Sunday 26th July 2020 - Ben Wyvis Loop ride - Long Haul Trucker

Yesterday I was out on a ride on the Long Haul Trucker with Brian and also Mark, Anna and Paul from the Highland Classic Bike group for a ride/loop around Ben Wyvis. It was a fantastic day out though a long one. I left home just on 7am and returned just after 10.30pm after a couple of hours driving and a long hard days riding. We did around 43miles of which about 90% was off road on a mixture of forestry road, pathways and remote trails. We managed around 3200 feet elevation. We met the others in Dingwall in the pouring rain which had us all worried about how far we would get but as we went on the sun came out, some light rain throughout but always just enough to make you think about a jacket before stopping. A quick stop at Strathpeffer for cake and tea before heading over familiar ground over the hills on the Puffer course before following the forestry track through to Garve, then on to the silver bridge where we had some lunch in the sun before following the river for a few miles before crossing the road to Ullapool and following the track further north/west before turning off road proper again to head upwards to our highest point. This fire road started out easy enough but went on forever and near the top it just kept ramping up and up with the gravel seeming to grow in size as well. Once over our summit we hiked a bike across a few landslides before stopping for second lunch of which Brian and Anna generously shared with me. From here it was a long run down to Loch Glass and Wyvis lodge with some truly beautiful scenery down through the valley. A quick stop to rest on the banks of the loch before pushing on back to Evanton over the Black Gorge. Here we stopped at Marks as this is where the others started from so we had a tea and some biscuits before Brian and I rode the five or so miles back up to Dingwall on the quiet backroad. We almost made it but the rain had other ideas, we stopped and put a jacket on a it was quite heavy once again but even this couldn't dampen what was such a lovely ride. For the first post lockdown ride out of Caithness and back with the usual riding suspects it was a cracking day. Hope everyone else had a nice weekend as well. Jamie Raining steady while waiting on the others before starting Brian Anna Paul Mark Mid piont and my phone died so only a couple of borrowed photos ;)