Rest day in Glasgow, how fantastic is that?! This is one of my favourite cities - interesting things to do, bustling, plenty of great dining!
And we’re ready for a rest, it’s been a big week with 60 miles to Kendal, over Shap to Penrith, 43 to Gretna, 51 to Abington (and the better than imagined Beattock Summit) and then the 47 mile ‘not even close to freewheel into Glasgow. Debating if the 5-day sections are harder than the 4-day ones, even with less gruelling terrain just because of the blindingly obvious extra day. And the terrain this week is still Lancashire-esq.
Lots to do today - resupply, visit the bike shop, find new shoes (why do things fall to bits when you’ve hardly worn them?!), see how our old haunts have changed and indulge in our day off treat - a churrascaria. Viva Brazil is a Brazilian steakhouse where the servers bring meat directly from the grills to the table on long skewers and carve slices onto your plates. Why Spanish and Brazilian rather than Scottish in one of Scotland’s biggest cities? I suspect we’ll have plenty of Scottish as we head north! And, protein, that’s what we need after all that pedalling!
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| There’s going to be a few of these, the architecture here is so gorgeous! |
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| Spanish, tapas, a new favourite |
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| Just off George Square |
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| This is the building I used to stay in during my weeks up in Glasgow |
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| George Square |
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| Lots of large wall art around |
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| New bike storage location |
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| This is not a crime scene, just weatherproofing the jackets (again) |
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| Viva Brazil, our day off treat |
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| Always love a churrascaria! |
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| Glasgow Central, came through every Monday morning and Friday afternoon |
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| Now this looks like fun, maybe next time |
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| Behind these doors lies a tandem |
Today is also ‘reflection on the last Section’ day:
This is all we do - Sometimes it feels like this is all we do - get up, have coffee / breakfast, pedal all day, have dinner, go to bed - repeat. But it’s so much more than that. I mentioned it earlier, but seeing the changes in the country byways we’ve been traveling continues. Seeing the architecture and house styles change as we’ve crossed the border is interesting to watch. The plants in the gardens are different and we’re watching the season change day-by-day as we head further north. The sounds of people’s accents are distinctively different in each place and sometimes I have to really focus in to catch the cadence of the new speech rhythm so I can understand what people are saying, rather than getting the gist from a few words. Accents in the U.K. can differ in a 10-mile radius, it’s even much more so in the distances that we’ve been traveling.
Farms / farming - On this trip, we’ll see thousands of farms. “In 2021, the U.K. agriculture industry was made up of 216,900 farm holdinga. The utilised agricultural area was 17.2 million hectares of land, 71% of the U.K. land total.” Our trip, except for the odd large town or city, has been primarily through farmland and neither one of us realised how much of it there is or how many farms there are. Also didn’t realise how many and how massive the tractors are that are whizzing down those little country lanes!
The charity - our friend Jon asked us last night about why we choose the Diabetes U.K. charity to raise funds for? I pointed to Steve. We’ve watched Dad struggle with diabetes for years, Steve’s Mom was dealing with the same in her last few years. If there is anything we can do to avoid this miserable disease for Steve, we want to do it. The Diabetes U.K. link is that they are working on rolling out Roy Taylor’s Newcastle University work on a nutritionally (rather than drugs) based approach to bringing down and keeping down people’s blood sugar levels. It involves a rapid weight loss phase to get rid of the fat in the liver and pancreas, and then cutting out the foods that raise blood sugar moving forward, along with physical activity. The 3 F’s - fat (around the organs), food (those that don’t raise blood sugar) and fitness seem to be the 3 legs of solving that particular puzzle. We’ve tried it, it works so we’re supporting it.
Ongoing Fitness - Mom asked earlier how we were going to keep up this level of fitness after we’re done with this trip? We’ve been pondering that while pedalling (and would appreciate any thoughts or insights). It would be a real shame to literally climb this fitness hill and then slide back down it (again!). One of the things we’re noticing (actually Steve as I’ve never really done it) is that building the fitness (strength, aerobic capacity, stamina) is harder and takes longer. So, I guess if we want to maintain all the work we’ve put in, we’d better put some things in place to keep what we’ve gained and develop it further! Steve just posted about a 90-year-old man who completed LEJOG, what an amazing thing!
I’m sure Steve will add his reflections at some point, but those are the things I’ve been thinking about whilst pedalling.
Other than that, it’s been a lovely day in Glasgow and tomorrow we recommence the journey as we head off to Balloch!
Addendum for Brian (who probably knows all about this brewery, Brewdog:
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| Brewdog’s selections tonight |
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| Hmm, what shall I have?! |
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| Bustling place on a Tuesday |
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| Took 3 sips of this one, not giving up wine though! |
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| WeihenStephan |
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‘My Grandma used to drink this,’ said Steve
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Second Addendum:
Well hello from the front (of the tandem). Excellent day in Glasgow is drawing to a close and we are ready for the next stage up to Aviemore which is the place of the next and final rest day. I think I want to mention just a few things, some practical and some philosophical.
ReplyDeleteOn the practical front, part of my team responsibilities is keeping the tandem serviceable, compared to a sail boat it’s “a bit of bun” (Scottish expression for pretty easy) but it does need doing. Mostly it’s lubrication and adjusting the brakes to compensate for wear in the disc pads and rim brake blocks, the former is more complex than the latter but is not difficult. We are carrying one defect as a “green line entry” (when I maintained aircraft for a living a green line entry in the log book was for a defect that didn’t affect the operational capability of the aircraft as opposed to red line entries that did) our green line entry is Katherine’s spring saddle seat post aka “the squeak”. Tried to buy a replacement in Glasgow but failed in three bike shops ( that’s the internet age I guess), anyhow I have adjusted the spring tension, lubrication has been added let’s see how it goes. On the rain proof jacket front I had re-proofed the jackets in Blackburn and whilst they are better they are not waterproof ( that said in the sort of rain we are having we would probably need a dry suit and then you would be soaked in sweat anyway), another attempt today let’s see how it goes.
On to matters more philosophical, becoming retired and the notion this is helping with that transition…. Of course we won’t know till we are back in the new normal but I think the trip so far is confirming something I first experienced when joining the Royal Air Force which was a similar scale life change, after a few weeks that which was novel and new at first becomes the new normal. So getting up, riding for the day (or a significant part of it), getting showered, doing the laundry and then going for a meal a the odd “wee drink” going to bed becomes the new normal. In that sense it seems to be working, haven’t given the world of work a minutes thought. Retirement income wouldn’t fund living in hotels for ever but get rid of that little problem and it seems doable, bring it on.
So we have to deal with storm Agnes tomorrow and the day after good news is there is a weather window in the morning up to Balloch ( so we will be “ pedals
turning” for 8 am or so)and then another on the following morning to the next stop, thank you cycling gods, bring on the tail wind!!
You never told us what you ate at Burger King??!! 🍔 👑
ReplyDeleteWe actually had a Chinese, it was definitely off plan, but okay
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