Ride the Coast

Scotland Day 3 - A spot on forecast, a horrible start, but what a stunning finish to the day!!!!.

2009-08-12T11:59:00.000-07:00

I woke at 6.45 with my alarm, it is the time I usually set when I am at work and thought I might as well keep it, my way of thinking is that if it is a nice day then I can get up early and take advantage, however if it is not so good like this morning I can look out the window or tent and then turn over for another hour or so, and this is what I did this morning, finally getting out of bed at 8.15 packed my stuff up had a quick shower and shave then down for breakfast. As you can see from the photo, there was nothing to race for, however the forecast said it was going to get better. At a quick stop at the Bank in Dunoon it was off on my way, before turning off to and head over the hills through the very woody part, I was amazed by the amount of Forestry Commission land around these parts and they are managed on an industrial scale with massive one man, tracked machines, that not only cut down the trees, they trim them, cut them to the right lengths then load them onto a trailer they are towing behind.Half way along this section I came to the head of Loch Slieven, with the mist and rain that had been following me, now creating this eerie sight as it now presented this thick wall of mist, luckily I wasn’t going back down it straight away.

My immediate route was to take me down to the A84 and turn left through St Catherines and then onto towards the Colintraive to get the ferry over to the Isle of Bute, my first Island on this Scottish leg, it was a great piece of road with wonderful swooping bends that I could just relax and let the bike do it’s own thing almost, with just small amounts of reverse steering, ( a simple technique) rather than pulling the left handlebar towards you as you go into the bend, you actually give it a little push away, which means the front wheel starts to go to the right and the bike then falls to the left and you are into the perfect lean into the bend, then you then balance the amount of lean with the throttle, in fact you can up to a point lean the bike further the more throttle you apply, a simple matter of centrifugal force. Science lesson over - back to the ride.

About 100yds further on I spotted a grey seal basking on top of a rock, unfortunately by the time I was able to turn around an come back he had moved off, luckily the second time I spotted a seal doing this I didn’t miss out.

On arriving on Bute the road down to Port Bannatyne is not only lovely it is also very picturesque and offered me a view of the RFA ship I had got close to yesterday but too close to photograph if you know what I mean. RFA Orangeleaf, which is a fleet refueling tanker and from this picture you can just make out the giant fuel tanks hidden in the hillside just to it’s right, you can also see the 4 container ships, moored up from another angle.Sorry you can’t really see The Orangeleaf well but she is a 40,000+tonne tanker that was originally a commercial tanker that was subsequently converted in 1984 for fleet refueling. Along with her sister ship the RFA Bayleaf they were both built at Cammell Laird shipyard in Birkenhead. By the way the two images were taken a short time apart and it was amazing how the day was clearing up.

Carrying on as I came to Rothesay I was able to see Rothesay Castle (48) the castle has been described as "one of the most remarkable in Scotland", for its long history dating back to the beginning of the 13th century, and its unusual circular plan.

The castle comprises a huge curtain wall, strengthened by four round towers, together with a 16th century forework, the whole surrounded by a broad moat. Built by the Stewart family, it survived Norse attacks to become a royal residence. Though falling into ruin after the 17th century, the castle was repaired by the Marquess of Bute before passing into state care last century. During the Wars of Scottish Independence, Rothesay was held by the English, but was taken by Robert the Bruce in 1311. It then returned to English hands in 1334, before being taken again by the Scots. Following the accession of the Stewarts to the throne of Scotland in 1371, the castle became a favourite residence of kings Robert II and Robert III, who died here in 1406. Robert II granted the hereditary keepership of the castle to his son John, ancestor of the Earls and Marquesses of Bute. Robert III made his eldest son David Duke of Rothesay in 1401, beginning a tradition of honouring the heir to the throne of Scotland with this title. In 1462 the castle survived a siege by the forces of John of Islay, Earl of Ross and the last Lord of the Isles.

Rothesay was garrisoned for the Royalists during the Wars of the Three Kingdoms, then for the occupying forces of Oliver Cromwell, who invaded Scotland with his New Model Army in the early 1650s. On their departure in 1660, the troops partially dismantled the structure. What was left was burned by the supporters of Archibald Campbell, 9th Earl of Argyll during his rising of 1685, in support of the Monmouth Rebellion against James VII.

Following a long period of neglect, the 2nd Marquess of Bute employed 70 men to excavate the ruins, clearing large amounts of rubbish from the castle in 1816-17. But it was not until the 1870s that the ruins were stabilised. The 3rd Marquess, a keen restorer of historic buildings, embarked upon a series of repairs and restorations, following surveys and advice from his regular architect William Burges. His "restorations" continued until 1900, and include the clearing and shaping of the moat, as well as the red sandstone additions to the forework, which reinstated the hall roof while significantly altering the character of the building. In 1961 Rothesay Castle was gifted to the state, and is now a Scheduled Ancient Monument, in the care of Historic Scotland.

After touring around Rothesay, which struck me as cross between a commercial seaside town and a county town, as if it couldn’t make up it’s mind what it wanted to be, that or it was playing both sides to ensure economic survival. It was then along the A844 for a while before turning off on the only back lane I would take around the coast on Bute, past Piperhall and then on to Kingarth then past the Golf Course before the next photo overlooking Arran, just as I entered Kerrymenoch. Okay it was an A road again but it was still tight for two cars to pass each other.I have been wondering what my challenge for next year would be and now I think I have it.!
My son has asked me whether we can go camping next year and play some links courses, he suggested Cornwall, while there is no slight meant in this comment, however if you want to play links golf, the only place is Scotland and I don’t mean the big name courses. For example The Isle of Bute is host to 3 courses alone all of which can be described as links style golf. I have played on a number of courses in Scotland and village 9 hole courses are as good as anything you will find, they usually don’t have pro-shops etc. just an honesty box for you to put your green fees in. So the plan next year is to play on two of these courses each day for 5 days and write about them and rank them.

One course that doesn’t count that I have played is Lochmaben, focused around the (Clubhouse) village hall it was a stunning 9 hole course that dated back nearly 100 years that was compromised when they added a further 9 holes, okay I played it 10 years ago and it may have changed but the original 9 hole were stunning.

Although it was meant to be an A road it was very tight and I was met with a family out for a cycle ride and a car coming the opposite way, great just what I needed, the problem being the female cyclist wouldn’t get out of the middle of the road, the children, the father all got out of the way, in the end we all got held up, the car couldn’t pass, because she would stop, I couldn’t pass because she was in the middle of the road, in the end the husband had to shout at her to stop and pull over. I honestly don’t know whether she was ignorant to what was going on around her or she was just being bloody minded, however in the end she had hacked me off but more importantly one of the locals. I just don’t get it. I was in London today walking around The City on business, but the last thing you should do is walk across a pedestrian crossing on Green unless you have double checked each way then checked your health insurance. Bloody Cyclists!, even today I had to pull back twice. Why is it these so called Green Anarchists believe they are a law to themselves and they don’t have to obey traffic signals like the rest of road users. I think I have told the story of when I almost got in a fight with a cycle courier who went across a traffic signal and rode straight into me and then argued that I wasn’t looking what I was doing. The crossing was on green and he was on red, so when he threatened me I was close to punching his lights out.

Anyway after finally getting going again, it was up to a viewing point at Quien Hill to take another photo over towards Kintyre taking in Inchmarnock in the near distance.

The day was really turning out to be a revelation, the weather, the scenery, the people and the roads, Today I really had some serious fun, long may it continue.

Coming back onto the roads that had lead me to Port Bannatyne I quickly turned left to go back towards the ferry over to Colintrave where I took the following photo of the ferry, the sister ship to which I would meet later in my travels. I pulled up alongside another biker near the front of the queue, sorry those car drivers I overtook but usually ferry companies put two bikes in the space of one car, so the fact I jumped the queue didn’t hinder anyone, if anything it helped people out.

The ferry at this point is the Loch Dunveggan and it is said for the distance it covers across the narrows it is the most expensive form of transport available. More expensive than Concorde on a cost per mile basis, it cost me and the bike costing me £9.20 for the return journey of a few hundred yards in each direction. To give an example I used one of the Highlands Ferries a little later at Corran and that cost me just £1.90 for a single.

Back on the Ferry despite the shortness of the trip I ran up the ladder to take a photo of the crossing point, looking up the Kyles of Bute, I only had time to take one before I had to run back down and put my helmet back on and get sorted out on the bike, because I would be let off first.

Back on the mainland it was back on to the A886 for a short while before taking the more coastal road of the B886 and a tough piece of riding that turned out to be as it was yet another stretch of road that has been tarred and chipped and very recently as the everytime I came to a corner either the front or rear wheel would skid, either under braking or accelerating, this made me ultra cautious and therefore it took me a long time to get back to A 886 after a quick 5-6 mile run along the Loch.

Once I reached Ormidale I was turning back on myself along the other side of the Loch on the A8003 this steeply climbing road produced a wonderful sight at the viewing point just after Craig Cottage. This point had one of those metal panorama signs that highlight all the peaks and points of interest for miles around.

Right the way down the Kyles of Bute, although it cannot be really seen from this photo but right in the middle literally is the Loch Dunveggan, the ferry I had returned from Bute on less than an hour ago, once more on the Bute side. Looking back at the bike I was able to view some of the mountains back towards ‘Rest and be Thankful’ that I had crossed yesterday and I would pass close by once again this afternoon.The next hour or so was spent negotiating some very tight and narrow roads, after leaving the A road at Tighnabruaich it was on to Kames then down along a track to Ardlamount House and coming back up to Millhouse before getting back on to the B8000. The road at this section wasn’t too bad in fact it was one of those sections that was one and a half tracks wide so in most cases when cars coming in the opposite direction used their brains it was easy for both of us to pass each other just by slowing down or speeding up rather than stopping completely in one of the ‘passing places’.

However after passing through Drum and just before Kilfinan I was passing through part of the Estate owned by Otter Farms, when I abused all my rules about stopping in passing places, to take some time and a number of photos as I watched a couple of Scottish Black Angus Cows giving birth in a field. I missed the first calf by about 20 mins, by the looks of things as it was on it’s feet and suckling however I didn’t miss the second within minutes the mother was mooing away and licking the calf trying to get it to stand. I stayed around for as long as I could and the second calf was very close to standing before I got under way, I won’t bore you with all the stages, I’ll just post the last one I took. The mother is the one on the left, however the one on the right was very protective almost like an Auntie and was trying to help it get on the feet as well.

A little further up the road I came to Otter Ferry and no sign of a ferry which made me think. So I did some research; Otter Ferry lies on the eastern shore of Loch Fyne, and was once connected to the western shore of the loch at West Otter Ferry by a ferry which began operating some time in the late 1700s, and only ceased operation in 1948. Operating from a jetty and quay built by James Campbell in the late 1700s, the mile and a half crossing provided an alternative to the long trek around the north end of the loch. In 1791 the fare was 3d for a man and 9d for a horse.On the road to Strachur I did pass a historic site although on first sight it didn’t seem that much, yet again it was another Castle number (49) Strathlachlan is the home to the Clan Maclachlan; Euan Maclachlan of Maclachlan is the 25th Clan Chief. Old Castle Lachlan was built at the beginning of the fourteenth century about the time of the Battle of Bannockburn.

It remained the home of the Maclachlan of Maclachlan until it was bombarded from the sea in 1746 by an English warship following the defeat of the Jacobites at the Battle of Culloden. This was retribution against the Maclachlans for joining in the unsuccessful rebellion. Lachlan Maclachlan, the Chief, ADC to Bonnie Prince Charlie was killed in the battle.The New Castle started life as a Queen Anne style house at the end of the eighteenth century. At the end of the nineteenth the Scottish baronial transformation was undertaken. Now the whole house can be booked for either weddings or special events, the only warning it is not cheap but it could be very, very special.

I was pushing on at pace, as I was starting to feel it, my backside was aching, however the weather was getting better all the time. And it was becoming a real pleasure to ride, this said I had set myself a target of getting on to Arran tonight, and finding somewhere to stay, if I was to achieve this I needed to get a wiggle on.

It was then on to the A886 and then again on to the A815 for the run up to St Catherines and Ardno before joining the A83 and the quick turn around the head of the Loch to be almost stopped in my tracks by a relatively massive Oyster Restaurant selling Loch Fyne Oysters which to be honest are famous the world around. I wasn’t hanging around and I was shortly in Inverary where you cannot avoid the sight of the Castle (50) The initial design for the castle was made in 1720 by the architect Sir John Vanbrugh, who also designed Blenheim Palace. This design was later developed by the architects Roger Morris and William Adam, who oversaw the beginning of the castle's construction in 1746, commissioned by Archibald Campbell, 3rd Duke of Argyll. It was completed in 1789 for John Campbell, 5th Duke of Argyll and his wife, Elizabeth. Built in an eclectic mixture of architectural revival styles, it stands on the original site of the village of Inveraray - when Archibald Campbell decided to build the castle he had the village demolished and rebuilt a mile away, so that it would not impinge on the castle's outlook.

The castle was damaged by two major fires, in 1877 and 1975, but most of its important artefacts and features survived or have been restored. It contains outstanding furnishings and interiors from the 18th and 19th centuries. The elaborate decoration of the castle's State Dining Room, completed in 1784, is the only surviving work of the French painters Girard and Guinard, who were also commissioned by the then Prince of Wales (later George IV) to decorate his London residence, Carlton House. The Armoury Hall, which contains a display of wall-mounted weapons dating from around 1740, has the highest ceiling in Scotland (21 metres, or nearly 69 feet).

Inveraray Castle is the home of the current duke (Torquhil Campbell, 13th Duke of Argyll) and his family, but its distinctive appearance, beautiful interiors and attractive setting make it a popular tourist attraction, and it is open to visitors at certain times of the year.

My god this is taking me longer to write about than it took me to ride at times and this is one of those sections when it wasn’t the case, don’t get me wrong the A83 is wonderful coming down the A83 alongside Loch Fyne and in fact this day I enjoyed the experience so much I didn’t get too carried away. I will return to Lochgilphead in the following post as I was able to really enjoy it’s main feature, The Crinan Canal.

