And another 2 weekends. I'm sorry about this. It keeps happening!

Oh my, I'm getting lazy about my blog. Still - so a week past Saturday, according to the photos, I went out a run on my own. I don't know what happened to Peter. He was a bit disapproving of my picture of the dead moth on the windowsill, but I liked the colours. I went out and over Corstorphine Hill, which pleased me because my leg behaved quite well.

The next day we went a cycle together however. We had a plan; -  the Lanterne Rouge first and then Saltoun Big Wood to see if there were any dragonflies doing. On the way we were brought to a sudden halt by a small piece of scrubby clearing at the side of the road near Winton, which someone had sown with flower seeds. It was hoaching with butterflies. Buchanan was beside himself.

I took my new mountain bike for versatility. I'm finding it really enjoyable. It feels so bomb-proof that I am actually coming right off the brakes on the down hill (!!). 

Coffee and cake at the Lanterne Rouge was good as usual. It has a nice atmosphere and the old couple sitting at the table with us (not us, another old couple) were chatting with us about what we were up to.

At Saltoun Big Wood I gave myself a stiff neck trying to get decent pictures of the huge and ferocious looking dragonflies that were patrolling the pond. While I was there we were visited by some ghost children.

This week I'd done quite a hilly run on Wednesday, which had gone well, but then sadly afterwards my right knee started to hurt again. Peter was away during the week hunting dragonflies (drinking wine in a tent). On Saturday we went for a cautious run around Gullane. We haven't been there in a while. It wasn't the best ever day. I'd ordered some new Hokas from Pete Bland which we picked up at Telferton sorting office on the way to Gullane. I was hoping to give them a trial run but whoever had packed them had packed shoes that were 2 sizes smaller than the ones I ordered. Pete Bland are usually very good. It was disappointing. My right leg was kind of sore when I started running and both legs were hurting by the time I finished. I was wearing old trainers because I didn't expect to run in them. I think we were both tired. I got home and had an hour's sleep and felt better.

I had entered Philiphaugh Hill Race which was today, but it was not to be. The weather forecast was terrible and my right leg was sore again this morning, so Peter stayed home to catch up with his blog and I went out a cycle tout seul. This went a lot better than I thought it might.

Heading up Leith Walk was a pain in the ass, with too much traffic and cars trying to run me off the road in the rain. I had been half thinking about trying a new route out to the Pentlands. The A702 just feels too deadly - too narrow and too fast. Looking at a map though I thought I might head out the A701 towards Penicuik and then round about Bilton turn up towards the hills and it looked like there were smaller roads going through Bush which would bring me onto the A702 quite near Flotterstone.

Coming up to the top of Liberton Brae there was wind and rain in my teeth however and I thought I'd have a rethink. I headed down Captain's Road planning to hook up with the cycle path to Musselburgh and come back along the coast and that would be better than nothing. Just before getting to Danderhall though, I saw a signpost for route 61 which I'd never seen or heard of before. It promised to take me to Roslin. I wasn't convinced I wanted to go to Roslin but I thought there was no harm in exploring.

At one point there was a fork in the path and I followed a gravelly track through Bilston Glen. It was kind of pretty but I wouldn't have been all that surprised to find a dead body. I came across these hauntingly beautiful crashed and torched cars.

Bilston Viaduct. Impressively high!

As I was nearing Roslin I realised that I wasn't far from the road to Bush and so maybe the Pentlands was back on. The incentive of the thought of coffee and a bun at the Flotterstone cafe was enough to keep me going. I was soaked through but it wasn't all that cold and I was quite enjoying myself. 

The Bush Road came out where I'd hoped to come out, so I just had about half a mile of A702 death-run before the turn off for Flotterstone and cafe heaven. The cafe owner looked gloomy. The other occupants of the cafe were rather young and were going on about how many "steps" they'd done in the hills. I hope I didn't roll my eyes.

I am not a brave mountain biker but I am much better on my new bike than my old bike. It has big 29 inch wheels which give a reassuring feeling that you can plough through most things. I pretty much had the hills to myself as well, apart from a few die hard fishermen.

The whizz down the Water of Leith on the other side was likewise a blast. Again, I mostly had it to myself and I got a fair speed up. I arrived home very dirty and wet.

The weekend that's just been - back on the bench.

It was all going so well. Peter had to do stuff with his mum on Saturday morning so we never got out until late. God is rumoured to look after drunks and little children and I think this might extend to slightly disorganised people. It had been raining in the morning but we arrived at Flotterstone well into the afternoon and, only hesitating a moment to have a big piece of cake and a coffee each, set off up into the hills.

