Edinburgh/Central Scotland folks – inspire me to ride

I like a good dump me – of snow that is – but the amount we've had and the current weather is just putting me off getting out there.

So, what is it to be on Sunday? Are there some trails that are actually rideable – and which don't involve wading through knee-deep wet snow? Do I commit to a road ride, but have to stick to main/busy cleared roads?

What prod up the arse can you give me to make sure I don't waste another day at home?

If you go for a ride you can then eat a huge curry without getting fat?

i'm road riding tomorrow in stirling…free?

Whaddya mean your not pit bitching for TJ!

dirtygirlonabike – Member
i'm road riding tomorrow in stirling…free?

Nah – but thanks for the offer (see below).

I'd be interested in your route and, more importantly, road conditions though 🙂

geoffj – Member
Whaddya mean your not pit bitching for TJ!

That was the plan but I have a dying father, ailing mother to deal with at the moment. Tomorrow is hospice visit, mums shopping and mums house-work day. I believe she also has a few small house maintenance tasks lined up for me 🙂

I'll be out both days, prob on the CX bike on a mix of canal path and road round Falkirk, ice and snow all round I expect but I guess it doesn't matter where I go I'll be cold and wet.

No point in proper off road just now as everywhere seems to be an icerink and I'm not convinced that I'd feel entirely safe on the road with the state of some peoples driving recently.

I'll be out both days, prob on the CX bike on a mix of canal path and road round Falkirk, ice and snow all round I expect but I guess it doesn't matter where I go I'll be cold and wet.

No point in proper off road just now as everywhere seems to be an icerink and I'm not convinced that I'd feel entirely safe on the road with the state of some peoples driving recently.

That was the plan but I have a dying father, ailing mother to deal with at the moment. Tomorrow is hospice visit, mums shopping and mums house-work day. I believe she also has a few small house maintenance tasks lined up for me

I feel bad now, sorry 🙁
The roads aren't too bad up here, could potentially make for an interesting CX bike outing.

sorry that hear that onion 🙁 *hugs* i will report back via text on the conditions – doing a route from larbert/stirling over to kippen/kintry. i've been told its okay but not checked in yet.

this snow / ice is a real pain. i've not been out on the bike for weeks, am fed up of the turbo and treadmill, so braving a run outside today and the ride tomorrow. beginning to go a bit crazy having to train indoors all the time when i want to be outside!

am just back in from cycling in perthshire dg. wet snow, loads of drag, ugly cycling. no fun. i'm about to go back on the trainer to get the frustration out of my head.

Hey – don't feel bad for me. I'm feeling shit enough for all of us 😉

CX bike you say……..and that nice Hakkalugi hanging up in the shop too…..

dgoab – do let me know what it's like. And I emphasise with the not getting out bit. I don't have your determination to make me exercise indoors either.

The forecast is reasonably good Colin – BBC Optimism

I'd be doing some 'all-weather' routes up by (puke – phantoms – up maidens – harlaw – beech ave – Green – loganlea – castlelaw road) where walkers may have compacted a track, if my 'kin rear hub recovers from it's freezing treatment. OK, Phantoms ain't exactly weatherproof, but is well tramped already.
Failing that, probably go for a couple of road-hours 'lapping' Balerno – that is, up the climb by Rosebank, over to Balerno on the back road, up top of beech avenue, back down to main road + repeat to fade…. Good climb training, IMO.
Gimme a 'mail if you feel like it. 1st chance for me to get my shiny new helmet out in public too!

robgarrioch – Member

Gimme a 'mail if you feel like it. 1st chance for me to get my shiny new helmet out in public too!

You've been polishing your helmet?

Doesn't everyone?
I did ask the S.O. to do it, but she was on the Wii at the time…

I've been feeling the same about bikey stuff as the snow in Peebles has been quite extreme compared to what I'm used to – so I've dusted the cobwebs off my walking boots and gone for a few strolls – maybe do that instead?? I went a short ride this morning in the forests and it's still a PITA – so I'll wait another week…..

Cross bike tyres work quite well on the backroads too 😉

how about this?

eck where is that??

Colin – have you figured out your Sony Alpha camera yet? Fancy a photoshoot type mess about on Sunday? We can pull some MBUK/MBR faces for the camera, arse about in the snow – would be a laugh.

EDIT: Er, it's not meant to be as gay as that sounds… 😉

road-riding in these conditions seem like madness to me. nobhead drivers + potential black ice = ??

Rob, Phantom's and Maiden's weren't really going last Saturday, dunno how much snow you've had since! I did see some skiers heading up Phantom's on Saturday so that should have compressed it more.

