Glen Tilt tour

Yesterday saw us tackling the beautiful Glen Tilt for a third time. The wounds from last weekend had healed somewhat and the weather looked promising.
We set off from the Blair Atholl car park at 12 noon, and ached up the immediate steep hill, and a long one it is too....
A clever shortcut Rick had worked out saved us the way down to the cottage at Shinagag and back up the hill, but required a river crossing...as he knows how much I hate to get my feet wet, he offered to carry me across....I accepted. If I had known tho' how many streams, puddles and generally boggy surface were to cross still, I hadn't bothered....

Nobody but sheep
Great rocky descent to Daldhu Lodge for a well earned lunch. Then up the long steep track up to the pink house (the ones who've done this tour know what I mean). And I was chuffed to bits to manage this for the first time without having to get off and push. I even had a few gears left and enough air to keep talking, to Rick's dismay !!
Anyway, at Fealar Lodge as it's called, we filled up water, played with the dogs (or better we made silly faces and they barked for Scotland), had a muesli bar and, with the knowledge that it is mostly downhill from here set off with a smile on our faces.
Dog thing
Which was wiped off a minute later as on the steep ten meters up the meadows behind the Lodge, the shit hit the fan.
Ricks chain broke, got caught in the rear mech, and as this all happened on full power application uphill, wrapped the mech about 180 degress round backwards and subsequently bent the hanger. My immediate thoughts where to find somebody in the Lodge who would hopefully help us to get back down to the car park. But no, my man is sooooo clever and he had all the right tools and knowledge to fix the mess at least good enough to make it down (well, almost....). So, 40 minutes later we set off again.

Fixer
Over the meadow, finally descending into the gully to the river, where both of us got off at the bits with the murderous drop-offs to the left. I still have to talk to somebody who actually cycled this...
And then, the view of the Glen always blows me away, Scotland at it's best !! Over the iron bridge at the falls, great track all the way down the glen, and apart from the worry if Rick's bike will hold, all was well.
Of course the chain had to break one more time, about 3 miles before the end. A quick fix and then an easy roll back into Blair Atholl.
35 miles, 7 hours ellapse (would have been about 50 minutes less without the breakdowns). Hard, but superb, one of my all time favourites....
Bikes packed up quickly and then the big reward, a stovie and beer stop in Dougie McLean's Taybank Bar in Dunkeld. All is well with the world.....
(Andrea)