Just before reaching Lochilphead there is another castle however it is one of those faux 19th century affairs I have decided to ignore on this trip. However further down the road when I was becoming increasingly desperate for a fuel stop I entered Tarbert, a town with two sides having ferries going in opposite directions, to the East lies Portavadie and the mainland from the West and Kennacraig they run to Islay and Jura. It was then I came upon the following view whilst I was refueling.

Shortly after which I met an Italian couple on their BMW R1200GS Adventure that I would come across at various locations over the following three days. Also whilst in Tarbert I came across Castle (51) Tarbert Loch Fyne Royal Castle. Tarbert Castle was a strategic royal stronghold during the Middle Ages and one of three castles at Tarbert. The castle overlooks the harbour and although pre 14th century in construction, the tower dates back to 1494 and the visit of James IV to the Western Highlands.

In 712, Tarbert was burned by King Selbach mac Ferchair of Cenél Loairn and of Dál Riata and in 731 by his son, Dúngal mac Selbaig. King Edward II of England handed control of the castle to the Scottish King John II de Balliol in 1292. A fortified structure was built in Tarbert during the 13th century. It was reinforced with the addition of an outer bailey and towers in the 1320s by Robert the Bruce, to protect it against the Lords of the Isles. A towerhouse was added in the 16th century, which is the most noticeable part of the remains. The castle occupies high land above Loch Fyne, providing views up East Loch Tarbert and beyond to the Firth of Clyde. This castle was captured from John MacDonald by James IV of Scotland as part of his campaign to destroy the power of the Lords of the Isles. In 1685 the castle was involved in another skirmish when Walter Campbell of Skipness Castle seized it as a stronghold for the Clan Campbell.

There are only a couple of standing walls left and they are considered unstable. The castle has a very commanding view of the water approaches.

Skipness castle would be one of my last points on the mainland today as I headed towards Arran. After refueling I was off further down the A83 before turning off just after Kennacraig and on to the B8001 towards Skipness Castle and the ferry from Claonaig to Lochranza on Arran. The B8001 gave me my first view of Arran as I approached Glenreasdell Mains.

After which I had a quick run to Skipness Castle (52) and back to the ferry point at Claonaig. Skipness Castle was begun in the early 13th century, when Argyll was ruled not by Scotland but by Norway. The builder was probably either Suibhne (Sven) ‘the Red’, founder of Clan MacSween, or his son Dugald. By now, though, the writing was on the wall for Norway. In 1263, when Hakon IV was repulsed by the Scots at the Battle of Largs, he was compelled to return the Hebrides to Scotland. The MacSweens, having backed Hakon, were forced out of Knapdale and Kintyre.

By the end of that century, Skipness had passed to the MacDonalds of Islay and Kintyre. By now Scotland was at war with England. The MacDonalds initially supported the English, and it may have been with English support that they comprehensively rebuilt Skipness much as we see it today – a formidable curtain-walled enclosure, bristling with arrow slits.

The MacDonalds remained lords of Skipness until their downfall in 1493. Thereafter, the castle was held by the Campbell earls of Argyll. During their tenure the lofty tower house at the NE corner was built. By 1700 the castle was unoccupied.

The Ferry point at Claonaig is not a harbour just a basic ferry ramp, with a bus stop close by. But on this day what a setting! Whilst sitting there waiting I was able to watch a pod of Dolphins sweeping through The Sound, whilst I had the binoculars out doing that I was also able to watch the Gannets diving from a considerable height to catch fish from the same shoal the Dolphins were chasing, to be blunt it is absolutely jaw dropping to watch this live. Maybe from the next couple of photos you can just imagine.

And then all of a sudden there was the ferry that would take me across. I took advantage of the opportunity to take a number of photos on the way but wow! This was the best part of the whole 10 trip in my view. The Loch Tarbert is a 16 car Ferry that runs during the summer months between the mainland and Arran. The photo was taken just as it started to drop it’s bow ramp. It just doesn’t get much better than this, however just wait until you see the pictures from the crossing the following morning. Within minutes of leaving the ferry, I was at the campsite I had thought about using a guest house but after landing at Lochranza the Camping and Caravan Club authorised site at the nine hole golf course was literally minutes away, so I thought given the weather, what the hell!.

It turned out to be a great little campsite although the Polish Caretaker was a bit surly at being disturbed, having booked in I met another Africa Twin owner, Yves, he was over on tour from Germany and had just arrived the day before from the mianland. He was also planning to go off to Islay, Jura before Mull a couple of days later.

He became an instant hero after witnessing the modifications on his bike and even more so when he pulled a can of lager out of his tent. I do intend to carry out a couple of the mods, Yves had built into his bike.

After sorting out my tent and getting my stove going for my evening meal, it was time to educate Yves about the fearsome Highland Midge. Luckily I had some insect repellant, on top of which I have never suffer too badly with them, it is only when they go after my eyes and nostrils, the two parts that the spray won’t work.

Beyond the fence you can see in the photo above is the barrier to a stream where all the Midges were coming from at the same time it was an ideal cooler for my Milk bottle which I was able to tie to the fence before I threw it in.

Before turning in after another long day, I took a quick walk despite the bloody midges and too the following two photos of the two mountains, yes both were by 50-80 odd feet Torr Meadhonach and Torr Nead an Eoin.

To be blunt, it was a fabulous campsite and the weather this evening was wonderful, just a shame about the midges.

Take care and as Mick says ‘You don’t stop riding when you get old, you stop when you meet another Africa Twin Owner!!!

Scotland Day 2 - Back on the road with a warning of bad weather to come!!!!.

2009-08-11T07:21:00.000-07:00

I woke early, decided that 6.45 was too early and decided to snooze a bit longer which then turned into and hour and half later. No problem as I had been told breakfast was from 9.00am onwards so I packed my stuff brought it downstairs only to find that breakfast was well under way and it was on just after 8.30am.

Dumping my stuff in the bar I then got on with having an excellent traditional cooked breakfast but I could have had a range of products from the local smokehouse. On leaving the owner was very gracious when he found out what I was doing by taking out a contribution from his own wallet.

He gave me directions to get back to Monckton which was as far as I had reached the night before on my search for a bed for the night. Once more my luck had really held with probably the best overnight stay so far and I’ve had a few to describe so far.

I headed back to Monckton through the back lanes to get on the road to Troon it took me past what you may think is Prestwick Airport but it is so much more, it is certainly airfield (42).In the past it has been RAF Heathfield, and RAF Ayr and in fact part of it still is, it was RNAS Wagtail and is now RNAS Gannet, with a detachment of Royal Navy HAR Sea Kings. Interesting point, the RAF call them SAR (Search and Rescue) the Royal Navy call them HAR (Helicopter Air Rescue) being an ex-crabfat (RAF) I know what’s right.

Even researching this airfield I found so many different stories and recollections, it would mean a huge blog just for this former and in fact current airbase.

The area was no stranger to such activity, as the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) had established a school of aerial gunnery to the south, on the site of Ayr Racecourse, The racecourse continues to occupy the site, and had utilised at least two of the original RFC hangars for its own building. Both heavily modified, one served as the course tearoom until 1991, when it was demolished to make way for a supermarket. The second survived until 2004, when it was demolished for reasons of safety, leaving a clear area now used to host events and for parking.

The airfield at Heathfield lay to the north of the original RFC site and the racecourse, and was commissioned as RAF Ayr early in World War II, later to be shared with the USAF during the war. Towards the end of the conflict, ownership passed to the Royal Navy and Fleet Air Arm (FAA), when it was commissioned as HMS Wagtail. Paid off at the end of the war, the site was acquired by the USAF during most of the 1950s, after which the airfield was closed, and the land subsequently developed for housing and retail use.

RAF Ayr should not be confused with RAF Prestwick which was a completely separate facility, and would develop into Prestwick Airport. Located adjacent to Prestwick, Ayr became home to transatlantic operations arising from the Lend Lease agreement between Britain and America, which explains the significant American operation on the site.

The United States Air Force (USAF) operated the latter named base in 1952 on the site of the original airport using former Royal Air Force (RAF) facilities (the USAF Military Air Transport Service (MATS) 1631st Air Base Squadron), and in 1953 on the Monkton side of the airport, both used by the USAF MATS. The USAF base closed in 1966, though part of the site is still occupied by the Royal Navy.

Prestwick Airport is also considered to be the only piece of United Kingdom territory on which Elvis Presley ever set foot, when the United States Army transport plane carrying him home stopped to refuel in 1960, whilst en route from Germany. A lounge, bearing his name, and a marker reflecting this event were inaugurated in 2006. However, on the 21st of April 2008, during a BBC2 radio interview with Ken Bruce, theatre impresario and chairman of Everton F.C., Bill Kenwright, claimed that Elvis visited London two years prior to this, with his friend, Tommy Steele. Immediately after, Airport authorities issued a statement requesting that photographic, or other evidence of the said visit be provided, lest they shall continue with their current claim. ‘Our Bill’ has worked wonders at Goodison since rescuing my team from an admitted Red***** Peter Johnson but I would also want some further evidence if you were going to overturn such a classic event.

Today, as well as the thriving no-frills segment, Prestwick has continued its traditional strategic role as a refuelling point for military aircraft – the USAF, RAF and the Canadian Forces Air Command are frequent visitors for example. Cargo traffic has also become another stronghold of Prestwick with the vast majority of Scotland's Boeing 747 Freighter traffic entering via the airport. There is also an RAF involvement to this date RAF Prestwick (formerly RAF Ayr) is the home of the "Scottish Air Traffic Control Centre (Military)", which is located within the civilian Scottish and Oceanic Area Control Centre.

The Scottish Air Traffic Control Centre (Military), or "ScATCC (Mil)" as it is also known, is staffed by RAF Air Traffic Control Officers and Air Traffic Control Assistants. Both military and civilian aircraft are controlled by RAF controllers who provide a variety of air traffic services predominantly outside controlled airspace or within airspace designated as Military Training Areas. An "Alerting & Fixing Cell" is also located at "ScATCC (Mil)", specifically tasked to assist aircraft in distress and/or encountering emergency situations.

In 2003, NATS announced plans to invest £300m in a new ATC Centre at Prestwick, which is planned to become operational in November 2009. It is intended that "ScATCC (Mil)" will continue to share the ATC facilities with NATS in this new building. To this date there is also an RAF Station Commander.

By the way when I did some research on this airfield I looked on Google Maps, once I hit the satellite button I was met with the image of 3 yes 3 giant USAF transport aircraft. Whether it was because they were so large or for security reasons they were parked up on the secondary runways, rather then any of the dispersal or cargo areas.

Very shortly afterwards I arrived in Troon passing Royal Troon golf club on the way and I made my way down to the harbour just in time to see the High Speed Ferry to Northern Ireland heading out, This is a summer only sailing and seems quite popular.

To the left is a small cargo vessel being loaded with timber that has been harvested from the area South of Ayr.

Heading back up to the A78 to head to Irvine and beyond, I was able to getting a further photo and one of the large ferry that runs between Ardrossan and Broddick on Arran. Thankfully all my gear was dry and at this time of the morning, just after 9.30 in the morning the sun was out and even at this time of the morning I could feel the warmth coming through.

The black spot on the first image is a bird flying by and what looks like smoke is the exhaust fumes from the vessel, not a very clean vessel.

The next hour or so turned out to be a really rewarding section of the ride, up through Irvine which provided something of a weird site, next to the large Leisure Centre there are signs for the regeneration of the area, however they seem to have stalled a few years ago, or part of it has stalled for the time being. The bridge over to what appears to be some sort tourist centre has a huge section missing.And it looked as if this has been the case for some time, with the amount of rust and corrosion apparent.

What was more heartening was just along the way in the harbour itself. When I saw one of the classic Clyde Puffers, something that featured in one of my father’s favourite BBC TV series Para Handy.

The Clyde puffer is essentially a type of small steamboat which provided a vital supply link around the west coast and Hebrides islands of Scotland, stumpy little cargo ships that have achieved almost mythical status thanks largely to the short stories Neil Munro wrote about the Vital Spark and her captain Para Handy.

Characteristically these boats had bluff bows, crew's quarters with table and cooking stove in the focsle, and a single mast with derrick in front of the large hold, aft of which the funnel and ship's wheel stood above the engine room while the captain had a small cabin in the stern. When publication of the Vital Spark stories began in 1905 the ship's wheel was still in the open, but later a wheelhouse was added aft of the funnel giving the puffers their distinctive image. Their flat bottom allowed them to beach and unload at low tide, essential to supply remote settlements without suitable piers. Typical cargoes could include coal and furniture, with farm produce and gravel sometimes being brought back.

A small number of puffers survive as conservation projects, though most have diesel engines The Spartan, a diesel engined "puffer", is on display at the Scottish Maritime Museum at Irvine. "Spartan" has recently undergone restoration work on her hull, and is still being refitted but now back in the water.

The next stop was Ardrossan, I had taken a picture of the Ferry closing on Arran earlier so it was no surprise to see the dockside empty. Apart from the harbour there didn’t appear to be much more to the town, although when I came out on the A78 to West Kilbride and Largs, I was able to get a beautiful view of Arran, under the clouds.

The road between the two towns brings two sights that makes you really think the first one is and also poses a question. It is the giant elevator and conveyor lift for taking coal to the major Coal terminal at Hunterston and the very name should give you a clue of what is next door. Hunterston Nuclear Power Station. I had mentioned that when I visited Heysham that I was aware that the huge proportion of Nuclear Power Stations had been place well away from the local population; why? is beyond me. To be frank; 3 Mile Island!, Chernobyl!, it was irrelevant how far away from civilisation they were because in this country you couldn’t get them far enough away, if they are badly managed.

I have visited the former or at least the entrance to it and it is one of the most benign sights you will ever see. Three Mile Island is so named because it is located 3 miles downriver from Middletown, Pennsylvania and I passed this way on one of my trips from Washington Airport to Harrisburg, the state capital of Pennsylvania, where my company’s HQ was. The power station had a very mixed history including a box office smash hit with the film China Syndrome and even now has still not been fully de- commissioned.

