dundee & the kingdom

It’s a steep downhill cycle from the train station to my home, it was glorious cycling the daunder down familiar sites, even the traffic lights and traffic at the roundabout where in my favour life was great, it had been nearly six months since I was last at home it felt like much longer! While I never get homesick, I do love being at home, which I am not even going to try and explain!

There are two local pubs in the village I live in, one is much more just a restaurant that will also sell you beers, the other is a traditional pub the black bull. Having been a regular at the bull for more than thirty years, I think its fair to say I’m what is known in Scotland as a well ken`t face in the bull! After I locked the daunder up in the garage her first night back in nearly a year, I readied myself for a stroll up to the bull, my eyes were wide when I opened my socks and pants drawer’s and looked in my cupboards, I had so many clothes to choose from it wasted pub time being indecisive about what to wear, for six months the only clothes choice I could make between my three T-shirts was which is the cleanest! Now I was faced with at least twenty shirts and five drawers of t shirts to choose from?

Once up at the bull while we were in theory supposed to be still social distancing two meters apart, the reality was if I wanted to chat to one of the other regulars, I would need to be closer than two meters due to my hearing being so poor, it was still the very early stages of coming out of lock down, this made for a surreal situation for me, it was disappointing when asking the usual questions, how are you doing? What have you been up to? The answer to this question for everyone else was simple! Doing fine not done anything it’s been lock down for the past six months, it was disheartening to me, on one hand to think that nobody would have even noticed I was away as they hadn’t been out! I also felt a tinge of guilt saying I have been having the most wonderful adventures, I never even bothered trying to tell those friends about my Shetland trig point adventures, I just told them I hadn’t been home for six months, I had packed in work and cycled home the slow way, this was fine and is always followed by the usual question so what’s next? People in general are really not much interested in what’s past, only truly interested in what’s now and in the future, this used to frustrate me as I wanted to share the adventure, it no longer does as I just say if your really interested there is a full blog about it all, then go on to discuss what’s next!

Scotland had held England to a goalless draw in the euros, this kept our dream alive to get through to the next round, while also stopping our English friends from ripping into us about their superiority, this event was marked with many`s a beer, thankfully before that game had even kicked off, I had got the daunder all packed up and ready to depart on the train the next morning to use my return ticket to do the remaining leg home of the NCN1, I was one very happy chappy on that train in the morning happy with the team’s performance, surprisingly feeling not hungover getting back out on the route with the daunder. Life was perfect

The train journey was wonderful not just for the dramatic scenery that journey always treats me with, but also the group chat on my mobile phone, was hilarious banter about the previous days game, I never want to be that person who sits on his phone as he passes over the forth rail bridge though! This made me intentionally pushed the phone aside as the train approached this iconic bridge, the journey went all to my plan; I was healthy happy and loving life feeling a lucky man as I left the train station,

It was midday as I cycled over a section of the NCN1 route that I hadn’t done before, all my previous cycling holidays heading north, had always went west coast or through the middle of Scotland, this time it was the east coast route over the river Tay on the mighty Tay road bridge, it was opened on the week I was born! Tay Road Bridge carries the A92 road across the Firth of Tay from Newport-on-Tay in Fife to Dundee, just downstream of the Tay Rail Bridge. At around 2,250 metres, it is one of the longest road bridges in Europe, this was my first time cycling over this bridge, there is no possible way of counting how many bridges I have walked ran or cycled over in my life, this one is fairly unique in that the pedestrian part is in the centre between the two roads, the Brooklyn bridge in new York is similar, but its thankfully rare on bridges for the footpath to be in the centre, I loved my cycle over it but! the scenery isn’t as good on a central pathway when there is a lot of traffic on either side of you, making a lot of noise and spoiling the view,

