Ben Alder circuit for Birthdayboy Bawheed
August 24th, 2010 • Mountainbiking • Misha
I fist met Somhairle at playschool almost 3 decades ago. Since then he’s had a few nicknames (although not nearly as many as Spad it must be said), but we’ve remained friends none-the-less. In a celebration of the start of his 30th year in existence the three of us took off for a circumnavigation of one of Scotland’s most-difficult to get to Munros, Ben Alder. The forecast might’ve looked crap, but as the adage goes – you snooze you loose – so on we went despite the fact snoozing was pretty tempting at half six in the morning. It stayed a bawhair off crap all day as we picked our way through Glens, over the the bealuchs, through bogs, around lochs under mountains fixing punctures while eating Haribo and sitting looking at the wilderness. We found some twisted aircraft metal on our way through Bealach Dubh before the descent into the glen. Ben Alder bothy in the sunshine was a rare place to be where we sat chatting to a Liverpudlian, who we met a few times on the way round, before tramping up and over Sron Bealach Beithe with our tyres sinking frustratingly into the bog when the path was just getting under way. But we’d paid our dues, and the descents reminded me yet again how good it is to be on two wheels in the wilderness. One crash from the now expert crashist Bawheed and three punctures courtesy of the drainage ditches (and some miss-timed bunny hops) kept us in our place. Back at the pub Fash n Chaps n a shandy sorted us out before the Citroen took us the backroads home three muddy bikes stuffed in the boot – HAPPY BIRTHDAY BAWHEED!
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