I won’t pretend to be a virgin when it comes to riding my bike down mountains in Scotland, but i do love riding there and hearing about other peoples trials and tribulations.
Please wax lyrical about your Scottish wanderings, or just maybe inspire with photos of your adventures, any outlandish descents you would like to tell us about, i won’t tell honest. 😀

I took TJ up the Pentlands the other week, it was beautiful.

Ha ha the infamous TJ, Black hill on a tandem. Never ridden in the Pentlands where are the good bits.

There aren’t any (well, certainly not at the moment as it’s all a bit of a mudfest).

Depends what you mean by good bits.

druidh please play ball, summer is on the horizon 🙁

fergal – Member
druidh please play ball, summer is on the horizon

Not on mine it ain’t. Black Hill currently looks cold, dark and wet 😥

I’d say the most fun trails are scattered fairly randomly over the Pentlands.

No mountains in the Pentlands for a start.

There would be if we built a 21 metre high cairn on Scald Law.

Go to this issue and there is the article i wrote about a bit of touring in the mountains. Kintail is an epic place to ride.

And from last weekend.
See this thread.

Whose was the post about biking as many munros as possible? Started with some stunning photos of Ben Lomond. Was that you Dan?

I’ve written a few stories on here, start here and follow the link at the top back to the start

http://www.singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/cape-wrath-saga-the-final-days-kinlochbervie-to-durness-via-cape-wrath

The Pentlands must rank fairly low down on the list of Scottish Mountain Odysseys, but we must be thankful for what we have etc.

I reckon the climb from Spital farm to the Borestane is the best trail in the entire Pentland hills, and I recommend it to wee Fergal when the weather improves.

Proper mountains please, who brought up the pentlands!

by the way i don’t read singletrack, way to niche for moi.

CLICK HERE

Oh yeah photo’s of Ben Lomond would be nice, had the pleasure, but so enjoyable it’s nice to be reminded of the stunning riding.

Kbrembo thats more like it, cheers.

13thfloormonk fantastic blogging, followed your expedition during the summer, real inspiration to get out into the wilds and think outside the box.

Some more pics

13floor, Ben lomond wasn’t me but plans are definitely afoot for linking some bits I’ve found out about recently with some wel known routes.

Made a bit of a solo effort last year here – Loch Maree & Letterewe. Only after being shown the true spirit by Mr. 13thFM though…

Kbrembo Torridon what can i say, nice looking wheels too 🙂

Kbrembo, cracking pics. I recognise that Nicolai, do you ride Golspie and live in the Inverness area?

The Torridon/Achneschellach circuit has to be the best in the UK. Awesome combination of riding and scenery

Annat descent by CaptainMainwaring1, on Flickr

Chippbutty…

Yip that would be me!

Captain Mainwaring…link/onfo please…do-able as a weekender?

Pike

I’m guessing thats the one in Kenny F Wilsons book. About 60km, doable in a day.

Fort William World Cup…. Greg Minnar less than 1 min before his start

Glen Bogle Beach

Loch Muick

Cairngorm Circuit

Jocks road. There is just about to be a bit of walking…..

Devils Staircase

Kenny Wilson’s “Walks With My Mountain Bike”

Torridon, up from Coulags

Kenny Wilson’s “Walks With My Mountain Bike”

😆

Ben Avon

Coming down from a Big Mac

River Avon crossing

Earn your descents boys

Very lo-fi maps of routes around Torridon here – Torridon Circuit Google Maps.
Parking at NG958569, then a mile or 2 north on the road to start the Coulin circuit. Hoping to do it once or twice this year myself…

Some years ago a former workmate of mine and a friend did the full round of the Munros one summer by, or maybe with, MTB. There is a photo of them climbing the Innaccessible Pinnicle in Skye.

He had a nice print in his house of him abseiling off the short side of the Pinn with his bike over his shoulder. I think the bike he used was a rigid Rockhopper.

http://www.john.macpherson.btinternet.co.uk/fullimagepeopleg.html

The weather took a turn for the worse by Pimpmaster Jazz, on Flickr

Say no more….

I reckon the climb from Spital farm to the Borestane is the best trail in the entire Pentland hills, and I recommend it to wee Fergal when the weather improves.

I’m not convinced any climb could be a best trail – but perhaps that’s just me! My favourite trail in the Pentlands is the Nail Trail, followed by Black Hill – both off-limits when the ground is this wet though.

The only proper mountain I’ve mountain biked on was Mount Keen. Bit of a slog getting up there – but certainly the longest, fastest descent I’ve ever done!

ir-bandito

What route was that you took?

Messiah

As ever, pics to inspire and make me want to ride the Cairngorms. Have you any more pics e.g. Braeriach, Lochnagar etc?

The MacDui route in the current issue is an absolute belter for a summer day with a bit of everything. I can highly recommend it.

Plans are afoot to try a bigger loop taking in Feshie over to Braemar and back via Falls of Avon and Bynack Mor as a Spring or early summer day ride

Right, now one for experts.

Where the heck is this bit of trail in the linked pic below?

I can’t find Eagles Coire on the map. Any ideas of a rough location. It looks magic!

Cheers

Sanny

I’m not convinced any climb could be a best trail – but perhaps that’s just me! My favourite trail in the Pentlands is the Nail Trail, followed by Black Hill – both off-limits when the ground is this wet though.

It’s true that one of the drawbacks to the Borestane this way round is that the descent off the other side towards yellowbrick road is fairly ordinary. So you do a lovely sustained climb, nice out-in-the hills feeling, but the DH rewards are scant.

Haha! Finally learning the meaning of Gaelic hill names has payed off.

‘Eagle’ is ‘Iolaire’, and I remembered a ‘Coire na h-Iolaire’ near Bynack Mor. A little search on geograph…

http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/229252

Over 10yrs ago I did a route from a book called “Scottish Mountain Bike Rides” or words to that effect. It started about 7 miles east of Ben Nevis, climbed on forestry track for 5 miles or so reaching one of the remote train stations north of Rannoch Moor, it was then some pretty awesome singletrack which dropped me out behind the back of Ben Nevis (due south) eventually by a river which we had to cross. Several miles later we ended up in Kinlochleven. This was about 30 mile in all if I recollect – it is a one way ride – i have to say it was fantastic – it was a bluebird day and very remote and not boggy like Ranoch Moor (apart from one 30 min section)

Some great pics and stories.

Sanny Braeriach really is an enigma, would love to know whether that descent north is a goer, will be up in those parts in may so will hopefully find gold in them there hills.

Sanny, it was an attempt at the classic Cairngorms circuit a couple of years ago. For logistical reasons, we started at Tomintoul, but as we climbed the sides of Cullardoch, the weather closed in. We were saved, literally, by a pre-programmed gps. Found our way to the shooting hut on Bealach Dearg here

Home, the morning after by Pimpmaster Jazz, on Flickr

Too much snow the following morning to carry on, so we pushed back down the hill, and went and stayed in a B&B in Aviemore for a couple of days and took on some low-level riding instead. But we’ll be back…