Little Adventures on Two Wheels: Cairngorms

April 2007

Day 1: Aviemore, Glenmore Forest, Cairngorm, Avon Refuge Hut
Day 2: Glen Derry, Linn of Dee, Dee Valley, Falls of Tarf, Glen Tilt, Blair Atholl

Easter approaching fast, we asked ourselves what to do on our long weekend. Not having booked anything in advance - organised as we are - Kiki studied the maps for a day and we decided on the Cairngorms since this would be a nice hilly challange. 'Shall we do the easy one or are you up for an adventure?' - 'Adventure!', silly me. We started from Aviemore, the beginning of the route being very pleasant until we found ourselves on a very steep, very uncycleable walking path. We met some friends by chance. They were the only people that didn't shake their heads at us as we pushed our bikes past them, sweating but still smiling. For a while pushing uphill was alright but we got frustrated very quickly as the path got worse, steeper and lined with more and more huge boulders, over which we had to lift our loaded bikes. After what seemed a long long time we had a short, but fun descent through the heather which felt like riding a camel (or at least what i imagine riding a camel would feel like), but apart from that it was a hard-going long day and we were happy we could finally get into our tent near the Refuge Hut between a patch of snow and a river as the sun was setting over the mountains. Next day we had to cross that river, running back and forth on numb icefeet with bits of bike and luggage, it turned out to be only the first of many rivers to cross that day. After a while the path got better and we could finally enjoy the cycling. Pedaling through all the beautiful valleys and along rivers in the sunshine made the whole trip worthwhile, but i still wouldn't want to do the first part on a bike again.