Hunterston B started generating electricity on 6 February 1976. Its net electrical output is 1,215 MW. Operating at its current (May 2008) reduced level of around 70% of full output, Hunterston B is capable of supplying the electricity needs of over 1 million homes.

In 1977 there was a minor incident but such were the safety procedures that it was contained
When maintenance work was carried out on the reactor and the pressure in the gas cooling system was reduced, sea water was able to flow back up this bypass pipe and into the reactor. The residual heat of the reactor was such that the seawater evaporated rapidly, leaving deposits of salt in the reactor around the gas circuit. It was estimated at the time that the reactor could be out of operation for a year, that the repairs could cost £14 million, and that electricity tariffs would have to rise by between 1 and 2 per cent. Extensive modelling work was performed in the Nuclear Power Company's (NPC) Whetstone, Leicestershire, fluid flow laboratories to determine where the salt would have been deposited, and the salt was successfully removed by technicians using vacuum cleaners and the plant returned to operation without too much delay. It is currently scheduled to be decommissioned in 2016.

The nearby Hunsterton A was opened in 1959 and operated from 1964 to 1989 and is currently in the middle of decommissioning.

Without stopping it was up to Largs which is deemed to be one of the jewels of the North Ayrshire coast and I cannot argue, it was not only attractive, it was very busy the landing stage area for the ferry to Great Cumbrae Island was crammed full of cars and cyclists, despite the road running round the Island I had decided to give it a miss, as it was a long time on a ferry for 15-20 mins of riding it would take to get around the Island.

It was then up to Skelmorlie and Then Wemyss Bay before turning off on to the A770 where I pulled over to take the following photo of the ferries that run between Gourock and Dunoon it made me think of one of the rather surreal animations in children’s TV programme Teletubbies when they show a number of ships sailing in formation.

It was now turning out to be a beautiful day and I was keen to cover as much ground as I could, as the forecast for this evening was not good and I had already decided that I was going to find a small hotel or B&B probably around Dunoon area. Shortly after this I pulled up at McInroy’s Point on the outskirts f Gourock to have a quick look at the competing ferry for the run over towards Dunoon, Western Ferries run two boats between this point and Hunters Quay near Dunoon, it appears that it is a quicker run, however according to the timetables it is exactly the same time as the Caledonian MacBrayne ferries from Gourock.

As I said I was enjoying this section of the ride so it was quickly underway once againand I was through Greenock before stopping at Port Glasgow for fuel close to Newark Castle (47) The castle was built in 1478 by George Maxwell when he inherited the Barony of Finlanstone (Finlaystone). The original castle had a tower house within a walled enclosure or barmkin entered through a large gatehouse. All that remains of the outer defensive wall is from one of the original corner towers. It is thought that there would have been a hall and ancillary buildings such as a bakehouse and brew house inside the walled enclosure.

In the late 16th century the castle was inherited by Sir Patrick Maxwell, a powerful friend of king James VI of Scotland who was notorious for murdering two members of a rival family and beating his wife who left him after having 16 children. In 1597 Sir Patrick expanded the building, constructing a new north range replacing the earlier hall in the form of a three storey Renaissance mansion. At this time the barmkin (defensive) wall was demolished except for the north east tower, which was converted into a doocot. (Scottish for Dovecote).

In 1668 the Glasgow authorities purchased 18 acres (7 hectares) of land around Newark Castle from Sir George Maxwell who was then the laird, and developed the harbour into what they called "Port Glasgow". The last Maxwell died in 1694 and the castle had a series of non-resident owners. An early tenant was a ropemaker called John Orr who also dealt in wild animals such as big cats and bears which he obtained from ships visiting the Clyde and often housed in the castle cellars. The cellars and gardens were later rented by Charles Williamson who blocked access from the hall to stop the joiner John Gardner who rented the hall from stealing fruit stored in the cellars.

Newark Castle came into state care in 1909 and is now a property of Historic Scotland with excellent visitor facilities.

From here I carried on down the A8 and took the slip road for non-motorway traffic up through Bishopton before taking the turning for Erskine Bridge to cross the River Clyde, yes according to the ordnance survey map, at this point it stopped being the Firth of Clyde and became the River Clyde, hence I felt justified crossing at this point and getting on the A82 for a short section before it split and I took to the A812, which took me through Old Kilpatrick and into Dumbarton and the unmistakable image of Dumbarton Rock and Dumbarton Castle (48) which has the longest recorded history of any stronghold in Great Britain.

At least as far back as the Iron Age (and probably much earlier) this has been the site of a strategically important settlement, whose residents were known to have traded with the Romans. The presence of a settlement here is first recorded in a letter Saint Patrick wrote to King Ceretic of Alt Clut, (or Clyde Rock) in the late 5th century.

From the fifth century until the ninth it was the centre of the independent British Kingdom of Strathclyde. The King of the Britons of Dumbarton in about AD 570 was Riderch Hael, who features in Norse legends. It is said that during his reign Merlin stayed at Alt Clut. In 756 the first (and second) losses of Dumbarton Rock were recorded. A joint force of Picts and Northumbrians captured Alcluith after a siege, only to lose it again a few days later.

By 870 Dumbarton Rock was home to a tightly packed British settlement that served as a fortress and as the capital of Alt Clut. The Vikings had laid siege to Dumbarton for four months, eventually defeating the inhabitants when they cut off their water supply. The Norse king Olaf returned to the Viking city of Dublin in 871, with two hundred ships full of slaves and looted treasures. Olaf came to an agreement with Constantine I, King of Scots, and Artgal of Alt Clut. Strathclyde's independence may have come to an end with the death of Owen the Bald, when the dynasty of Kenneth mac Alpin began to rule the region.

In medieval Scotland, Dumbarton (Dùn Breatainn, which means 'the fortress of the Britons') was an important royal castle. It sheltered David II (Robert the Bruce's son) and his young wife, Queen Joan, after the Scottish defeat at Halidon Hill near Berwick-upon-Tweed in 1333. Patrick Hepburn, 1st Earl of Bothwell, was Captain of Dumbarton castle on April 1, 1495. In 1548, after the equally disastrous Battle of Pinkie, east of Edinburgh, the castle protected the infant Mary, Queen of Scots for several months before her removal to France for safety.

The castle's importance declined after Oliver Cromwell's death in 1658. But threats posed by Jacobites and the French in the eighteenth century caused new structures and defences to be built and the castle continued to be garrisoned until World War II.

Today all visible trace of the Dark-Age Alcluith, literally Clyde Rock its buildings and defences, have gone and precious little survives from the medieval castle. The most interesting structures today are the fortifications of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, which illustrate a painful struggle by military engineers to adapt an intractable site to contemporary defensive needs. The splendid views from the twin summits of White Tower Crag and The Beak remind us why this rocky outcrop was chosen as 'the fortress of the Britons' all those centuries ago.

The castle is open to members of the public who wish to climb the 557 steps to the White Tower Crag and view all the other features on a daily basis during the summer season and Saturday-Wednesday in the winter.

Dumbarton Rock itself is in state ownership and is legally protected by the Scottish Government as a Scheduled Ancient Monument, to conserve it for future generations. Activities such as rock climbing are forbidden as any change or damage caused is considered a criminal offence.

Leaving Dumbarton once again I had a section of really enjoyable riding, through Cardross, Helensburgh and Rhu. And as I approached Shandon, I was strcuk by a large but very, very messy Peace Camp on the side of the road, irrespective of their views, they do themselves no favours in the way they look, it really was a mess.

The reason it was there is quite simple the massive Faslane Base HMNB Clyde, which is the home of the UK’s Nuclear Submarine base, I was staggered by how big it actually was, it seemed to go on for miles, eventually I pulled into Garelochhead and found a lovely little coffee shop at the top of the Village. it was now just after 2.30pm in the afternoon and I was desperate for a cup of tea, I was also a bit peckish so I had a lovely Ploughmans Lunch, I had expected something half the size of what finally arrived but it was delicious.

Back under way I headed off round the peninsular on the opposite side of the loch and separates Gare Loch from Long Loch, just touring around I had my eyes opened to the huge significance this area has to both the Royal and also US Navy. Immediately around the coast I stopped to look across to Faslane and then down the Loch itself.

When I got down to Kilcreggan I stopped again for a quick photo looking over towards Gourock.

After this I head back up the other side past the armaments depot at RNAD Coulport where all the weapons used by the Royal Navy in this part of the world are stored. For obvious reasons I didn’t even attempt to take any photos for the next hour or so, even when I was taking the back roads up to join the A814 to Arrochar, I had thought of stopping at one point for a photo, looking down over the base at Faslane only to have second thoughts when I spotted an MOD Police landrover patrolling just inside the security fence to my left.

Soon after getting back on to the A814 itself I was soon struck by the sight of Fort Rosalie a vessel I had discussed in an earlier post when I came back from Northern Ireland and mentioned Cammell Laird shipyard in Birkenhead. I had mentioned that she was in dry dock there, well I was wrong she had actually come out a few months prior to that date, it is now here sister ship the Fort Austin that is currently going through a major refit.

I was able to stop and have a chat with the MOD Policeman armed with his Heckler and Koch machine pistol a little further on but didn’t dare pull out my camera again. The road was wet and I would suffer this more and more during the rest of the day as the furtehr North and West I went the showers seemed to be coming in. A sight that could be seen more clearly when I pulled over at ‘Rest and be Thankful’ on the A83.

Before taking the B828 and B839 over the hills to Ardno near the top of Loch Fyne. A point I would go through again approx, 24 hrs later, this time I was to head south on the A815 towards Dunoon alongside Loch Eck.

Shortly afterwards turning off to take the track through Glen Finart to Ardentinny then down to Blairmore before getting on the A880 which was firstly called Shore Road and then more aptly for this part of the world MIDGE Road. For the run around Holy Loch.

Another piece of history was immediately sparked in my brain, purely by the name. In July 1960 the Holy Loch was designated as ‘Site 1’, to provide forward servicing facilities for the USA’s first SSBN Squadron in the UK. It was the only such base outside US waters and was strategically vital because of the limited range of the Polaris missile.Submarine Squadron 14 arrived there on 3 March 1961 followed by the USS Patrick Henry (SSBN 599) on 8 March 1961 for a major refit. The number of submarines being supported by Squadron 14 varied over the years. On 2 April 1987 the 2500th Ballistic Missile Deterrent Patrol was completed by USS Mariano G Vallejo. However with the reduction in European tension after the end of the Cold War, it was announced on 6 February 1991 that the Holy Loch base would close.

On 6 March 1992 the last US Navy ship – the familiar submarine tender USS Simon Lake - sailed out of the Holy Loch, ending thirty one years of America presence in the Dunoon area. The tradition of friendship and cooperation between the US Navy and the people of Dunoon which endured for 31 years is a cherished part of Site One’s history.In the wake of the base were necessarily large-scale plans for environmental cleanup, beginning with Robertson’s Yard, which serviced some small American boats but latterly became a scrap heap. It was purchased by Argyll and the Islands Enterprise as part of a plan to spearhead the regeneration of the loch and the immediate area. A number of substantial tourism projects were also under construction within a year of the closure of the base, aiming to replace some of the revenue generation of the base in the area.

This latter work has proved to be extremely successful, riding around the loch towards Hunters Quay and ultimately on to Dunoon there is now no outward signs of the former use of the loch.

From Sandbank and Hunters Quay, the road runs around the front to Dunoon and rding along this section I had to make a double take, a business contact from Cisco I had been speaking to only a few days previously was walking along the front with his family and their dog. I then turned around road back along checked again and it was Darrell so once more I turned around and went up to great him, he looked at me totally bemused, surprise, surprise. Helmet on black visor down, who the hell was going to recognise me?. So after lifting the visor and introducing myself, he was as surprised as I was that we came upon each other in this part of the world.

After exchanging good wishes for our respective holidays I made my way into Dunoon, it was now just after 5.00pm and I though I would have an early finish, the forecast wasn’t brilliant and whilst I could have made it to Rothesay on Bute I didn’t know when I would get there and there was no guarantee whether I would find anything when I did get there, at least here I had found a Tourist Info office that was still open.

Young Christine behind the counter worked hard and found me a room for the night in the Esplanade Hotel, yep just how it sounded, part of a small group of tourist hotels on the West Coast. With the confirmation in place I decided that I was going to explore a little further around the coast and tick that off before morning. With that in mind I continued on down the A815 to toward and took one of the last photos of the day, overlooking my destination for tomorrow, The Isle of Bute.

Further around the coast the road diminished to a single track road, firstly to Port Lamont and the ultimately the end of the lane at Glenstriven. The end of this lane brought about yet another surprising sight. RFA Orangeleaf, at her moorings. RFA Orangeleaf (A110) is a Leaf-class fleet support tanker of the Royal Fleet Auxiliary.

RFA Orangeleaf saw action in the Gulf War in 1991 and was one of the first units to hear the code "Walkman" which was to signify the start of the offensive against Saddam Hussein's forces in Kuwait.

During early to mid-2004, the ship took part in a deployment with a French carrier battle group, centred around the Charles de Gaulle to the Indian Ocean. She also appeared in the International Fleet Review of 2005.

As MV BALDER LONDON, before joining the RFA, she saw action in 1982, carrying aviation fuel to the Falkland Islands from Ascension. At the end of the conflict, she entered San Carlos water.

RFA Orangeleaf was built by Cammell Laird shipyard at Birkenhead, being launched in 1973. She was accepted into service in 1979. Over 30 years later she is still in Active service, Just goes to show the quality produced at Cammell Laird.

As it is the end of the track I created a bit of a stir and an MOD policeman soon popped his head out of the window of the security hut, with that in mind I waved to him and pointed to the 4 container ships tied up, further up the loch before taking my photo.

It wasn’t until the following day when I took a photo from the other side of the loch and then look at Google Earth did I see the huge Fuel Tank Farm, cut and hidden in the hillside behind the tanker.