I had kind of an idea that we should just run down the hills to South Black Hill and then come back the way we'd come. Peter wanted to come back over Black Hill though, and I conceded, curious to see how dry it was. The legendary bog at the top was nearly completely dry and it was easy running. My legs and feet were protesting a bit by this point, as I haven't been doing all that much in the way of hills and I was wearing my very lightest Inov8s. I belatedly remembered I had bought those shoes  with cross-country in mind. My feet were sore but that's par for the course. We threw in Bell's Hill for good measure and then took the stony path and then road back to F'stone.

The next day my left leg was a bit sore and we didn't get out at all as the heavens had finally opened and there was rain pretty much all day. I half thought about going out on my bike but I don't want to rust it up. It was actually quite good. We tackled some jobs that we never do, like unplugging the drain hole at the back of the fridge so the fridge stops drooling. Maybe if it rained for 40 days and 40 nights we'd do some decorating.

On Monday the pain in my legs had switched to my right side but it wasn't that bad so I thought if I did a flattish run I'd get away with it. I did the usual Granton run with a detour out onto Granton Pier and back. There were a lot of fisherman arrayed along there - some of them normal, and some of them not entirely.
Anyway, the run was fine, if a bit slow and I thought I was okay, but later that day my knee and ankle on my right side were sore, and then worse on Tuesday, so's I was actually limping. Today they're a bit better but I wasn't chancing a run.

I just entered the Philiphaugh Hill Race the other day as I've been so beautifully injury free. I didn't have any ideas of an all out race but I remember liking the course and it's a manageable distance and a nice organiser. I paid for both of us since it's only £5 each, telling Peter if we can't do it it's for charity anyway. I can't help but feel there's a connection between my entering the first race in months and suddenly being brought up sharp with an injury. Bah!

I had an hour free this morning anyway so I went out on my new bike instead and I actually had a really nice cycle, most of it off-road, and it was good to get out moving pain free.

Another 2 weekends.

I can't believe it's 2 weeks again since I last wrote. How did that happen? Maybe it was the shock of the MOT. It only cost £200. I was stunned.

I doubt you're any more interested in what we did 2 weeks ago than I am, but now my blog's become a scrap-book, and the summer pictures get me through the long Siberian winters. So I'll blog it all anyway.

2 Saturdays ago we went to the Lammermuirs. I've been cautiously increasing the amount of hilly running I've been doing, and then backing off if I have any problems. It seemed like a plan to go to the Lanterne Rouge for a coffee and then head up to the car park near the Hopes Reservoir. From there we could run to the top of Lammerlaw and back down again. Simples. Peter had to do stuff with his mum in the morning though, so we were late setting off. I hoped we would only have coffee at the Lanterne Rouge, but when it came down to it we felt we needed cake. What was it Marie Antoinette said again? Go on, stuff your face fatty. Something like that. Anyway, we did. We decided to share in some of the world's burden of obesity, which was kind of us.

It was damn hard setting off from the car though. It's all uphill and the wind was blowing quite stiffly in our faces. My legs were moving quite stiffly too, and very slowly, and I felt puffed. Too puffed to argue with Peter for long when he wanted to go up the near-side of the reservoir and round in the hope of finding adders. Needless to say we didn't find any adders. My legs slowly unfurled and I started to run a bit better.

At the very top there was a welcome breeze and quite a number of beasties; wasps on the cap stone of the cairn and then 2 types of butterfly - I'm tempted to say there was a chocolate and orange one and the other one was lemon and ginger. Just to annoy someone. I can't be bothered going around naming things. It's only the names we've given them, it's not their real names after all.  Oh never mind.

The next day Peter went off and did some race. I was going to go a cycle, but hadn't got out the house by the time Mr Jubilant was phoning to say he'd only gone and WON the bloody thing. So I waited for him and then we took the bikes up to the Pentlands for a pedal around. Controversially, I had ordered a new mountain bike off Wiggle. Peter hates that. He thinks you should try things on first in the shop. My mind was on mountain-biking so I took my old mtb and we went round some of the trails. I can be a bit crap, but also, I realise now, my bike has been a bit crap for some time.

Coming down the track towards the ranger's station we again met Kathy and Graeme (as we had 2 weeks ago, on our cyclo swim). Kathy was showing me her super-swish mountain bike - light as a feather and with a dropper seat. I hoped I wasn't going to feel disappointed with my new bike after seeing hers. I knew it was going to be a bit heavy and it didn't have a dropper seat. Maybe I could put the seat off my typing chair on it?

