Prior to the theft of the Bastard (I'll get over it eventually, honest). I had a little jaunt on the XJR
Friday afternoon I decided to go to Oban, for a crab butty, as you do.
Via Edinburgh (as you do).
Well, weather looked iffy to the south, Scotland was looking warmer and
dryer.
I noted that most of England had a similar idea as the M6 was nose to tail
until Preston and busy to the Lakes.
I broke the journey up by hitting the B roads (and A6) to beyond Penrith
and then Gretna. At Lockerbie I cut across the Borders, really glad I
did. Probably the best bit of road during my short spin. A burst of
colours, blue, green, yellow, purple and black (the tarmac, BEAR
Scotland doing some sterling work on the single track B roads). And
rarely a car to be seen.
Following a night of beer and whisky (we were still in the hot tub drinking at midnight), an early start saw me dash up to Stirling and pick up the A84/85, I was surprised how much traffic was around, but as I had chosen to use the XJR it made lazy, short decision, over takes easy. The Peg would have knackered me with being ridden on the edge, ready to go, at all times.
From Tyndrum, as I hoped, all the traffic headed up to Glencoe, and then the A85 in to Oban was largely mine. I'd forgotten what a fantastic swooping road this could be, with some pretty stunning vistas to both sides.
Noting how most traffic had been heading north up the A82, I took the sensible option and used the A828 up the coast before coming back down past Glencoe in a clockwise direction. The coast road was another blissfully clear route allowing me to take in the views.
Glencoe was a blast, in many ways, as I tucked in behind a couple obviously out for the day and let them carve the traffic (lots of people still going north reducing overtakes).
Then it was down past Loch Lomond (I'd forgotten how big that was). And hit Glasgow by 16:00. At which point I decided the sensible thing was to use the M74 and drop my plans to go across county via Dumfries (I wanted to be home before midnight :-) )
After a bit more motorway dodging to break up the boredom of the M74/M6 (including the M74 being shut at one point which meant when I got back on it was empty...... really really empty), I rolled up back home just after 20:00. A 714 mile round trip.
Although I stuck mainly to fast A roads, that was the right choice with my being on the XJR. As I whizzed past single tracks and "white" roads I eyed them up for coming back on the Peg, another day. (Yeah, well, tht won't be happenning now will it :-( )
