Day 9

Tuesday 12th August 2008

Troon to St Catherines:

62 miles, and one river crossing.
We had a send off committee of 2 as we left Troon Rob gave us an unexpected, and unwanted detour though Troon, once on the road it appears that as we get progressively more tired we take longer to get started, and this morning was no exception. We had expected the wind to be blowing strongly from behind us, however it turned out to be more across than anything else. We had decided to go on without stopping to Gourock from where the ferry left for Dunoon. We had the official information from the website and the telephone support for Argyle ferries that told the ferry leaves on the hour, We also had some information from Jimmy of Troon that told us the boats go every 20 minutes. Discounting Jimmy’s opinion we were aiming at the 11.20 crossing. With about 15 miles to go it was looking tight for the 11.20 crossing while, some hadn’t noticed this, and some were accepting of the fact that we would have to take the next one Ness was determined to push for the 11.20 crossing, and so we pushed, we were doing speed we just could not keep up for too long, but we knew that if we made it would cut an hour off our day, Gill was at port, and had confirmed which of the 2 possible ports it was and fortunately it was the closest. As we hammered on Mike’s phone went, but he was unable to answer this and cycle at full speed, so he did not reply. As we came over another summit we were broken to see the ferry leaving port, but it was only 10 past not 20 past, how could this be? Well if we had listened to Jimmy, or answered Gillian on the phone we would of known the boat go every 20 minutes, but we did feel exhilarated in knowing that if we had to we could put the pedal down. The short journey across the firth of Clyde took about 20 minutes, and is was one of the highlights of the trip, the mountains looked so commanding, and it felt like we were really beginning to leave the heavily populated part of the UK behind. Once across we regrouped with Gillian, who had caught the boat before ours (the one we could of caught had Rob not given us the guided detour around Troon), we then cycled slowly until we found the first café, come coffee shop and had lunch of soup and a sandwich. It is interesting, that 4 or 5 days ago we were wolfing down huge quantities of food, but as the days go on we seem to be loosing or enormous appetites, and consuming more normal amounts of food, not sure if this is a good sign or not? The last 22 miles were along the banks of Loch Eck, and Lock Fyne, the scenery was fantastic, and what a pleasure it was to cycle all day in the relative dry and to finish the ride with dry clothes. As we conclude the day’s note I must tell you of the strangest noises Mike is making at Gillian, team masseur, gives him a gently rub down with a towel, tomorrow will see if the rub down has worked, if not we might have to go for the deep friction version, if he does we do we might need ears plugs.


Mileage : 62 miles

Time 4 hours 03 mins

Total : 677 Miles

Beer of the day: Fyne Ales -Innishail.

Overnight : Thistle House Guest House, St Catherines.