A Run in the Sun - Take #2

Fine weather in March is rare here so I took advantage to go for another run on Monday. 

Route

Inveraray on Loch Fyne

Main Street

Looking out to Loch Fyne from the town.

A favourite view of mine looking north along Loch Awe

Asknish Bay looking towards the islands of Shuna and Luing (I think)

The marina at Craobh Haven

Loch Craignish

Lochgilphead

There is an old-fashioned boozer in the town called The "Comm", strange name but it's short for The Commercial.

Loch Long at Arrochar

 

A Run in the Sun

It's been a long time coming but yesterday was sunny and fairly warm. It looked like every bike in Scotland was out on the road. I headed for Ayrshire and Dumfries & Galloway.

My route

 

Girvan Harbour - just for Trobairitz

Abandoned church, Barrhill

Loch Maberry. It's hard to see but there are many small islands in the loch. These are man-made and there was once a castle on one of them. Old, maybe late Dark Ages - 6th century?

Shennanton Old Bridge

River Bladnoch

Derelict cottage

Newton Stewart

Panorama

Monument to Randolph, 9th Earl of Galloway.

The inscription says "Erected by public subscription of all classes" - how very British.

Roadside daffodils are a sign of spring

The Glenlochar Barrage at the south end of Loch Ken controls water for the power station downstream

The church at Crossmichael

Parton

Loch Ken

Scottish Motorcycle Show - Footnotes

Ok, I promise that this is the last Bike Show related post.

Mystery Bike

In my first post I included a photo of an old bike that wasn't all it seemed. The engine is from a Yamaha XV250 Virago (I think). Well done to Andrew Thompson who identified it in the original posting. I was thrown off a bit because the chrome cylinder head covers had been removed.

And finally,

As we left the show we found a guy in the motorcycle parking area struggling at the front of his Kawasaki ER5. He had attached an old combination padlock to his front disc and the thing refused to come off. He said he would phone his recovery service.

Malcolm emailed me later to say that after I departed the guy's recovery service refused to help because there wasn't anything wrong with the bike. He then went back into the show and bought a pair of bolt cutters and some bungee cords. All's well that ends well.

Scottish Motorcycle Show - More Classics

I love the Kawasaki Two stroke triples - a 750…

…and a 250.

Suzuki GT750

Yamaha RD500

Honda CB400 Four

Honda CB750F

Yamaha XS650

Yamaha FS1E "Fizzie" 50cc moped

BSA Hurricane

Dave Newman's Jawa 350 Twin - Red Style indeed!

Post Office BSA Bantam. These were used to deliver telegrams. They were mostly ridden by junior postmen aged 16-18. They were restricted to 30 mph but the boys found ways of defeating this. They operated until the mid '70's.

Scottish Motorcycle Show - Long Distance Hondas

There were a couple of round-the-world Hondas at the show.

Firstly this unassuming CD175.

Its story

That's a long way to go!

But who needs a 175cc twin to go round the world? Nathan Millward did it on a CT110 "Postie bike". This is a version of the Cub developed for the Australian postal service.
 

We had a chance to chat to Nathan who was selling his travel books.

Nathan on his travels

Postie bike in action