Breakfast at St Leonards and then the rest of the team arrived from Durham. Ken Richardson driving the Sherwoods van and Tom Foster the personnel carrier .
Paul Rogers, Steve Taylor, Steve Campbell, David & James Morgan, Dave Cable & Andy Parker made up the rest of the ‘Chaingang’ for this years tour….
Up to the castle for a photo-shoot…. until some ‘jobsworth’ said that we couldn't have a group photo in front of the castle (when hundreds of tourists are taking pictures of the castle !!)
Eventually we were allowed a few minutes to get our picture (after we’d already taken a couple of unofficial one’s) – Time to leave and lo and behold we end up back at St Leonards Police Station – we’d only been staying there and none of us had seen the Route 1 sign !!
The route took us on cyclepaths through Edinburgh, via Musselburgh to Dalkeith where we took to minor roads and started climbing up and up into the Moorfoot Hills. Our first rest stop was just over the summit and then it was off and downhill towards Innerleithen…….
ACCIDENT…… Steve Taylor became the first casualty of the tour about a mile after the rest stop when he came off his bike on a downhill section and injured his right shoulder. Fortunately Tom & Ken were behind us and managed to get Steve away to hospital at Melrose and he subsequently had to return to Durham. Innerleithen then took us to Galshiels where Ken had another rest stop organized, it was here that we met Kathy Walter of Thistle & Heather Books , a keen cyclist from the Peebles area who ‘shared’ a cup of tea with us. Last few miles dropped us into Melrose where we found the Abbey but not the YHA !! Eventually we arrived and at the same time so did Bishop Auckland cycling club and Nikki Willis from the HQ Sports centre (it is a small world).
The pensioners – as Andy calls the more mature members of the ‘chaingang’, retired to the Old Abbey School B & B (01896 823432) (highly recommended) and then we all met at the The Ship Inn for some great food and ‘banter’ about the days ride which we all agreed was fantastic
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