I then made my way back to the Hotel, across some streets that were being re-surfaced, with raised man hole covers, Christ! Were they raised, when I hit one I thought I had damaged the wheel. Shortly afterwards I arrived at the hotel, which turned out to be a little better than I expected, the views from the upper lounge were stunning, despite the increasingly grey sky. It was owned by an Indian family and staffed by a mixture of Poles and Russians, okay I had come to expect this in London but I though hotels in this part of the world would have more locals involved.

I arrived just in time, as I was unloading the bike and getting it parked up underneath an overhang that would keep it dry and secure overnight a large coach party arrived and started disgorging it’s contents which made me lock and unload the bike faster than I’d ever done before.

In my snug but very comfortable room, I noted a heated towel rail, so I took the opportunity to was some socks and underwear for the next day. After which it was download the camera and then go downstairs, with the view of having a quick drink before walking into Dunoon to get something to eat, a task that got as far as walking out of the back entrance of the hotel to find the forecast rain had arrived and it was getting heavier. I then performed a quick paced walk around the block before coming in the main entrance again. Straight to the bar another pint and then it was up to my room and opened up my supplies box and made myself a couple of sandwiches. I didn’t fancy eating in the restaurant, in fact I never do even when I am away with work, it is either somewhere away from the hotel or I buy a Salad bowl and some additional items in a local supermarket. I must save my company a fortune.

Half an hour of writing up my notes and I can feel my eyes closing, so it was off to bed again, well before 10.00pm and I’m starting to think I am a wuss, but in my defence I’ve been on the road for nearly 9 hours today and weather permitting I plan to get going as early as possible tomorrow morning.

Take care and as Mick says ‘You don’t stop riding when you get old, you stop when you use Tourist Information!.

Scotland Day 1 - Like fine wine, the start refreshing, the middle was okay, I then had some doubts And THEN the finish was spectacular!!

2009-08-10T13:26:00.000-07:00

The morning dawned bright yet a little breezy with the forecast for the day ahead to be a little mixed as I reached the end of the days riding on the Ayrshire coast. After a hearty breakfast I got on the road relatively early and soon picked up my route where I had left off last time on the outskirts of Carlisle. It was quickly out through Kingstown and Cargo before being brought to a halt by a level crossing just after Rockliffe. Unfortunately I didn’t get my camera out in time to catch the high speed express flashing through. Well it was really travelling.After this the map gave me the impression that I was going to either get on to the A74 or at least cross it, however with the upgrade to Motorway status there is a small road that runs along side it, separated by a barrier and a screen, a little way along this I was able to pull over close to a farm entrance to get a shot of my first look at the Solway Firth beyond the power lines. I then got a move on, I wanted to really cover the miles today, so it was into Gretna and then immediately out on the B721 through Eastriggs before changing to the B724 in Annan to continue the run along the coast before turning on to the B725 which took me down to Caerlaverock Castle (41) it is a 13th-century triangular moated castle in the Caerlaverock Nature reserve.

Being very close to the border with England, it had to be defended several times against English forces. One such occasion was the Siege of Caerlaverock of 1300 by Edward I of England who had eighty seven of the most illustrious Barons of England in his host, including knights of Bretagne and Lorraine. The Maxwells, under their gallant chief, made a vigorous defence, showering upon their assailants such heavy missiles that they retired time and again; but in the end the garrison were compelled to surrender, when it was found that there were only sixty men all told, and that they had defied the whole English army for a considerable period. In recent years, Historic Scotland has organised re-enactments of the Siege.

Possession of the castle was subsequently restored to Sir Eustace Maxwell, Sir Herbert's son, who at first embraced the cause of John Baliol, and in 1312 received from Edward I an allowance of £20 for the more secure keeping of the castle. He afterwards gave in his adherence to Robert Bruce, and his castle, in consequence, underwent a second siege by the English, in which they were unsuccessful.

But fearing that this important stronghold might ultimately fall into the hands of the enemy, and enable them to make good their hold on the district, Sir Eustace dismantled the fortress, a service and sacrifice for which he was liberally rewarded by Robert Bruce.

I pulled up in a small picnic area close by with what appeared to be a very strange sign.

Behind the high gorse bushes and high hedges was part of the Nith Estuary, just to the right of the picture was a very overgrown stile giving access to the marshes and sand flats beyond.
I decided to go and stand on a Picnic bench close by and was able to get a much clearer view of the estuary that runs up to Dumfries. A little further on I stopped on the banks of the Estuary to get a better picture and came across a local tradition for the first time. Although the picture and caption talks about catching fish in the nets close to this spot it also talked about Flounder Tramping. This method of fishing was used in the coastal waters and river estuaries of South West Scotland for centuries. Once trapped the fish were often secured by impaling them on a leister before being bagged. A leister is the local name for a trident or three pronged long handled spear.

It was then quickly into Dumfries for a quick refueling stop before heading down to the village of New Abbey, I hadn’t originally planned on stopping to take a picture of the Sweetheart Abbey but entering the village it provided such a striking image I just had to turn around and come back to this spot.It was a Cistercian monastery, founded in 1275 by Dervorguilla of Galloway, daughter of Alan, Lord of Galloway, in memory of her husband John de Balliol. His embalmed heart, in a casket of ivory and silver, was buried alongside her when she died - The monks at the Abbey then renamed the Abbey in tribute to her. Their son, also John, became king of Scotland but his reign was tragic and short. The depredations suffered by the Abbey in subsequent periods, have caused both the graves to be lost. The abbey, built in deep-red, local sandstone, was founded as a daughter house to Dundrennan Abbey; this Novum Monasterium (New Monastery), became known as the New Abbey.

I didn’t go much further before stopping again to get a photo across the Solway Firth.Although it doesn’t show on the photo but I could just make out the aerials at the former RAF Cardunnock; I then spotted an information point that gave some details on what could be seen, back down the coast towards Caerlaverock castle and further along to Carsethorn.The small port of Carsethorn, even something as small and out of the way as this it still has made it’s mark on history. When Edward Longshanks was attacking the nearby Carsethorn Castle he moored 97 ships here full of troops and supplies. It is also the port from where the founder of the US Navy; John Paul Jones, who we have mentioned previously for his attacks on the Royal Navy off the coast of the UK and his abortive and somewhat comical assault on Whitehaven, sailed when he emigrated from Scotland in 1760 aged 13.

Back on the A710 it was a great road and I was quickly into Dalbeatie and back out on the A711 and I shortly came to the most amazing banner outside a Campsite at Palnackie. The World Flounder Tramping Championships, yep! you read it right.

On the first Saturday each August, this small village on the Urr Water, hosts the World Flounder Tramping Championships. Several hundred competitors walk out onto the mud flats of the Urr Water estuary, south of the village, at low tide. They feel for flounder hiding beneath the mud with their toes, and trap the fish beneath their feet. The competition is held to raise funds for the Royal National Lifeboat Institution.

Along certain parts of this morning’s ride I had been getting views of a huge offshore wind farm if anything the largest one I had seen so far on my trip EON one of the UK's leading green generators, announced in 2007 they were starting offshore construction of its £325m Robin Rigg Wind Farm in the Solway Firth. It is now well under way.

The company used the jack-up vessel MV Resolution in the mammoth task of installing the 60 turbine foundations, each weighing up to 280 tonnes - the equivalent of around 70 fully grown African elephants - and two substation foundations.

The Resolution will used six massive legs, each almost half the length of a football pitch, to lift itself out of the water and create a stable platform for the work. Using an 80 metre crane to lift the foundations off the deck of the vessel and then drive them into the sea bed with a 140-tonne anvil a form of incredibly powerful hydraulic ram.

Each foundation consists of a monopile, which is a steel cylinder 50 metres long and 4.3 metres in diameter, and a large yellow transition piece, which is fixed over the top of the monopile and forms the base to which the turbine towers and substation platforms are fitted. The turbines supplied by Danish firm Vestas and are 80m to hub height with a blade diameter of 90m, meaning they are a maximum of 125m above sea level.

The MV Resolution is the world's first purpose-built vessel for carrying out the installation of offshore wind farms and is one of only a handful of vessels capable of carrying out the construction of what will be one of world's largest offshore wind farms.

Now my point on all of this, having seen so many wind turbines as I have been going around the coast and a large number stood apparently idle I am now starting to question what we are doing here. There is a huge green lobby calling for more and more of these, a current government that seems to encourage their use, yet I don’t see any form of lobby about the environmental and wildlife impact of these things, The Solway Firth is the home of a large number of migratory birds, that come to winter and feed on the muds flats. Has anybody done any research on what impact this huge artificial reef will have on the currents and the mud flats in years to come. There were a number of well documented reports of these Wind Turbines causing the deaths of migratory birds in the past.

Secondly if any body tries to convince me that these things are Carbon Neutral, watch out, I believe they have a huge Carbon Legacy, that will take years to recoup, in fact I would suggest, each one has legacy that will last beyond it’s useful life. Don’t get me wrong I am as worried about the future of our planet as anyone else but I would hate to see propaganda drive us head long down another route to disaster.

Carrying on along the A711 I then turned off through Townhead and Balmae on the way back onto the A711 I stopped to take the following photo of Kirkcudbright Bay.

As you can see the clouds are starting to build up and it is still before lunch time. When I arrived in the town I was quite surprised by how quaint and touristy it was. It was nothing like what I had expected, possibly I had got the wrong impression about this part of Scotland, something that was reinforced during over 70% of the places I visited on this trip.

After a quick run down he back lanes through Borgue and Knockbrex it was back up on to the A75at Gatehouse on Fleet, passing Cardoness Castle (42) It is a well-preserved 15th Century tower house just south west of Gatehouse of Fleet, It was originally owned by the MacCulloch family of Galloway also known as the MacCullochs of Myreton. They abandoned the castle in the late 17th Century, following the execution of Sir Godfrey McCulloch for the murder of a Clan Gordon neighbour. Fleet Bay can be seen from its battlements. It is now in the care of Historic Scotland.

A little further on I came to Carsluith Castle in the village of the same name. (43) The lands of Carsluith were held by the Cairns family until 1460, when they passed to James Lindsay of Fairgirth, Chamberlain of Galloway. He was probably the builder of the main tower at Carsluith in the late 15th or early 16th century. His son, Sir Herbert Lindsay, was killed at Flodden in 1513. The castle then passed, though a daughter of James Lindsay, to Richard Brown. The Browns (or Brouns) of Carsluith added to the castle, building the stair tower on the north side in the 1560s. A Roman Catholic family, the Browns feuded with the Protestant McCullochs of Barholm, and in 1579 Richard's son John was fined £40, when his son, also John, failed to appear on a charge of murdering the Mculloch laird of Barholm.

Another descendant of Richard Brown was Gilbert Brown of Carsluith, who served as the last abbot of Sweetheart Abbey, previously mentioned, before the Protestant Reformation. Later it was alleged several times that Gilbert was sheltering Jesuit priests at Carsluith, and in 1605 he was arrested for his Catholic sympathies. He was banished to France, where he became rector of the Scots College, Paris. He died in Paris in 1612.

The Browns of Carsluith emigrated to India in 1748, and the castle has not been occupied since. In the early 19th century, new farm buildings were built on to the castle, forming a U-plan steading which remains. Today the castle ruin is a Scheduled Ancient Monument, in the care of Historic Scotland.

Looking at the time I decided to push on it was now well past lunchtime and I had a personal target of getting beyond Ayr before pitching my tent, the forecast had been hopeful, although it did warn of showers at some point along the route. After a quick run into Newton Stewart it was back out on the A714 to Wigtown.

It is well known today as Scotland's National Book Town and is home to a wealth of second-hand book shops. And despite the time I took the opportunity of stopping over to have a look in some of them and see what I could find, as I hadn’t brought a book with me this time around. I was also looking to see if I could find a decent Map I had bee working off the Collins A-Z map of Scotland and although it wasn’t bad, it missed out on some the things I had become used to with the Ordnance Survey Road Series Maps, I have been using to date, such as contour lines and better definition on points of interest, such as castles etc, but the two worst points were the size of the text, I struggled to read it, as well as missing out complete villages that I came across on my ride which at times made me think I was going wrong. To cut a long story short after searching in four or five of them, I didn’t find anything I really wanted to read, although a couple of Ellery Queen classics had me interested but they were special edition hard backs and I didn’t want to buy them and end up ruining them by getting them soaked during my travels, nor did I find the type of map I was searching for.

Leaving Wigtown and heading the Isle of Whithorn which is at the tip of The Machars peninsular I passed airfield (40) the former RAF Wigtown, an airfield that has pretty much returned to agricultural use. The area was originally covered with anti-invasion defences at the start of World War II, to deny its use to enemy aircraft, but these were cleared once the site had been allocated for wartime use.

The airfield opened in 1941 as a training school, and hosted No 1 Air Observers School from September 13, 1941, to February 1, 1942, and operated in conjunction with a tracked target range near the coast to the southeast. Initially constructed with grass runways, flooding of the land soon caused these to become unusable, and two concrete runways were installed during 1942.

Operations at the airfield came to an end in 1945 with the end of the war, and the field passed to Maintenance Command and was placed in care and maintenance, transferring to No 14 Maintenance Unit from July 1, 1946, to March 1, 1948, when the airfield was finally closed.
A quick stop at Garlieston for a quick picture of the harbour and I was quickly underway again.
On to Isle of Whithorn and the following photo.

Back up to Gasserton and then onto Monreith, I stopped to take a photo of this very hardy group in the sea and the grey skies out to sea, it looked increasingly likely that I was going to get wet at some point. I then had the great fun of riding up o Glenluce on the A747 before turning off to take the back lanes through Stairhaven and then Milton before joining the A75, which was an experience all by itself, Since leaving Gretna the traffic had been fairly light and certainly none of the huge 40 tonne atics. As I waited at the junction 6 of these leviathans blasted past on their way to either Stranrear or Cairnryan for the ferry to Northern Ireland. There was a huge line of traffic held up behind them but I was soon able to get out and finally past the cars and eventually the artics as they slowed to climb a small rise.