I would stick to the lower stuff in the trees, could make a decent run out of Torduff, Clubbiedean, Pistachio, Harlaw, Balerno and back via the water of leith

ok, so it wasn't edinburgh area, but we do live in edinburgh… we were just about to finally make it to the lairig leacach bothy, to the south of spean bridge. we'd come from corrour via a night in the staoineag bothy. bit of an epic in the snow anyway…

Swello – Member
I've been feeling the same about bikey stuff as the snow in Peebles has been quite extreme compared to what I'm used to – so I've dusted the cobwebs off my walking boots and gone for a few strolls – maybe do that instead?? I went a short ride this morning in the forests and it's still a PITA – so I'll wait another week…..

Cross bike tyres work quite well on the backroads too

A walk isn't out of the question.

Nice to see the Toscana is getting some use. Don't drop it in the snow though – you might never find it again 😉

Kit – Member
Colin – have you figured out your Sony Alpha camera yet? Fancy a photoshoot type mess about on Sunday? We can pull some MBUK/MBR faces for the camera, arse about in the snow – would be a laugh.

EDIT: Er, it's not meant to be as gay as that sounds…

Believe me – that sounds VERY gay. TBH – I think I need some good, long, hard…….exercise.

Well, how about you go up and down a few times for me while I snap furiously – you'll be puffing away in no time 😯

Has anyone been up in the pentlands for the last couple of days? Big thaw on today, so the snow that was left has gone Evil, wet and slushy and constantly on the move. I know a lot of the trails will be in a horrible state but I'm thinking I might just knock off a couple of maiden's-green cleugh-threipmuir-harlaw laps since that's almost all surfaced or rocky. But I gather Maiden's was a bit interesting last week, we watched 2 poor souls carrying up it from the Harlaw side…

PS I hope our ice monolith at harlaw hasn't thawed away…

Eck, what was your route and how much of it was rideable?

Anyone else, how rideable are the Pentlands trails just now? I've been up a few times in the last few weeks and it's been great riding in the snow. However my suspicion is that there could be loads of ice tomorrow which is a bit crappy.

Post up if you're lapping around on Sunday NW – might break out a working bike & head up; looks like being 'dryer' / calmer than Saturday

Few of us heading out to the lowlands of East Lothian on Sunday for a ride that should take in a good mix of woodland, singletrack, John Muir Way… and beach.

I'll report back at lunch tomorrow on trail conditions. Gee-ing up for a slushy slidey ride…

I biked to work (Edinburgh to Dunfermline) for the first time in about a month and had to get off and walk a couple of times. The roads were clear but it was the footpath / bike only sections that were lethal, the combination of melt water over polished ice was not fun on skinny slicks!

I would think most road routes would be looking ok by the weekend if it stays mild and windy.

Will do Rob, don't really have any plans as yet but tomorrow looks a bit blustery so I might just lock myself in the garage and build up my rigid.

Well I looked at the weather at 8 this morning and thought "f*ck this" and went back to bed 😀

Could be up for a ride tomorrow though, depending on start time – I finish work tonight at 1am, so probably couldn't meet anytime before 12ish…

Looking up into the hills from here (top of Currie) the lower slopes up as far as pistachio/harlaw should be fairly open I reckon. But the higher hills are still pretty white, so if they've had much thaw it might be a bit iffy. Didn't actually bother to ride anywhere today though so that's as close as I got.

>we were just about to finally make it to the lairig leacach bothy,<

Respect…

Word from folk that were out today is that the Canal and Water of leith paths were unrideable with compacted ice covered in water. Can't imagine anywhere higher up being any better so don't get your hopes up!!

http://s2.excoboard.com/exco/thread.php?forumid=49727&threadid=2156456

Going to meet a buddy for a pre-work ride at 9am from Harlaw (he's working, not me!). If anyone's heading in / after a ground report, I'm on o776six5five352o (probably be around for a couple of hours, if conditions allow… 🙄 )

Count me out for tomorrow.

We were out around Milngavie today. It was a massive slippy icefest and I nearly died about 10 times slipping onto my head. Fun though when the rain started and the ice sheets became ice sheets with rivers flowing down them…

Get out, it's always worth it!

Probably too late for the weekend, but if anyone's out tomorrow… Pistachio Way, best avoided obviously, until May 😉 Bottom half is a sea of mud and slush, even the diversion over the log is messed up. Top half is fine as usual. Climb up maidens didn't look like much fun so I went to Harlaw instead, most of the harlaw singletrack is spot on, some you'd think it was the middle of summer. Nail Trail, the east-west bit that runs beside the road is fantastic, except for some localised mud, the stretch down to balerno is very muddy in places and icy in others, rideable but probably best not to. All the link roads and paths are still icy/slushy/occasionally snowy so hard work.

Oh, and the water of leith path from balerno to currie is evil in places, lots of water on ice, I almost had the rear overtake me even without brakes at one point. Be very careful… Mostly it's fine but the bad bits don't look so different to the grippy bits.

(I bumped into a feller on an Inbred, he was walking down from Pistachio while I rode up. He stopped me and said "Don't bother, nothing's rideable up there" "Really?" I said.. "Yup, it's all exactly like this, unridable". "Um, thanks, I appear to be riding on it though". Felt a bit like a mint sauce cartoon)