortunately, the chain connector link was snapped in two.
I was lucky to discover that, but unfortunately the spare connector links we had on hand would not work. Patti Googled “bike repair shops near me” and found a nearby shop. The hotel summoned a taxi for us. “Abraham Roys”, the proud East Indian owner of two – !!! – taxis in Galashiels ferried us to the bike shop where, while Patti waited in the car with Abraham, the female owner of the repair shop checked the model number of the chain and sold us two or three possible links. Abraham drove us back to the hotel and gave us a great summary of his favourite places to visit in the Borders.
Yahoo – one of the links worked. Our show-stopper broken chain dilemma was over.
We postponed our Tapestry visit until the morning, and added to our GPS route for the next day in a drop-in to the Melrose Abbey (recommended by Abraham. Honestly, the best ambassador for Borders sites and living). We enjoyed a relaxed dinner at the hotel, extremely relieved that the trikes were once again operable.
The next morning, after a hearty breakfast and a questionable weather forecast, we set out for the Tapestry revisit.
Once again, fantastic. My little discovery was a tapestry that had a small crescent moon in the top corner. It turns out that Neil Armstrong died during the creation of that tapestry panel, and that Neil’s ancestry was Scottish. Neil had visited Scotland to discover his background, and that fact was captured by this tapestry. The Great Tapestry of Scotland is full of interesting tributes like this. The history of Scotland is one that more people should know about: these people have made so many important contributions to the world as we know it.
The ride from Galashiels to Melrose Abbey was interesting: it’s obviously a wealthy village – many stately homes – and then south of there it’s horse and estate country. The Abbey is stately, beautiful, and Patti was interested to see the grave of one of the many Dukes of Buccleough. Patti’s mother’s father’s (honestly, it’s complicated) ancestors came from nearby Jedburgh, and the one who left Scotland had been employed as a gardener for one of the dukes.
This is the grave of someone remarkable. But do you think we could actually understand what the guide was saying? Not a chance.
From Melrose Abbey we continued our ride south, alternating between glimpses of sun and misty rain, always fighting a fairly stiff wind out of the south-west.
We rode through a forest where there were these curious blue tubs, always paired with black, metallic devices. It turns out, according to the hikers we met further along the road, that those are grouse and partridge feeding devices. The estate owners’ grounds keepers place the feeders low, then progressively through the season approaching hunt season, move the feeders to the top of the hill. Presumably people then pay a lot of money to be a part of the grouse and partridge hunts. For now, those birds – and, really, they’re pretty daft – are skipping along the roads just in front of us.
The cycling app chose a perfect route, mostly on single-lane, farm roads, very pungent with freshly spread manure. The Scottish Borders are hilly! We had fantastic descents – Patti loves coasting – and earned back the altitude many times. Large sheep-populated hills loomed in the distance. And there were some significant cattle (read, “lazy bulls”) lounging in the sunshine.
We finally arrived in Bonchester Bridge, a tiny Scottish Borders hamlet. The proprietor of the ‘Horse and Hound’, an Australian expat, welcomed us. Our wee room is indeed wee, so we’ve installed ourselves in the main floor pub to write this blog after showering to warm up. We just listened to a delivery man share an absolutely indecipherable bunch of words with our host. Who knows what he said!!!
We have one more night in Scotland, and it will hurt to leave it. One more day for tatties and ‘neeps, haggis, Scrambled Eggs with Smoke Salmon, and “tablet”.