Thursday, February 28, 2008

A touch of spring


















Coltsfoot near Stair 27th Feb

Failford to Stair yesterday in clear skies felt like spring and as if to prove it we came across a blooming clotsfoot by the river near Stair.
According to a web source the leaves can be used as a herbal remedy for coughs. Could have done with that last week.

Today Anne and I went over to Castle Semple for a walk.
It was surprisingly cool beside the loch until we got into Parkhill Wood, the birds were singing, the sun was shining and there were even a bunch of kids out mountain biking.
We had lunch at Craigmiles and then Anne dropped me off at Hunterston so that I could walk over Goldenberry home.
Well it was lovely! snowdrops, and daffodils in Hunterston estate and warm sunshine along Seamill beach.
Took a few photos along the way and have put them together with one or two others on to flickr, view them here.

PS I seem to be having trouble uploading to jumpcut so maybe it won't work out, shame it looked like it may have been interesting.

Wednesday, February 27, 2008

Jumpcut


Les Arc video

Found a site for video www.jumpcut.com where you can use other peoples clips to remix into your own video, could be fun. I've only uploaded a little of my Les Arc ski so far and but I'm hoping it might be useful to spice up some of my short boring videos, time will tell.
Because it takes a long time uploading next time I'll upload a finished video of my own and try to splice in some other stuff from Jumpcut.

Weather has been dire the past couple of days but today looks good so time to make some plans.

Sunday, February 24, 2008

Eglinton Dundonald












Summer Hare Bells

Today was my fist outing on the bike for two weeks, I've been down with a chesty cold and didn't want to risk overdoing it. Today though I was really looking forward to getting out, didn't want to do anything too tough so Graham and I went down to Eglinton and over to Dundonald hill linking in with as much off road as possible but keeping hills to a minimum. It may have been flat but the off road behind Perceton was a muddy mess luckily with a firm base. Not so firm over behind Dreghorn the motorcycles had been out and the trail was cut to bits.
At Drybridge we met Steven Lockhart from walkers Cycles, he'd been time trialing and was just heading in for a well deserved tea and cake at the community hall.
For our lunch we headed along to 'Taste Buds' in the industrial estate before looping around Dundonald Hill.
Altogether we spent about 4 hour on the bikes, we also got very muddy but thats all part of the fun. Best of all I feel fine so its back on the bike for me.

Friday, February 15, 2008

Great weather sick me.


















View from High Kelburn

Anne and I are still suffering from a chesty cold but I got out most of the day pottering about up in Kelburn fixing short trail sections on a downhill line I've been sorting out.
PM was looking nice and warm(ish) at 11degC so I decided to get up into Kaim quarry for more trail pottering.
An old workmate came by about 4.30pm and we got chatting as we wandered along the hillside, he's into paragliding and skiing and gallivants all over Scotland to get a good flight.
His pal Tony came well equiped with a flask of tea and some biscuits, very nice picnicing watching the sun set behind Arran.

See a very short video here.

Thursday, February 14, 2008

Nursing a cold













Clydeport at Failie Arran in the background

Started a chesty cold Monday (may have caught it on the flight home from Lyon) so I've only been pottering about doing trails, drinking 'Lemsip' and sipping Drambuie.
Up in Kaim quarry I've added a line to a rocky downhill, fixed a track in one of my secret trails and also been grooming a downhill in Kelburn.
Unfortunately Anne has come down with the same bug so looks like dinner duty is mine tonight so I'd better get back to the unmannly art of slaving over a hot stove.

Tuesday, February 12, 2008

Flood, stairs and singletrack by the River Ayr

Monday, February 11, 2008

Les Arc Skiing















Les Arc

No bike last week, I was off skiing at Les Arc in France with some ex workmates. Needless to say I didn't miss the cycling, there was no time! It was all ski, eat, booze, sleep then do it all again next day.
Free wine is hard to resist but I just about limited my intake to keep the hangovers at bay.
Getting there was a bit of a drag, 4am rise and didn't arrive until 7.30pm, it was the first week of French holidays and Saturday can't be a great time for travel.
The week was great, second day we had about 100mm of snow which set things up for a few days great skiing.
I even did a few of the easy black runs, lots of reds and the big 7km run along Aguille Rouge, its designated black but its more like a big red if you take the chicken run around the top steep bit.

Back to the bike yesterday along the river Ayr. Five hours looping about among the woodlands near Auchincruive. Highlight of the day was managing to get over the set of five up and down stairs along the riverside path on route to Annebank.
Great day... in fact its been a great week.

Short boring video of our Skiing at Les Arc can be viewed here.
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