No sooner had I done this when my turning onto the B7077 and B7084 came up, this brought airfield at West Freugh (41). Dating back to 1936, RAF West Freugh first opened as an Armament Training Camp in 1937. With the arrival of World War II, its facilities were expanded to provide training for observers, navigators, and bomb aimers, with the addition of a bombing range and creation of a Bombing Trial Unit. The airfield remained operational after the war ended, and a large area of surrounding land, and sea within the bay, now serve as an MoD bombing range, MoD West Freugh, located three miles (5 km) northeast of Sandhead and five miles (8 km) southeast of Stranraer, extending over the foreshore and much of Luce Bay. The site has also been developed as a satellite ground station, primarily used for the reception of satellite based imagery. Although full time operation of the airfield ended in 2001, it still maintains a main runway of 1,841 metres (6,040 ft), and a secondary runway of 914 metres (3,000 feet) on care and maintenance by defence contractor QinetiQ, who took the facility over at that time. This allows the range to be reopened on a campaign basis to provide a controlled air space in which bombing trials can be conducted and monitored, and short range surface to air missiles (SAM) and rockets can be fired. Fixed and rotary wing machines guns may also be fired into the land or sea ranges.

There was no stopping at this stage it was on to the A716 and down to Drummore at the tip of The Rhins Peninsular before coming back up using the back lanes towards Port Logan and then into Ardwell for the second time where I overshot the turning and had to retrace my steps, as I have said the map I was suing is not the best and I had gone over my route using a highlighter pen which if anything had made things worse. All of this was compounded by the lack of a road sign. I finally worked out that the single track lane I turned on to was the only option and thankfully it became clear I had made the right choice when I went through Ardwell Mains, although it wasn’t on my map it made sense I was going in the right direction. Although it was signed as a Single Track road with passing places, it was actually much wider than that and I could pass a car coming in the other direction if they used their brains and pulled out of the centre of the road. The only downside was the fact that it appears that the local council had decided to re-surface these lanes with that horrible tar & chip application, that leaves a big pile of stone chips, right on the riding line, so when I braked or applied any power the bike would try and get away from me, so I slowed right down to make sure I made it in one piece.

At the end of these lanes is Portpatrick and Dunskey Castle (44) It is a ruined, early 16th century tower house. The three-storey L-plan structure is sited on a promontory, with a rock-cut ditch, although the building is now a roofless shell. The north-east wing is of a later date, and the foundations of a south range are visible. Near the castle are the remains of a watchtower, built on the cliff edge.

A medieval fortification on the site was destroyed in 1489 by Sir Alexander M'Culloch of Myrtoun. The present Dunskey Castle was built by the Adairs of Kinhilt, who also possessed the Castle of St. John in nearby Stranraer, around 1510. In 1620, it was acquired by Hugh Montgomery, 1st Viscount Montgomery, who extended the building. In 1648 it passed to the Blair family, but was ruined by 1684. The current owners have restricted public access to the castle, which is a Scheduled Ancient Monument and a Category A listed building.

Leaving Portpatrick on the B738 I set out on my loop around the northern part of the peninsular I made really good progress, all the way around and into Kirkcolm before getting on the A718, during which I felt my first rain but thankfully , I seem to keep ahead of the shower all the way until I reached St Mary’s Croft, unfortunately I wasn’t wearing any waterproofs at this stage but thankfully it was very quick and I was soon in Stranrear, where I immediately pulled over into a filling station, so I could not only refuel but also shelter whilst I put my Waterproofs on. I just wish I had paid more attention when doing so.

Close by the Filling Station was the aforementioned Castle of St John (45) The Castle of St John is a medieval tower house in the centre of Stranraer. It was built around 1500 by the Adairs of Kilhilt, one of the most powerful families in Wigtownshire. Over the centuries the Castle has been used as a home, a local court, a military garrison and a prison. Videos and reconstructions are used to tell the story of: the medieval landowners who built and lived in the Castle; the Government troops who used the Castle as their headquarters during the "Killing Times" in the 1680's; and the criminals and debtors imprisoned in the Castle during the 19th century. It is currently run as a Museum by the local council.

Back on the A77 Northbound towards Ayr I was brought to a sharp halt by the following scene over Cairnryan a few miles further on.

It was seriously throwing it down and I wondered whether I should stop for a while find a diversion, find a hotel/campsite around Stranraer, unfortunately the nearest campsite is right in the middle of that rain storm, it did not look nice. I thought what the hell, I’ve got my waterproofs on so I went for it.

I didn’t take long before I was regretting not paying more attention when putting my waterproofs on. The water started coming down my neck, it was running up off my hands and up my sleeve, and I was even feeling wet around my waist, which I couldn’t understand until I stopped much later to see the bottom of my jacket was sticking out beneath my waterproofs and it was acting like a huge sponge and just the water sucking up. I didn’t have much time to even think about how wet I was getting as the roads where more like a river, and given all the lorries coming and going form the Ferry Port at Cairnryan my eyes were on stalks looking for the telltale signs of diesel on the road.

Thankfully is was very intense but relatively short lived and by the time I got to Ballantrae it was starting to ease and by Lendalfoot it had stopped. Along this section I passed the signs for Glenapp Castle, however I have not listed a couple of castles of this type previously and I have decided not to count this one either, Glenapp Castle was built in 1870 - a strikingly beautiful example of the Scottish Baronial style of architecture.

Designed by the celebrated architect David Bryce in 1870 for Mr James Hunter, the Deputy Lord Lieutenant of Ayrshire, the castle’s mellow sandstone battlements are topped by soaring turrets and towers, earning Glenapp a rightful place as one of the most romantic castles in Scotland.

The castle was purchased in 1917 by James Lyle Mackay, who later became the 1st Earl of Inchcape. The Inchcape family owned the castle until 1982, during which time they expanded the estate considerably and enlarged and altered the castle to its present form. Local hoteliers, the McMillan Family purchased the castle in June 1994, by which time it had, sadly, fallen into a very poor state of repair. Their daughter and son-in-law, Fay and Graham Cowan, made the castle their home and embarked upon a lengthy restoration following which it opened as a 5 Star Hotel.

Then I got to Girvan the sun was actually out and I was able to get my first real sight of the famous Ailsa Craig.

Shortly after leaving Girvan I came to Turnberry the home of the 2009 Open Championships a few weeks before I visited in fact a full two weeks after the final Saturday some of the temporary stands and scoreboards are still in place.

As you can see from the sky the time is getting on and given how wet and cold I was feeling, I decided I was going to get myself a room for tonight, try and dry my gear and get another early start tomorrow. However before that I had a few more sights to see.

In fact I was sat on one of them RAF Turnberry (42) was a World War I aerodrome and World War II airfield which occupied a small headland, now better known as Turnberry Golf Course. The A719 Maidens to Turnberry road passes through the site of the former airfield. Turnberry aerodrome served as one of a pair of air gunnery schools located in Ayrshire during World War I, and operated by the Royal Flying Corps. Air Gunnery School No 2 was located at Turnberry, The aerodrome opened in 1917, and closed in 1918 with the end of World War I.

During the 1930s the site was reactivated, when it was then described as an anti-aircraft landing ground. The airfield had been used as a base by the Auxiliary Airforce until 1942, when a tarmac runway was laid. The airfield was then used for training units of the RAF in torpedo bombing at the nearby River Clyde torpedo ranges, and for air sea rescue missions. It seems some 1,200 men were stationed at Turnberry.

Reconstruction of the airfield by Wimpey had started in 1941, when it was structured as a formal training facility. The airfield reopened in 1942, but the layout of the surrounding land meant there was no possibility for expansion, and it closed in 1945 with the end of World War II.

In use, the layout proved less than ideal with approaches being made over the sea, or from the hills to the east. Both routes were compromised by the prevailing winds which generally blew inland from the sea.

Following the closure of the airfield, the accommodation was used to house Prisoners of War (PoW) until 1946.

Abandoned after the war, the airfield reverted to its use as a golf course - which has reclaimed a section of one runway, but much of the runway network has survived to some degree, and is clearly visible in aerial images of the area. The main runway 04/22 ran northeast to southwest and was 6,250 feet long, with two subsidiaries: 00/18 ran north to south and was 4,500 feet long, while 09/27 ran east to west with a length of 3,900 feet. The hills to the west housed the bomb store and technical site.

The former control tower is now a private house, and there may be a few other remains scattered around the site. The remaining serviceable section of runway, running southwest to northeast, were reopened during the 1960s and serve as a private landing strip for light aircraft which sees regular use during the annual Open Golf Tournament held on the golf course.

At Turnberry I turned off the A77 and went along to A719 along the coast and past the first of two castles in fairly quick succession, Culzean Castle (46). It was the constructed as an L-plan castle by order of David Kennedy, 10th Earl of Cassilis. He instructed the architect Robert Adam to rebuild a previous, but more basic, stately house into a fine castle to be the seat of his earldom. The castle was built in stages between 1777 and 1792. It incorporates a large drum tower with a circular saloon inside (which overlooks the sea), a grand oval staircase and a suite of well-appointed apartments.

In 1945, the Kennedy family gave the castle and its grounds to the National Trust for Scotland (thus avoiding inheritance tax). In doing so, they stipulated that the apartment at the top of the castle be given to General Dwight Eisenhower in recognition of his role as Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in Europe during the Second World War. The General first visited Culzean Castle in 1946 and stayed there four times, including once while President of the United States. An Eisenhower exhibition occupies one of the rooms, with mementoes of his lifetime.

Since 1987, an illustration of the castle has featured on the reverse side of five pound notes issued by the Royal Bank of Scotland.

In between the two castles is a phenomenon famous throughout the area and even beyond. This oddity at Croy Brae famous, though under its more usually applied name of Electric Brae, a name first given by someone who presumably thought that gravitational forces were being overcome by some sort of electric force.

There is a warning sign about slow vehicles as people experience the feeling of rolling uphill a Layby had been constructed in recent years to make things a bit safer.

The truth is less mysterious. As the stone placed by the layby explains, the effect is the result of an optical illusion. The inland end of this stretch of road is actually 17 feet higher than the coastal end, giving an overall gradient of 1 in 86. Yet because of the way the surrounding landscape slopes, the road appears to incline the opposite way, from its coastal end down to its inland end. The illusion is a powerful one, and the resulting effect is very weird, even when you know its cause. The layby was full so I had no space or time to take a photo so I pushed on to a viewing point a little further on.

Dunure Castle (47) stands in ruins on a rocky promontory on the Carrick coast, protecting the small Dunure harbour. The site dates from the late 13th century; the earliest charter for the lands dating from 1256, however the remains of the building are of 15th and 16th century origin. One tradition is that the castle was built by the Danes and another states that the Mackinnons held the castle from Alexander III, as a reward for their valour at the Battle of Largs.

The castle is the point of origin of the Kennedys of Carrick, who once ruled over much of south western Scotland and were granted the lands in 1357. This family though should not be confused with the famous American Kennedy family which came from Co. Wexford in Ireland.
In August 1563, Mary, Queen of Scots visited the castle for three days during her third progress round the west of the country It has another more gruesome part in the history of this part of Scotland. In 1570, a dispute arose between Gilbert Kennedy, 4th Earl of Cassilis, and Allan Stewart, the succeeding lay Commendator of Crossraguel Abbey over the ownership of some of the abbey lands and their rental income. The Earl's uncle was Quintin Kennedy, the last true abbot of Crossraguel. Gilbert had expected to secure the Commendatorship, however Allan obtained it through the influence of his relative, Captain James Stewart of Cardonald. Gilbert, with sixteen men, caught Allan Stewart unawares in Crossraguel Woods whilst a guest of the Laird of Bargany, and tricked him into journeying to Dunure. At the castle he was deprived of his horse and weapons and guarded by six of the Earl's men.

For two days Gilbert left the commendator to consider his fate and because he was obstinate and refused to sign over the lands and rentals he tortured him twice, roasting and basting his feet and body over a brazier in the Black Vault of the castle, aided bizarely by his cook, baker and pantrymen. As a result of the torture sessions of the first and seventh days of September 1570, the lands were signed over to Gilbert.

The Commendator was rescued from his confinement by the Laird of Bargany, Allan's brother in law, who arrived with a body of men; first hiding in the chapel and then storming the castle. The rights to the abbey lands were settled, partly by the Earl providing Allen Stewart with sufficient funds to allow him to live 'comfortably' for the rest of his life. In the meantime he had been taken to the Cross of Ayr where he had denounced the Earl of Cassillis. The Earl however was never fully brought to book for his actions by the Privy Council and Allen Stewart never walked again.

It was now the relatively short run into Ayr and to start the search for a bed for the night and to try and get my gear dry and a game of cat and mouse with 3 Italian guys in a hire car.

I tried a private but relatively large private hotel at the northern end of town just before it becomes Prestwick first, and as I was asking the manager if he had any space one of the Italians was behind me, when I had finished, he waited to get exactly the same information and directions.

I then tried the Holiday Inn Express as recommended as I thought I could use my priority points, but again they were full. The duty manager was more than helpful and pointed me in the direction of a couple of hotels, as I now had the Italian behind me again, I thought I would throw him off the scent by making him think I was going elsewhere, more fool me, he had signal on his phone and was able to phone ahead and get a booking, thankfully I was still able to get a room in the Stair Inn, wow! What a find! If you are ever in the area, either on business or pleasure, this should be your base, very inexpensive and better quality than most things you find. I had been informed about a Country House Hotel a little closer but that would have come in at £120 a night, The Stair Inn were apologetic, that they only had a Twin Room left at £50 for Bed and Breakfast and to be frank the Bedroom was top rate, I would be more than happy to take someone there for a romantic weekend, the bathroom was Snug shall we say, but adequate, deficiencies were more than made up for by the staff, everyone had a smile on their face. The food is better than good.

One other guest asked me what I was doing and when he heard his comment was ‘you’ve lucked out here’ and I totally agree with him If it was only to meet Caroline at the Stairs Inn. It takes a bit of finding but you’ve just got to make the effort.

