Day 3 - Fort William to Dumbarton

Before we get started with the blog for today we thinks we're at a suitable point in the trip to remind ourselves about what we’re doing and who were doing it for. Along the way we’ve got chatting to many friendly faces and described who Group B Strep Support www.gbss.org.uk are, what they are doing and we are so keen to help. 

In addition, 3 days in we are all missing our loved ones and would like to thank them for the sacrifices they’ve made letting us boys go away on this 10 day adventure – we love you all very much, thank you from the bottom of our hearts.

 

Day 3

We had 96 miles to bank today, 30 up hill, 50 down hill  - Ben Nevis and Glen Coe were in our sights and weather wise we struck gold today, blue skies and temperatures in the high teens, we felt fortunate as we set out from Fort William. The scenery on our way down was breath taking, especially over the bridge towards the Glenn Coe village and Loch Leven was just stunning. As we’d expected we’ve all found our natural groups, being: Tom and Sammy.  David and Big Tommy.  And Andy, Hamish and Craig.

We started the slow climb up from Loch Levan onto the Glen Coe Pass, it was baking hot and most of the group shed a few layers and got into their rhythm spinning the old pedals up the incline. We passed a Piper in the Hills, queue Waltdog and CJ pulling over for pictures.  It’s a long old climb and lads put in some big efforts to hit the peak. 

On the way down we were stopped in a big tail back caused by an overturned caravan wedging itself across both lanes, thankfully nobody was hurt.  We picked up the bikes and took a few steps cross country to round the accident and started our decent, a real blast and given there was no traffic behind us we were able to take up the whole road – what a buzz nudging 35-40mph as 10 miles passed in a flash, and barring a couple of small climbs it was plain sailing, and lots of whooping and hollering from the group!

As we skirted Loch Lomond Andy and Craig got drenched from head to toe by a car speeding through a deep puddle – literally soaked, shirts, shoes, faces the lot!  The rest of the groups ploughed on down the rough and potholed A82 all the way through Luss and into Dumbarton. 

After the finish line we quenched our thirst with some pints in a beer garden, dropped the bags at Travel Lodge then headed to the Gledoch House Hotel for a bit of pampering and for a dip in the pool.  We finished the night with Rib Eye Steaks and a few glasses of red wine, Steven the Manager of the Gledoch very kindly gave as the dinners half price given we were riding so far, and for charity. 

Tip of the day: A Scottish breakfast doesn’t include eggs.

Yellow Jersey: Wiggo and Froome Dog (even with the 15 minute head start)

Dismount of the Day: Hamish, full cleats in body slam in the Car Park at Lodge on the Loch.

Highest Number of Pictures Taken: Andy and Craig, well it’s for the blog isn’t it!

Downhill Animal: Sammy didn’t even need to pedal, spread the shoulders puffed the chest, 20 stone and the laws of physics were on his side.

Best Precision Distance Estimator: Colin Hudson, 4 miles, read 10 miles!

Longest wait in a Traffic Jam: Colin Hudson, 2.5 hours in a 15 mile jam on Glenn Coe,

 due to the caravan smash.