Punctured Pride

Two thorns as sharp as tin tacks could not be coaxed out of the front tyre casing using conventional methods.

This included squeezing as though a pimple, twisting the pliable rubber like wringing out a towel, picking at it with the end of the tyre lever and finally and successfully, pulling the stubborn little blighters out with my teeth.

The puncture repair kit was spilled out onto the tarmac of the imposing Inversnaid Hotel as I took to identifying the holes formed by the thorns. The standard contents of a repair kit, familiar to most cyclists, used to include a bright yellow crayon with which to outline the offending hole. Mine was missing or had never been in the plastic container in the first place.

Pumping a bit of air into the sad inner tube and running its limp form close to my ear did detect one of the holes but in preparing a patch and the rubber solution glue I lost sight of it and had to go through the procedure again...and again....and once more before finally pressing the red and black self adhesive on to seal the pinpoint hole.

The second hole was also elusive but I had just about perfected the performance and within a few minutes we were ready to set off back down the track.

The crowd of walkers at the hotel picnic tables had been enjoying the fiasco of the repairs and I was a bit disappointed not to be applauded for providing their lunchtime entertainment as I rode through and past.

In my mind the return ride would be horrific given what I had gone through physically and mentally in the previous hours and with no real recuperation possible because of the repair work. Just out of sight of the walkers the front tyre felt distinctly spongy.

I was now resigned to a return walk rather than a ride and that would be even more horrific. Pushing a mountain bike is hard work especially over ground that could be well traversed on two fully pumped up wheels.

I told my son to go on ahead as he was fully mobile and plodded on, head down and determined to tackle the 10 miles of track, trail, rocky ledges and that slippery grass bank that I had slid down fully frontal. At the slower pace it was possible to appreciate the magnificent views over the tree tops down to the Loch and the rivulets of snow stuck high up on the distant peaks.

I sat down on a granite rock and thought about trying to sort out the front tyre once and for all. Throwing the whole bike into the Loch did cross my mind. The peace of the hillside was almost painful to a city dweller generally acclimatised to sirens and shouts but nevertheless welcome respite. I could well imagine that the place had not changed much over the centuries and many Scots will have passed this same way in pursuit of their livelihoods or being pursued by the English invaders.

We had seen a strange structure by the trackway on our outward cycle which I later found referred to in a tourist leaflet as Rob Roy's Prison. That great Son of the Highlands had almost as many enemies and friends. I must, sometime, watch the movie depiction of his life with Liam Neeson as the main character.

I was brought back down to earth  from my fanciful thoughts by the discovery of yet another thorn embedded in the tread of the tyre and with no real compulsion to hurry and this time no audience It was an almost pleasurable task to seek it out and repair it.

Three thorns in one ride was unprecedented.

Fully inflated I could think about remounting and riding at last. I had walked about five miles by now and was pleased to get back in the saddle although this coincided with a long uphill stretch which tested my fitness and stamina in the extreme.

My son was long gone but I could make out his distinctive wheel rut pattern in the muddy patches where the surface water was in the shade of the trees and had not evaporated. He was by now back at the holiday lodge for sure.

The final, long downhill was great fun although a bit hazardous over loose gravel, potholes, rocky extrusions and projecting tree roots. I had no need to pedal for a couple of miles and felt refreshed and energised for it. The flat, smooth tarmac road just by the Youth Hostel and towards the Rowardennan Hotel was like a finishing straight and I breezed up to the lodge with style imagining the roar of a massed crowd at what was, for me, to be regarded as a small victory but a victory nevertheless.