After getting a quick shower it was now rapidly approaching 8.00pm so I wanted to get down to the bar and get something to eat. I had not ate anything since 8.30am this morning so you could say I was a little hungry.

A lovely meal, washed down by a couple of pints was just what the doctor ordered and took some time to write up some of these notes as I sat there, tiredness soon started to lay its heavy hand on me, so it was off to bed, for a great night’s sleep despite a busy pub being underneath me. Before I did I made sure that I had laid my gear out in the best way possible so it could dry.

Take care and as Mick says ‘You don’t stop riding when you get old, you stop when you find a little jewel!.

August 7th On the road again and many, many hours later I was still on it !.

2009-08-08T12:16:00.000-07:00

As the old song goes, “on the road again” and wow I do have a new bike. I took things very, very easy at the beginning, okay I had taken her out for a quick run the weekend before but that was without any luggage and it was not enough to take the molding injection remnants off the tyre, so I had at least a few hundred miles before this new rear tyre had bedded in, one problem being a lot of motorway miles don’t help, you need a few hundred miles of ‘proper’ riding before it is okay.

Because I had a few jobs to do, combined with finishing the working week meant I only got going at just before midday, even so I thought I would still get to Carlisle before 5pm, therefore I was thinking of going a bit further before finding a campsite, some hope!.

After a couple of quick stops, first one to pick up a repeat prescription then on to Nick Robinson Motorcyles to pick up a spare Clutch Cable, I didn’t need it but given the cost it was a good safety measure. The clutch was the only part of the bike I haven’t touched yet and sod’s law says, if I didn’t do something about it, it was the one part to fail.

Even with all this I was on the M4 west bound by 12.30pm and then on to the A34 15 mins later. When I was still on it an hour and half later I was starting to get a little pi**ed off. Especially as I was the one now leading a line of bikes trying to filter through the lines of stationery traffic, and getting more and more hett up by some idiots who, rather than help out by easing out of your way made it their mission in life to block you off.

Can I at this point highlight the fact that The Highway Code recommends motorcycles should ‘filter with care’ wherever possible, eventually I got within 3 miles of the M40 junction and the traffic was completely blocked so I then wove my way for a further mile or so before taking the turning towards Middleton Stoney and then Ardley before getting back on the M40.
I got onto the M40 at junction 7 at about 2.30pm, when I would have normally expected to get on it at about 1.30pm, so that had added an hour to my trip. The M40 wasn’t bad but the traffic was very heavy and a lot of bikes on the road to the Bulldog Bash at Stratford Upon Avon, I was passed by a number of large groups, who all waved their greetings. I decided I wanted to make up some time and took the decision to take the M6 Toll road as it would help me bypass the roadworks on the M6 but before I even got to the M42 there was another hold up on the M42, when we got going again there appeared to be no reason for the queue signs and the speed limits, I can only think it was due to a broken down vehicle, the ‘traffic wombles’ were clearing. These Traffic Officers do a lot of valuable work, but I do think that they are sometimes a bit over the top, closing the road completely to recover a crashed or broken down vehicle from the hard shoulder, something I witnessed a bit later on in the afternoon.

I finally got going again and stopped at the services on the M6 Toll to refuel and get my change sorted for the paybooth, back on the pay booth and on my way, one question I have is why have the people behind the Toll road come up with such a stupid figure for Motorbikes, probably why hardly anyone uses it, £2.70, £2.00, £2.50 would be easier even £3. but £2.70 is an awkward amount to try and hold onto to hand over.

Immediately the M6 and M6 Toll merged the traffic slowed once again and I had to start filtering, at this point it appeared to be purely the weight of traffic and I had to be very careful as the traffic coming on from the M6 all wanted to try and get across to the outside lane , why some people seem to be fixated with getting to the outside lane as fast as possible, pushing their way in is beyond me. After a couple of junctions it eased a bit and we started moving at a reasonable speed.

Not for long however and once I got up to around junction 15/16 the traffic slowed dramatically again, for yet another hold up, this time the road was closed for 4 vehicles on the hard shoulder. Unfortunately I had an incident filtering, when one car didn’t see me and closed the gap which forced me across and I just clipped the wing mirror of a car on my inside. We both pulled over and swapped details, although given the minor scratching and the fact that he had already had another impact with and other car who had broken his glass, meant you could hardly see what damage I had caused and what was there previously. One thing to consider and I do, when I am fully loaded, I am almost the width of a small car, something that others would come to reali8se later in the trip.

Back under way I filtered the short way to the front of the stationery traffic to be met with the sight of the Bling, Bling BMW R1200GS I had come across in New Quay in mid-Wales. I pulled up on the inside of the line of traffic as it appeared the whole carriageway had been closed and there was a Polish car, a private ambulance and a 40 tonne artic on the hard shoulder and inside lane, there appeared to have been no accident and no damage to any of the vehicles and when the ‘traffic wombles’ let us through, there was no debris or any evidence of any accident, so your guess is as good of mine why the whole carriageway was closed and the whole line of traffic got under way and were able to pass the vehicles in question without a problem.

By now I was in South Cheshire and it was well gone 4.00pm so any hope I had harboured of getting to a campsite North of Carlisle had gone out of the window an hour ago. I kept pushing on only to be met with the rush hour traffic around the M56 and M62 junctions then the perennial summer bottle neck around the M55 turn off for Blackpool.

After a refueling stop in the Lake District I pushed on to Carlisle, to arrive there close to 7.00pm in the evening with the idea of finding a cheap bed for the night and getting on the road early and catching up for all that I missed out on due to the delays.

As I pulled into Carlisle I spotted a Premier Inn and thought, ‘that’s for me’ unfortunately after enquiring at the reception desk, they had sold their last room just 20mins before I had arrived, damn traffic. Thankfully the receptionist had been talking with another hotel 10 mins closer to the centre of Carlisle who did have some vacancies so I got over there as fast as I could.

It was the Swallow Hilltop Hotel and was typical of the Swallow chain, or at least typical of the Swallow chain I have become accustomed to, basically very clean and well run but stuck in a 70’s time warp, all the rooms would have been state of the art in the late 70’s early 80’s but have not had a major overhaul since then, so it is dark varnished wood and white or magnolia walls everywhere. The Barman still has a uniform that is also a throw back with Waistcoat and Bow Tie, the beer and the menu also smacks back to those days as well. This time they were catering for a number of couples stopping off on there way to Scotland like myself as well as a Coach Party, that were on there way to The Lakes after a couple of days in Scotland.

By the time I was sorted it was gone 8.00pm so it was a couple of beers in the bar and back to my room, where I ate a cold Pasta salad I had packed ready for the night anyway then into bed.

Take care and as Mick says ‘You don’t stop riding when you get old, you stop when you get fed up with idiot car drivers!.

Chapter 45A August 22nd – A Holding Post

2009-08-07T11:14:00.000-07:00

I arrived back at the beginning of the week after a 10 day journey around the Scottish Mainland and a number of the islands. It was a very eventful time and will probably take me a number of weeks to complete all the relevant posts, So many great roads, major issues with traffic, a few idiots, a lot of great people, wonderful scenery when I could see it through the rain and some awful weather broken all too briefly with a couple of days of wonderful weather. (I'm going back to do some of these roads in good weather)

To give you a clue, although I had my tent with me I only actually used it for two nights, the rest of the time was guest houses, hotels and one night in a Youth Hostel Bunkhouse, sharing a room with 7 others.

I’ve also got to get my camera repaired and have some photos developed from the disposable cameras I had to buy for the last couple of days of my journey.

Before I get into completing all of the posts and put them up, I would like to mention a number of generous people.

The 3 ladies from my Dad’s golf club, Prenton Golf Club: Yep! he is still playing and is 89 in January. In his prime my father used to play off 2 and could hit the ball a prodigious length despite being relatively small in stature. It must be in the genes, as I used to have mid-single figure handicap when I was playing a lot and now my Son Adam, is on the verge of a single figure handicap, in fact his coach already views him as such and believes he will be a low- single figure handicap by this time next year.

Anne and Margeret Meikle

Mrs I Horan

My Dad’s golfing partner, Kenny Booth

On top of this I was very fortunate when I was going around Scotland a number of generous people made donations to add to the pot.

The landlord of the Stair Inn, in the village of Stair just outside Ayr. (Great place by the way)

The Post Mistress & Master of Post Office and Coffee shop at Port Bannatyne on the Isle of Bute (One of my all time favourite locations)

The owner and Post Mistress at the Clachan Filling Station on Kintyre

Charlie, one of the regulars at the Ferry Boat Inn in Ullapool

Chris, again from the above

Finally, I’m sorry I didn’t get his name but the father of 3 young children I met in the bar of the hotel I was staying in for work on Wednesday night, who also showed his generosity.

It all counts, thank you very much indeed all your generosity has been passed on.
With that I better get on with writing up my notes.

Take care and as Mick says ‘You don’t stop riding when you get old, when you have to sit down and write up your notes!

July 25th – Another rebuild Complete! but my car stops play, Thankfully!.

2009-07-26T06:44:00.000-07:00

Since arriving back from the last ride I had planned to go out again this weekend for a relatively short leg but long commute to ride around the coast of Dunfries & Galloway and Ayrshire.

However my car had been in the bodyshop this week to repair a fairly minor but very expensive dent in the rear passenger door of my car. Last weekend when I was finishing off the work on the bike I had started to plan to go into the company office in Birmingham and work from there on Friday leaving mid afternoon to head up to a Campsite North of Carlisle, before heading out to complete the next section on Saturday morning, with the idea of riding until Sunday Lunchtime before heading back home again. Yes a lot of riding for a weekend and as it got closer and the forecast worse, I was starting to think about the option of staying in Hotels etc.

But VW and their failure to deliver the parts on time saved me and I didn’t collect my car until late on Friday afternoon which didn’t leave me enough time, as meetings in London on Monday had been fixed in my diary for a few weeks.

It is now a case of booking 5-6 days off in a run around a couple of weekends to give me 10 days which should be enough time to complete the bulk of the Scottish Coast in one hit, including a stopover at my sister Helen’s place to use her washing machine.

Looking at the map of the UK it appears I have completed a significant amount, however I haven’t touched Scotland yet which is meant to account for 60% of the UK Coastline, okay a lot of that will be the parts of The Western Isles, The Orkneys and The Shetlands that I don’t intend to visit. The reason for that is quite straightforward, they don’t have coastal roads tending to have roads that run down the spine with spurs off down to villages and hamlets. The only two on the Agenda at the moment are Arran and Skye and a begging letter has gone off to Caledonian McBrayne to see if they can help.

The Green line is what has been covered so far. The house is approximately where I live and start out from each leg, the Green Box with the Map Pin is where it all started from in February and the motorbike is where I have got to so far. For obvious reasons I still feel as if I am riding uphill.

Since the last section was completed the following has been replaced and work done on ‘My Baby’ this includes a couple of jobs that have been ‘fitted in’ whilst she was in bits. Within days I was on the phone to Nick Robinson to order some further parts from him. They Included: a new chain, it couldn’t be adjusted any further. A new rear sprocket, it didn’t looked too bad on the bike but when the wheel was off you could really see the wear. When you replace a chain the front sprocket must be changed, now that was really worn. A chain guide, on my bike there is a plastic guide that fits around the rear swinging arm, it is advisable to change it but most people don’t, mine was so worn it had to go; I imagine it had been the originally one fitted to the bike so would have been in place for 45,000+ and two chains.

Whilst this was going on and I had the bike on the lift I decided to change the oil and fix a couple of other issues, one being the flip screen on the top of the windscreen that forces the airflow over my head when riding, it had been flapping around for a while, as fatigue had led to a couple cracks in the mounting. I’ve now adapted it and permanently fixed it to the windscreen.

Given the mileage covered I also decided ‘she’ deserved an oil and filter change, which I duly carried out, unfortunately to get at the filter properly it meant removing the engine bashplate, which is a huge piece of aluminium, unfortunately the mounting bolts on the front are not what they should be, in fact they should be retained nuts welded on the inside, however given an ‘off’ a few years ago when greenlaning the plates that fit across the from had broken and I fabricated a replacement and welded it in place, what I didn’t do was weld the nuts back in place, which was an absolute pain when trying to fit it back in place, more of that later.

After removing all the excess parts such as the pannier carriers etc. I used my unsual but effective way of getting the bike on the level, (I don’t have a centre stand) so I rig a set of ratchet straps through the rafters of my garage, and once they are tightened up the bike then stays upright and then gives me chance to lift the rear with a Paddock Stand, then it is a case of usually pushing the hydraulic Bike lift under the bashplate but this had to come off on this occasion, so I had to rely on the paddock stand.

So when taking things apart, the bashplate had to come off to replace the oil filter, okay some will say that this is not necessary however although you can drain the sump without taking it off, the oil filter is tucked inside the bashplate, so I would only fill it with the residue so it was best to take it off and clean the inside anyway. On top of this to take the cover off the front sprocket I needed to loosen the left hand Crash Bars, to a point of almost taking them off completely before I could get the plastic cover off, to achieve this I also had to remove the left footpeg. Believe me it was far from a straightforward task.

So the with everything off it was time to get the rear wheel off to both take the rear sprocket off and take it in to Micheldever Tyres for my second rear tyre of the challenge. I also decided to carry out some remedial work to the wheel, by cleaning up and painting the spokes, before applying a coat of lacquer to the whole wheel which should make it easier to clean next time around.

Getting the chain off is a bit of a crude engineering, it had a cold rivet link, which means the first task is to use and angle grinder to take the head of the rivet off, then it was a case of using a hammer and drift to knock it through.

Finally when putting it all back together the chain guide that was on back order arrived and I was able to fit that. Before putting the new chain on I invested in a special chain tool for re-assembling and flaring the head of the rivet correctly, which proved to be a lot easier than taking the old one off.

One of the final pieces to go back on was the engine bashplate and this is when the swearing started trying to get the nuts on the bolts at the back of the mounting, all I will say is the gap I had to get the nuts in place was half the size of my hand, so trying to squeeze it into place was very painful and never really successful, so I devised a way of taping the nut to the jaws of a long spanner, and it worked very well for the first one but the second one dropped off, so I had to undo the other one again and loosen the rear two to partially drop it down to get my hand in to retrieve the one that had got away. I eventually got it back together. After an hour of sweating and swearing I got it back into place.