Back round the other side, just past the Howe, I saw what looked like insects on the road, but looking closer it was a migration of tiny toads. These are just two of them. Sadly some of them had already been squished by passer-bys. The light was getting low so it wasn't so easy to photograph them.

Then another week passed. On Saturday Peter somehow tricked me into giving him a lift to the paint-shop in the van and then dropping off a bunch of equipment in Morningside, ready for starting a job on Monday. Since we were up that end of town anyway I suggested we go to the Pentlands for a change. I'm not saying I'm doing the Skyline but I have been thinking I might just see how my legs are as I really enjoyed the training for it last year, if not the race.

At Flotterstone we thought it would be rude not to have coffee and maybe even a bit of cake from the Pentlands Cafe before setting off. I sent Peter to get it and he arrived back with delicious coffee and blueberry and some kind of cheese cake. He said the guy said it reminded him of his grandmother as she used to make this cake for him when he was a little boy. We'd never found out where the new cafe owner is from. Peter was guessing Turkey but I thought that he had been in some forested mountains with bears and wolves, judging by the taste of the cake. It transpired that he is in fact Romanian and my cake-tasting intuition is uncannily accurate.

After coffee and cake we ventured out the van, only to be greeted by Fergus Johnston who had slept long and was only just setting off, and also the wood wasp pictured below. Peter and Fergus were having a good long chat and it seemed to me like we should get going so I suggested that they start off and I would "catch them up". Actually they both needed to go for a pee so I got a head start and they could catch me up. I hoped to hold them off for a while but even as I was just starting up Turnhouse I could hear them behind me and pretty soon we were side-by-side. I'm tired of trying to explain it, because it always falls on deaf ears, but there is nothing quite as dispiriting as running at full-pelt while the people beside you jog along at the same speed chatting. Thankfully they went ahead and I was left back in a more peaceful place. Conditions underfoot were very good but it was hot. I made it to the top in 24 and a half minutes, and I'm always quite happy if I can make it under 25, so I was pleased, if you can call that pleased. I nearly lost grandmother's cake at the cairn at the top. At this point Fergus ran on and he galloped off like a horse into the distance.

Seconds after leaving us we spotted Fergus disappearing towards the horizon. But I beat that other bloke (at Peter's hip) to the top of Scald Law - and he wasn't happy. Haha.

 We ran Turnhouse, Carnethy and Scald Law and then ducked down from the near-side of East Kip onto the Carnethy 5 track down to the Howe. We had a look to see what had happened to our toad migration and we found 2 little toads still there.

The run back down the road on hill shoes was painful but I'd had enough hills for one day for this trip.

 Back at Flotterstone Fergus also arrived back, having made it round most of the Skyline.


Then yesterday I wanted to go out on my new bike. I had actually quite fancied going back to the Pentlands but Peter wanted to go to Dalmeny. I didn't really want to go to Dalmeny, but the wind was blowing from the west so it made sense to go that way. I must be going soft.

My new bike has big 29 inch wheels and good suspension, not like the headshok on my old Cannondale, which despite it being sent back to the Netherlands to be fixed at quite an expense, hasn't worked well for years. The big wheels make you feel like you can just bulldoze your way over anything. It was all working beautifully and I really enjoyed it. Despite it being a little heavy you can get a good speed up on it.

Happy.

We went to South Queensferry by the road and as we arrived there Peter announced that he could now do with tea and cake. "You people" I hear you say, "and your endless cake". I know.

I have been in several SQ cafes recently and they suffer a bit from the booming elderly tourist trade. The town centre is full of bewildered people who have just arrived on coaches enjoying the full 3 bridge experience. I should be happy for them but it makes me want to run around shouting "Wake up! Hurry up!".
I'd seen the creative cafe on the edge of town looking just a bit less well-frequented, so we headed there. I liked it but Peter got a bit tetchy. The service was inexplicably slow.

Och I think he was just tired. After the cafe we went to a shell-beach adjacent to some scrubland. I thought maybe we would find a dead body, it was that kind of place, but to Peter's delight we found "Small coppers, small coppers". The variant with blue spots apparently. Amazeballs!

I liked the orange bugs best. And I liked the big housey-castle. I wish it was mine.

So I guess I better go and do something that will help prepare me for the week ahead. I might actually just read a book though. I bought a stack of memoirs recently, on a whim. I went out a run today and wore a rucksack because I had a package to pick up from Telferton. It was unbearably hot and I still have a big red face hours later.

Have a happy week.