The next section of the cycle route along to Tayport was proper segregated from traffic cycle path brilliant! I was in my element full of the joys of life especially when the route took me through traffic free woodlands on the outskirts of Tayport, where I cycled through the middle of a caravan park, then along a rough track briefly to get into the nature reserve forest virtually all the way to Leuchars, there was lots of other cyclists enjoying the trails through the woods and along the coast as I cycled this wonderfull section, there’s a big beach as you exit the woods with a large visitors car park, lots and lots of signs saying no overnight parking which I felt was a shame surely this facility could be managed by someone for limited stays for a few vans or campers, I had spotted some cyclists in the wood had made hammock tents strung across a couple of trees discreetly which I felt was a great idea I would like to copy one day,

Once in Leuchars I stopped to take photos of the daunder in front of the military base, it used to be a big airbase but it’s a Scottish army base now, cycling along the bases perimeter fence I was reminiscing about going to the air show with my then young son, we took the train up to go and walked along here at this perimeter fence, all excited to go see the air display it was a great day out while these days I wouldn’t condone such a thing, when arriving at the road junction near the train station, yet again I smiled at a different memory of the previous occasion that I had cycled up to this station, that time had been a cycle to Leuchars from home, this was also a very happy memory I had cycled what is called the coast and castles north route from home to Leuchars via Saint Andrews with an overnight stay at Kilconquhar Castle Estate where my mate Brottsy and his wife Lorna at that time had a time share there, what a great wee holiday that was, every time I pass through that station on the train I look at the millennium post and remember that weekend happily,

Now I was cycling past the station to head for a lunch date at The Tavern at Strathkinness with Sheila, she had chosen this place to meet me for lunch having researched it before hand, she is a star she knows me so well it was the ideal lunch stop for me with a selection of real ales and a fantastic menu, in old style country pub surroundings, I loved it this was shaping up to be one of the best days out ever! Sheila had a few days off her work and wanted to get away in her wee van, we had decided on an overnight stay at a campsite called the pillars of Hercules on the outskirts of Falkland, this was my next cycling destination after our lunch where we would meet again,

It was surprisingly traffic free B roads passing some good scenery along the side of a river in places and through woods, I came across a memorial bench near a very green rock pool and small waterfall, The inscription on the seat read: - 'Loving memory of local environmentalist Nuri Sabit 1930-1997 Chairman of East Fife Baha'i Community

I am interested in all things environmental So I tried researching this further, couldn’t find out anything about this person’s environmental stuff just the religion stuff, which I was mostly ignorant of! Baha`i is a reasonably new religion, I am non spiritual anti-religious, thus I felt I could be forgiven my ignorance, my research found it to be a good one all for equality one world stuff harmony and equal rights to all, if it weren’t for the god part, I would have liked it more, if ever I feel the need to join a godly gang, then this would probably be the answer

Eventually I arrived in the town of Falkland and wow I was surprised, why had I never been here before? What an absolute gem of a town with an amazing amount of history. I now know why the district of fife calls itself the kingdom, the Stewart royal family (very distant relatives of our present-day monarch) had their palace here, right in the centre of town the grounds of which are well literally palatial! Unfortunately, I had no time to book a tour around the palace and grounds, yet again it was a promise to myself to return some day,

It was a pleasant cycle past a cricket ground where there was a game on, I had been surprised how popular cricket seems to be in fife, then through a forest track to come out near the main road at the pillars of Hercules organic farm and camp site, I loved it this was my first visit here they are very welcoming to cyclists here, even having a separate camping area for cyclists! and there is a millennium post at the café,

Sheila had a beer sitting at a table ready for my arrival, we had timed our visit to coincide with a pizza van being on site with some live music in a marquee, this was ideal a big well fed fire was at the centre of the marquee, the band played some Scottish classics with penny whistles a flute fiddle, double base, guitars and accordion, the pizzas were awesome my dairy free pizza even had flowers on it all organic local produce wood fired, the beers were black isle organic beers out of the campsite shop/café, it was a shame this ended so soon we could have sat in there all night,