With the bike now back in one piece another bit of good news, the replacement baseplate for my tank bag finally arrived, so once again I have a complete bike, which has also had a number of the sponsors stickers renewed and ones for Norfolkline added.

And although I won’t be going out to complete another section this weekend I will certainly be taking it for a test ride.

In my time of owning this bike, I reckon she is now one of the most customised and enhanced Africa Twins, anywhere, the list is too long to list here but everyone that has seen her comments on some of the modifications, now it is time to stop writing and get riding.

Take care and as Mick says ‘You don’t stop riding when you get old, you stop to build a new bike, Again!

June 29th A long run along the historic coast of Cumbria to Carlisle.

2009-06-30T04:27:00.000-07:00

I woke early after a great night’s sleep most of which can be put down to the hours of riding on the previous day, as I did on the previous weekend of riding I decided that I would forget breakfast and get going early, then look to find somewhere along the road for tea and a bacon roll, I know it is not the most healthy of foods but, it does keep me going for a long while after coming out towards Ulverston on the A590 towards Rampside, I pulled over near Greenodd for a quick photo to be followed shortly after by breakfast at a layby burger van and a good one at that. After being personally refueled I was off again into Ulverston before taking the A5087 towards Rampside, Having ridden this road a few times on my way home from competing in the Coast-to-Coast Challenge. It is a really excellent riding road, with nice sweeping bends, you can get into a really good rhythm, down at Roosebeck I was able to pull over and get my first sight of Roa Island and Piel Castle. It was turning out to be a beautiful morning and I was glad I had got my skates on. The new tent had a lot to do with that, it was very easy to take down and pack up. Then it was into Rampside and then down the Causeway to Roa Island to then look out over Piel Island with its Castle (39) which is right in the middle of the channel.Piel Castle also known as Fouldry (or Fouldrey) Castle, is situated on the south-eastern point of Piel Island, 1 km off the southern tip of the Furness Peninsula, protecting the deep water harbour of Barrow-in-Furness A wooden tower was built on the island in 1212, when King John allowed the monks of Furness Abbey to store provisions there. The abbey engaged in much trade through Piel Harbour and further fortified the site soon after the Scottish invasions of 1316 and 1322. In 1327 Edward III gave Furness Abbey a license to crenellate the tower and a motte and bailey castle was built. It was dismantled in 1403 but then partly rebuilt some years later. However it was in ruins by the 16th century. Some renovations took place in the mid-19th century.

The castle was a concentric fortification with a keep and three towers surrounded by a ditch. A well preserved keep and two baileys remain today. It is managed by English Heritage. Roa Island is also meant to be the home of Dave Myers of Hairy Bikers fame but I saw no evidence of him or his bike, which is a great shame as it would be ideal to get someone like him to endorse my travels around the UK. Back on the causeway I took the following looking up towards Barrow, the shipyard and the Gas Terminal in the foreground on the right.

It was then back up onto the A5087 and into Barrow, were a I took the opportunity to refuel and take in the floating restaurant/club ship Princess Selandia, former Danish ferry had a long career on the Storebaelt and the Baltic Sea. She is now a restaurant and nightclub ship, moored in Barrow-in-Furness, England.

Built for the Danish State Railroad, Dansk Statsbaner (DSB), she began service as Dronning Ingrid on the Korsør - Nyborg route in April 1951. Several changes of Danish inter-island and Danish-Germany routes ensued. She had to give up her Royal title in August 1979 and took the name Sjaelland or Selandia in 1979. Portraits of the Danish Royal Family remained in the state cabin on board. For a time she plied between Malmö, Sweden and Kopenhamn.

In 1985 she was sold to Danish Radio and TV as a studio and used as the setting for Denmark’s TV series "Berth 114". In 1988 she became a museum and restaurant ship and was sold to English interests in April 2002, being moved to Tilbury, England and renamed Selandia. Following purchase by Rick Lucas in June 2004, she was sailed from Tilbury to Barrow-in-Furness for a £2 million, nine-month refurbishment. The whole freight deck, which once carried trains to and from Sweden, was converted to “The Blue Lagoon” - a 2500-capacity nightclub now permanently berthed on the Town Quay. I thought I had taken a photo but when I looked it wasn’t there.

After that it was then off around the huge BAE Systems Shipyard which is the home of submarine manufacture in this country I had heard about them being built in sections and then moved around town to the final assembly building, each section being moved by a giant transporter similar to the ones you used to see moving around the Apollo Rockets. It was then over to the Isle of Walney and realised it really is an island I had always thought it was a peninsular, so it was over the swing bridge before turning left and going down to Biggar and South End before coming back up to Vickerstown but not before I stopped to take a couple of images back towards Barrow and the Shipyard.

Bypassing Furness Golf Club on the way back, which although it may not be one of the top courses in the country looks to be a real challenge even on a good weather day like today. Going through to the furthest point on the Island I was met with the view if the Wind Turbines out to sea and the marker for the off-shore pipeline that runs across the island and on to the mainland, then the Channel Marker a little further on, having learnt the lesson a little earlier in Northern Ireland, I took the opportunity to look inland which showed me the route through the channel out to sea.

Back to Vickerstown it was back to the top of Walney Island and RAF Walney an Airfield I struggled to get a great amount detail about despite all my searching, what little I did was very interesting.It was still Airfield (38) The airfield is owned by BAE Systems, who operate private communication flights to various locations across the United Kingdom. The Lakes Gliding Club also operates out of the airfield when flying conditions are favourable.

Barrow/Walney airfield was opened during World War II, though the site had been used as an airship station since World War I. Three runways were constructed, laid out in a triangular arrangement, The airfield was designated as an Air Gunnery School, the coastal site being ideal.

In October 1941 number 10 Air Gunnery School was opened with 10 Westland Lysander aircraft for towing target drogues and 2 Boulton and Paul Defiants for instructor and pupils to have airborne practice. By December there were 17 Defiants and there was now sufficient barrack space for 100 officers, 140 sergeants and 1,200 airmen. For reasons unknown the school was moved to Castle Kennedy near Stranraer and the existing school at Castle Kennedy was moved to Walney on 1 December.

In May 1946 the gunnery school was moved to RAF Valley on Anglesey and by the end of 1946 there were no aircraft at Walney. The airfield was left disused until it was sold 1959 to Vickers, the company that owned Barrow shipyard at the time.

Back over the swing bridge and into Barrow once more before turning left back on the A590. around to the junction with The A595 up towards Askam-in-furness then on to Ireleth before pulling over in a gateway to a field over looking Duddon Sands and across to Millom and Haverigg. To be blunt I could have stayed there all day looking at this view, it was stunning. Watching some golfers on the course close to the estuary in the distance through binoculars and just about making out the traffic on the far side.

I finally dragged myself away and back on the road Northwards through Kirby-in-Furness, Broughton-in-Furness Before turning down the A5093 into Millom, which is a very pleasant picturesque small town based on Iron Ore Mining which is commemorated by a monument of a miner pushing an underground mine cart. Coming in to town I spotted signs for RAF Millom Aircraft Museum and decided to have a look, however before I did that I spotted another sign and went and had a look there first, it turned out to be the workshop for renovating the aircraft that would be moved to the Museum later on.

There were two or three things I could recognise straight away but there was something down the side, that looked like the framework without any skin of something resembling a Handley Page Hampden if it was it was going to take a huge amount of renovation.

So here is a Short 360, a very early one at that, behind it is a Westland Whirlwind in Royal Navy Search and Rescue colours. Tucked in behind is the fuselage of a civilian BAe Jetstream. I have flown in examples of all three in my life, only the Whirlwind whilst in the RAF and I have to say it was the most enjoyable, the most bizarre being the Short, it felt as if I was flying inside a van. And the scariest and shortest trip was in a Jetstream feeder jet from Washington to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, having arrived from Heathrow I then waited around for 2 hrs to take a 20 min hopper flight. Up, level out, served with a coffee by the time the 6 passengers had been served it was time to collect them up ready for the descent. Which then turned into the bumpiest descent and landing I have ever encountered, it was like jumping off the top of your house onto a trampoline then rebounding twice as high, if we hadn’t been strapped in, I would have been bouncing off the ceiling.

The pilot aborted the first landing and went round again, this time we got down okay and I went through and collected my things before finally getting a rental car to drive into the City. I ended up a with a very nondescript Dodge Cavalier, what a pile of junk. After this experience I never again took a hopper flight on my way to the Company HQ, I would always fly into Washington, Newark or Philadelphia; collect a car there, usually a much better range available, then drive to Harrisburg and on each occasion I would usually arrive before the hopper flight did.

Back to the ride I quickly head down towards Haverigg where the actual Museum is outside the gates of a massive prison which has been built on the old RAF Millom, (39) I have to say this part of the Museum was a bit of a let down given the history of the site.

Opened in January 1941 as No.2 bombing and gunnery school and in summer became No. 2 air observer School. In 1942 it became No. 2 Observer Advanced Flying Unit until 1945 and in 1946 it was put under care and maintenance until 1953 when it was reopened for a 12 month period as No.1 Officer Cadet Training Unit. It was then again put under care and maintenance until the 1960’s when various army regiments passed through. HM Prison Service took it over in 1967. The museum project originated in a very small way in 1992, however due to a great deal of hard work by volunteers and ex-servicemen and women of the old RAF Millom the collection has all but outgrown the present buildings and the yard hence the move to the other part of Town.

In July 2005, Time Team from UK's Channel 4 TV, along with members of RAF Millom Museum, took part in a major project to excavate the crash sites of two A-26 Invader aircraft which had collided shortly after take-off over marshes close to the then USAAF BAD 2 airbase at Warton in Lancashire on the 29th November 1944. The planes, A-26B-10-DT 43-22298 (pilot: 2nd Lt. Kenneth E. Hubbard accompanied by Pvt. John F. Guy) and A-26B-15-DT 43-22336 (2nd Lt. Norman Zuber unaccompanied), had been en route to Brétigny, Oise in northern France to take up service with the 641st Squadron of the 409th Bombardment Group.

Coming back into Millom I was then turning North again on to the A595 up towards Bootle before turning off through towards Stubb Place and then onto Eskmaels. This route was disrupted due to roadworks but it brought me past another former military base, apart from reading about it on the RAF Millom Museum Website I can’t find a great deal of information. But it was a Fleet Air Arm shore station called HMS Macaw and was used it seems as a transit station for pilots returning from flight training in Canada during the second world war. It was also used to accommodate other workers at the Munitions factory close by and the range and proving ground at Eskmeals.

The pole next to the boat with the sign, advises visitors to proceed with caution and if the flag was flying you cannot proceed beyond this point due to live firing.

It was then back up to Waberthwaite to get back on the A595 before going through Muncaster and the Castle before stopping in Ravenglass for lunch. Muncaster Castle (40) is a privately owned castle overlooking the Esk river, about a mile south of Ravenglass.

Built on foundations dating to the Roman era, the site was originally selected by the Romans as the place from which to guard the Esk River ("Muncaster" contains the Latin word castra, meaning "encampment", or "fort"). It is currently owned by the Pennington family, who have lived at Muncaster for at least 800 years, the land being granted to Alan de Penitone in 1208. The oldest parts of the castle include the Great Hall and the 14th century pele tower, a type of watch-tower fortification unique to the English-Scottish border region.

The castle was extended and enlarged on a number of occasions over the course of the centuries. Recent historical research (in the early 2000s) has uncovered records which indicate that in 1678 the castle had 14 chimneys; while a document relating to payment of Window Tax in 1746 recorded at that date it had 103 windows and 55 rooms and corridors.

However, by the time of the ownership of Sir Joseph Pennington in the 1770s, the castle had fallen into serious decay. His son, Sir John Pennington, arriving to live at the castle after his wedding in 1778, wrote with despair of how a part of building collapsed even as he was inspecting it. The preservation of the castle to this day is due to the efforts of Sir John Pennington to rebuild and restore it; surviving records indicate that this cost him some six thousand pounds, an enormous sum of money for the late 18th century.

The recent historical research project mentioned on the Castle's official website has also revealed that the castle's north tower (which complements the pele tower to provide a symmetry to the castle's appearance) was constructed in the 1830s. Some previous literature on the north tower mistakenly attributes its construction to the architect Anthony Salvin, who was engaged to refurbish the castle by the fourth Lord Muncaster in 1862.

The castle contains a wealth of architectural features and artefacts from a wide span of English history, including a rare portrait of king Henry VI, an Elizabethan banqueting table, and also an impressive library containing approximately 6,000 books. In August 2005, some archaeological investigation was conducted in the castle grounds and an Architectural Heritage Report was produced. It is planned to conduct a full architectural survey in the future, to examine the different phases of the building's construction.

I pulled over in front of a lovely Rosegarth Guesthouse and went in for a cup of tea and a baguette, I say baguette it was more like a french stick. Denise and Neil are ideal hosts and they are Bikers Friendly, even advertising the fact on their website. Neil owns a Harley, well no one can be perfect. But the view wasn’t far off.

After a sumptuous lunch and a great pot of Earl Grey tea I was underway again. Back up on to the A595 before the loop through Drigg and Seascale on the B5344, coming out of the latter I passed the rear entrance to the Sellafield Complex, it was then back up to Gosforth before coming off at Calder Bridge before turning off back down towards the Sellafield site.

The Calder name struck a cord with me and I did some research on the name that was in the back of my mind. Calder Hall. It was the world's first nuclear power station to deliver electricity in commercial quantities (although the 5 MW "semi-experimental" reactor at Obninsk in the Soviet Union was connected to the public supply in 1954). The design was codenamed PIPPA (Pressurised Pile Producing Power and Plutonium) by the UKAEA to denote the plant's dual commercial and military role. Construction started in 1953. Calder Hall had four Magnox reactors capable of generating 50 MWe of power each. The reactors were supplied by the UKAEA and the turbines by C.A. Parsons & Company. First connection to the grid was on 27 August 1956, and the plant was officially opened by Queen Elizabeth II on 17 October 1956. When the station closed on 31 March 2003, the first reactor had been in use for nearly 47 years.

