This last weekend a small group of us headed into the hills on our bicycles. Our aim was to stay at a bothy, and introduce the kids to the pleasures of bothying.
We chose Duinish as it is away from paddling routes, long distance walks and any Munro's. The choice was a long track climb from Rannoch, or an almost flat track and bog hop from Dalnaspidal. We chose the latter.
A last minute subtraction of two families and the addition of another in the form of some friends from Sheffield.
The English family were stuck in traffic on the border, and so the Scottish based contingent spent a great morning pedalling around Faskally and River Garry - some sweet singletrack and fun despite closed bridges. The plan was to head to the bothy, and I would pedal back out to meet our pals when the traffic released them.
The first group:
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Our route - the bothy is at the far end of the valley.
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LD had clearly filled his rucksack with the kitchen sink, and mini_LD's bag with the spare kitchen sink! Lovely spin along Loch Garry:
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The easy track ends abrubtly, and a more Scottish approach to 'riding' was soon required. Only one over the handlebars into bog...
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After a long slog, including a river crossing, we arrived tired at around 5:30pm at the bothy. Ignore mini_OAB wearing his fleece - it was 20*c, calm and no midges. 8)
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I dumped all my kit out, and headed back with an empty rucsac to collect contingent 2 and more firewood. Thankfully the traffic had eased up, and I arrived back at Dalnaspidal to find them practicing gears and standing up - the 7 year old had managed a few laps of the park before and was on a borrowed bike 😯
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The little lad was a star - loving the riding, and rising to the challenge of some proper Scottish bog gnar by floating over the top where his father and I sank...
When we arrived back, we found the rest of the kids were riding all the drumlins around. Kids on bikes rock. 8)
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BothyLife was led according to the clock on the wall - Duinish time was permanently at ten to eight...
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At the back of 11pm we headed for bed - it did not get much darker than this, and was light again by 3am:
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Teenagers are not at their best in the morning:
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A lazy morning in a stunning location- packing, eating and riding more bikes (plus taking pictures for eldest_OAB's art exam piece.
Still no midges. 😛
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A good clean and sign of the bothy book - there have been less than 10 parties sign the book this year here. A sign of how quiet it is.
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We bog hopped our way out again, until at the track end and waterfall, it was 'taps aff' in the heat. The geocache hunt started.
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The stream was paddled in and the waterfall climbed.
We had three geocaches on the way out, and all three were collected successfully. Many (ever larger) stones were lobbed in at the Rannoch outflow pipe. Once more it was 20*c, calm and no midges. Scotland at its best.
GPS checking
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We ended up back the cars, to find our final cache. While adult loaded the car, some other found the local stream!
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Scotland put on it's finest weather for us - and I think we have converted the next generation of bothy_rats. Some properly great memories for the adults, and the children.
Even better, the smallest lad has not stopped asking in three days when he can have an Islabike and come bothying again.... 8)
An awesome adventure!
Sunshine and no midges. A once in a century alignment of the natural forces. That was a result.
Nice work !
Great stuff. One to add to the list
outstanding adventure Matt, nice one.
that looks outstanding, what a fantastic trip, thanks for posting. I'd even be tempted to do something similar, but I just can't shake the midge fear after Fort William...
What a fantastic thing to do with the kids and the weather looked brilliant!
Great photos, thanks for making me envious 😉
Doing outdoor stuff with kids is great. Now my own son is 17 and cool our adventures take the form of longish linear road rides in the Dales using the Settle-Carlisle train to do the upwind bit and enjoying wind assistance the other way but no trip is without some kind of incident, diversion or chance meeting, so it's a teenage version of what you did.
Brilliant family adventure, that's the sort of thing your kids will remember when they get old.
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[quote=hooli ]Brilliant family adventure, that's the sort of thing your kids will remember when they get old.
This ^^^
Excellent stuff.
Proper technicolour memory generator.10/10
Did you meet Tracksterman? He hasn't posted for a while, I expect he was watching from afar, grumbling to himself about neds.
Great stuff 🙂
Just fab! 😀
Somewhere, at some point, my life took a horrible wrong turn away from amazing adventures like that! Lucky with the weather, and looks like you were lucky with the kids as well.
I was going to bore you all with tales of my 9 year old daughters first attempt on the velodrome, but having read that and admired the photos, I'll just crawl off back under my stone....
looks great!! looking forward to my daughters 2 wheeled adventures after a walking bivvy she wants to get there faster!
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Brilliant Matt, I'm inspired!
@Postierich - perhaps we need an STW junior bike packing weekend.... 🙂
McMoonter +1
Awesome thread and pics
There's one on the bear bones forum already - teddy bear bones
How far did the kids ride in the end?
There's one on the bear bones forum already - teddy bear bones
*raises interest*
It wasn't far really - 5miles or so each way