Bettyhill

27/5/15

We said farewell to Viv and Ashe and promised to visit their tea room in St Minver in North Cornwall towards the end of our journey.

It is my fault that we went back to Bettyhill in one day. The concept of spending several days unwinding our clockwise progress did not appeal so I just thought it seemed a good idea at the time.

The day was appalling, winds were lighter than yesterday but against us of course. The rain came at 2pm and continued until we arrived at, the appropriately named, Farr B&B at about 5:30pm. I was more exhausted than I can ever remember being, similar to the end of day one of a mountain marathon having not done sufficient training.

Our first stop was back in Thurso where I decided to buy another chain. I got the bike shop man to check our chains, he was appalled at how dirty they were, rubbing his fingers together, he said sand. This brought back memories of Crosby beach and the horizontal sand blasting we received. It appears that I have not been carrying nearly enough chains. He went on to tell us that the Germans, with Rohloff bikes like ours, carry three. One on, one being cleaned and one spare! I agree on this system for underpants, but chains?

We gave ourselves another radiation dose passing Dounreay and stopped at a familiar bench to eat cheese and oatcakes. We had used the same spot a few days ago, it was outside Reay cemetery.

As we sat there a procession of under 10's passed by clutching their bikes, high viz jackets and helmets tightly fastened. We must have seemed somewhat scary with our monster cycles loaded up with far too much stuff and stuffing our faces in full view of their ancestors.

The children were followed by 2 teachers with clipboards who quickly moved them on. As we cycled into town we saw the adults in the middle of the road beckoning each petrified youngster to boldly exit a side road onto the truck thundering A836. Necessary skill acquisition I am sure but scary for the little ones I imagine.

The entertainment for the day was over and now we just had 4 Big Hills to climb which Sue had abbrieviated to BH and one additional BBH. We stopped at the Hallidale Inn for soup and tea and chatted to the landlord from Essex. The rest is just a blur and, as you can see, the camera did not come out much/at all.

Lesley greeted us with tea and sympathy and cooked us a feast.

Figures:

Distance:- 65.3 km

Cycle Time:-  5 hours 2 minutes

Average speed:- 12.9 kph

Total Distance:- 2972 km