However, in its early life, it was primarily used to produce weapons-grade plutonium, with two fuel loads per year, and electricity production as a secondary purpose. From 1964 it was mainly used on commercial fuel cycles, but it was not until April 1995 that the UK Government announced that all production of plutonium for weapons purposes had ceased.

The four Calder Hall cooling towers were demolished by controlled explosions on Saturday 29 September 2007.

Also on the same site was The Windscale Advanced Gas Cooled Reactor (WAGR) was a prototype for the UK's second generation of reactors, the Advanced gas-cooled reactor or AGR, which followed on from the Magnox stations. The WAGR golfball is, along with the Pile chimneys, one of the iconic buildings on the Windscale site (Windscale being an independent site within the Sellafield complex). Construction was carried out by Mitchell Construction and completed in 1962. This reactor was shut down in 1981, and is now part of a pilot project to demonstrate techniques for safely decommissioning a nuclear reactor.

There is a huge amount of information about the Sellafield site on Wikipedia and I am amazed at how much goes on there. Anyway I couldn’t hang around I wanted to get Carlisle by the end of the day, although I had the Tuesday off I still wanted to get home at a reasonable time, so I thought if I got to Carlisle at a reasonable time I could start my way home, before stopping off in the Southern Lakes somewhere around Kendal for the night.

Up the road a short way to Beckermet before turning off for the coast road down through Nethertown and Middletown before entering St Bees, only to be thwarted part way due to a road closure for some form of drainage works, unfortunately the workers had moved the signs so they could get their vehicles down without replacing them, so I got a mile down the road before being met with the sight of a JCB excavator hard at work ripping up the road. So it was a case of an 8 point turn even for me on the single track road. The diversion didn’t cost me that much in time just the inconvennience. I got back on to the back lane at Coulderton before coming down the hill Into St Bees. The Golf Course which you can just make out in the middle of the picture looked a serious challenge, sat high on the cliff tops.St Bees is a lovely little town based around a large public school, I had time to take in the station thanks to a freight train that decided to collect the mail as well as talking with the female station master, or that is how it appeared, as we were stood at the level crossing for an awfully long time for an old Diesel Engine pulling three tanker trucks.Just beyond the station is the school and some of the pupils were involved in a Cricket Match. I don’t know it’s history at producing England Test Cricketers but from what I witnessed over the tens of minutes I watched it was quite impressive, I know the batsman and the bowler would certainly get into our Village team.

On out of the town and on my way through Sandwith then in the back ‘back way’ into Whitehaven I came across an almost bizarre sight, lines of fencing and turnstiles to get through a certain points, to an area that seemed to have been recently demolished, leaving no evidence of what might have been in place. After a lot of research it turned out to be the site of a major Soap factory owned by Marchon and then a chemical factory owned eventually by Allbright and Wilson.

It was established during the Second World War in 1940, was taken over as part of Allbright and Wilson in the 60’s. and before it was closed and ultimately demolished it had a number of credits and was actually one of the largest employers in the region at it’s height; at over 2,500. It won it’s first Queens Awards for Export in 1966.

The 1990’s saw the start of the decline as environmental issues based around the chemicals and acids being produced on site started to bear heavily on the organisation. Including a private prosecution by Greenpeace due to the discharges, led Greenpeace to go one further by blocking the outfall discharge into the Irish Sea as one of their protests.

In 1994 Allbright and Wilson tried to re-launch the factory and invested heavily in a new plant in 1997 however 2 years later Allbright and Wilson was taken over by the French company Rhodia, It was then bought again by the American organisation Huntsman in 2001, before finally being run down in 2004 and finally closed in 2005. During it’s time it was the Was the largest single-site producer of Sulphuric Acid in Europe as well as the largest single-site producer of Sodium Tripolyphospate in the world. Now it is a deserted demolition site and those two statistics are probably the reason why, it will be a long time before it is fit for anything else.

Whitehaven seemed almost like a ghost town riding through, a large number of boarded up buildings the one saving grace was, the sun was shining if it hadn’t it would have looked even more depressing and then I reached the Marina and Harbour.

I must have got something wrong about how depressed things were as there were a number of decent looking and probably expensive vessels moored. I then looked at the history a little bit more. Whitehaven Harbour has seen all kinds of action, the John Paul Jones attempt of attacking the harbour being one of the most dramatic – or at least it could have been had not his fellow sailors gone to the pub and stayed there!

John Paul Jones was a Scot who had learnt his seafaring trade in Whitehaven and who would become the founding father of the American navy. After sailing to America on the "Friendship of Whitehaven", Jones grew up as an adopted American - returning to Whitehaven in the late 1770s. During this time, the wars of independence were playing out and John Paul Jones, now a commander in the Continental Navy set sail for Europe.

In 1778, The Ranger was sailing up the western coast, causing havoc on British vessels.Whitehaven was the only harbour where Jones and his crew landed - which turned out to be a minor misfortune. The American sailors sneaking up at night and coming up these stairs, overpowering the pier master to keep his silence. And then his boats had the intention of coming into this inner harbour on the tide.

The old ships and briggs and brigantines, schooners were really thick, piled in here either loading cargo or waiting cargo or whatever and the intention was to set fire to the whole fleet and cause havoc. It didn’t come off because I think from the report the American sailors came ashore and got sniff of the rum and beer locally and ended up a little bit tight and went back out to sea with the tails between their legs.

Paul Jones and the Ranger continued up the coast, without getting off the ship.

During the first Maritime Festival in 1999, American Marines travelled up to Whitehaven to take part in the festival. On the Sunday of that first festival, Mr Allen, then harbourmaster, together with the harbour commission and an officer from the American navy signed a proclamation forgiving the 1778 raid by John Paul Jones and the American navy. The Americans took this very seriously and that proclamation ended up on the desk of Bill Clinton.

It’s now on display in the American navy academy at Anapolis in Maryland, another copy is in the Beacon Centre and the third copy is in the harbour commission’s office. The signing is now celebrated each year with a visit by a contingent from the US Navy to the Festival. Other notable bits of Trivia about Whitehaven and a further link to America, George Washington’s Grand mother is buried in the town and finally during the 18th Century it was the third largest port in the UK behind London and Bristol.

Out through Lowca and it was then into Workington which seems to be less effected by the economic troubles and a number of industries can be witnessed, one thing that was evident was not only the Wind Turbines but a number of modern factories and warehouses on the road North out of town to Maryport.

Now given I know of the history of rivalry between the two town and the fact one of my best friends is a Director of Workington Town Rugby League Club, I thought I better do some research on this Cumbria icon as well. I had only done as much on Whitehaven because of what I had witnessed and the fact around John Paul Jones I saw on the BBC series Coast.

Workington is an ancient market and industrial town at the mouth of the River Derwent. Some parts of the town north of the River Derwent date back to Roman times. It was in the 18th century, with the exploitation of the local iron ore and coal pits, that Workington expanded to become a major industrial town and port.

Iron and steel manufacture have always been part of Workington's heritage, and it was here that the famous Henry Bessemer first introduced his revolutionary steel making process. In recent years, with the decline of the steel industry and coal mining, the town has diversified into other forms of industry.

Workington formerly manufactured 'Railbus' and 'Sprinter' type commuter trains and Leyland National buses. The Leyland National was based on an Italian design, which included an air conditioning unit mounted in a pod on top of the roof of the bus at the rear. Adapting the design for Britain, Leyland replaced the air conditioning unit with a heating unit. However, as hot air rises, much of the heat generated by the heaters was wasted as it escaped out of the top (most vehicle heaters are located low down in the vehicle). This design flaw in the National bus became infamous in certain circles.

The 'Railbus' trains were based on the National bus design, designed as a cheap stopgap by British Rail. This initiative led to Workington's brief history of train manufacturing, the buses already being built there. They are generally considered a poor design, and are very uncomfortable to ride especially on less-than-perfectly-smooth rail lines, as the carriages tend to jump about much more than most trains. This is due to the fact that they are not equipped with proper train bogies, but have two single axles per carriage (each train consists of two carriages), a cost-cutting design feature which when they have been worked on some lines has also caused problems with rounding tight-radius corners. Some industry experts have also raised significant doubts about their level of safety compared to other commuter train types, such as the Sprinter.

Having traveled on both of these I can fully understand why they failed, I won’t play the political card but both these forms of transport were promoted by one particular government and thank god the transport media has gone if not the government, shall we say.

Leaving Workington behind it is only 5 miles up the road before I hit Maryport. The town was first established as the Roman fort Alauna in around AD 122 as a command and supply base for the coastal defences of Hadrian's Wall at its western extremity. In the early 20th it had less attractive historical fact to it’s name when unemployment in the town exceeded 50%. And whilst the area is starting to enjoy slightly better times it is now more famous for it’s annual Blues Festival. The 11th Maryport Blues Festival takes place over the weekend of July 24th, 25th & 26th July, when the small Cumbrian harbour town will once again be alive with the best in blues music on offer.

This year, over 40 bands and 150 individual musicians from all over the globe will be performing in the main stage marquee, in the pubs and clubs and on an outdoor stage and on the street, to thousands of visitors from all over the UK. Headliners Jethro Tull, John Mayall and Eric Burdon are supported by Ruby Turner and The Blues Band amongst many others.

It was now 3.40pm and I needed to get a move on and shortly after leaving Maryport I turned off on to the B5300 to Silloth, stopping briefly for a photo and a drink at Crosscanonby and my first real look at the Solway Firth towards Scotland.

I then had a good run up the coast through Allonby and Beckfoot before entering Silloth. the town is a small holiday resort, developed in the 1860s around the terminus of a railway from Carlisle which had begun construction in 1855. For the first time, workers from the factories of Carlisle were presented with affordable access to the seaside and the town flourished as a destination for day trippers. After its heyday in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Silloth slipped into disrepair, as other resorts became more accessible however recent years have seen a great deal of development with many of the sea facing properties having received long overdue facelifts. The main central attraction is a large expansive green that is utilised throughout the year to host various events and activities. Amenities include a championship golf course ranked amongst the country's top fifty courses.

I was impressed riding through the town, or would have been if I wasn’t being very careful across the recently washed down cobblestones in the town centre, I hate cobblestones when they are wet, it is like trying to ride your bike on a ice rink at times add to that a rear tyre that was well past it’s best. Following a back road out of town brought me to the Championship standard Silloth Golf Club before heading on to Skinburness for another photo opportunity across Solway Firth this time with a far better view of the hills I would come across on my next section of riding which will end up being in August for a number of reasons that you will end up reading about in subsequent posts.

The B5302 took me back out and on my way to the next Airfield on the list and parity with castles at 40 a piece. RAF Kirkbride was extremely hard to find information about, despite its relatively long history first opened in 1939 and remained open for use by the RAF and remained that way until May 1960. Its primary function was as a care & maintenance base both 12 MU and 22 MU (Maintenance Units) having both been based there. It’s main function was to keep aircraft prior to being delivered from factories until they could be accepted to full time active squadrons, the idea that aircraft were being kept as far as practical from the action until needed. A long list of famous aircraft went through Kirkbride including, Fairy Battles, Spitfires, Hurricanes, Avro Lancasters, Halifaxes and Liberators. Last official aircraft to be flown out from the airfield was a mk14 Gloster Meteor in 1960. Today Kirkbride is still a huge site with private flying taking place off the remaining main runway and all the main hangers still intact and being used for various things, sadly none of them appear aviation related as in most cases like this they become ideal bases for transport and storage companies.

To be honest I hadn’t spotted this airfield during my preparation for the trip I was more focused on what I was about to find just a couple of miles up the roads at Cardunock.

You can actually see one of the secondary runways in the above photo.

The former Fleet Air Arm base of HMS Nuthatch. (41) Once again it took a lot of work to research this base before I could find out that it was Originally a WWI landing-strip in the vicinity of the now-demolished Solway House, the site was reinstated by the RAF at the start of WWII as an Emergency Landing Ground for RAF Silloth. (Kirkbride as previously mentioned)
The Royal Navy bagged the site in December 1942, building RNAS Anthorn, eventually being commissioned in September 1944, and given the title 'HMS Nuthatch' . RNAS Anthorn operated well past WWII as No:1 ARDU (Aircraft Receipt and Dispatch Unit), and the last 'official' aircraft left the runway in November 1957. The base was put into 'mothballs', finally closing down in March 1958. It is now used as a VLF and LF transmitting station, I won’t say what the VLF is used for but the LF is used by The National Physical Laboratory (NPL) who have installed three atomic clocks at Anthorn and on 27 February 2007 Britain’s national time signal transmissions, retaining their original call sign of MSF, were transferred there on a trial basis, moving formally on 1 April 2007 Monitoring and logging of the clocks and control of the transmissions is by internet link from the NPL offices at Teddington, using comparison with GPS signals at both locations. So in one way they help keep my wristwatch accurate, which is a Casio Waveceptor which relies on these radio signals to keep it accurate.

After passing this point it was on towards Bowness-on-Solway now this is where things got interesting, a fabulous road all the same.

To get on this section it wasn’t a cattle grid it was a cattle gate, so it was case of creakily getting off the bike, take the photo, open the gate, ride through, get off again very stiffly, close the gate, get back on and ride on.

Not only is part of this coast a bird sanctuary it is also the home of Salt Marsh Lamb, with flocks of Ewes with this season Lambs grazing on the marshes. Bowness-on- Solway is actually the western end of Hadrian’s Wall but is only a very small village, not even a town. I stopped just before I reached it in a small car park as I had been bursting for at least an hour, so I nipped behind a wall, but then looking across the Firth towards Annan I was stunned by the view.

Wow! 5.00pm on Monday evening and it was beautiful, was I going to stay around Kendal or not?

I had looked at the map and wanted to go via Port Carlisle and then Drumburgh but road closures for road works (Again!) meant I had to head inland before coming back to Glasson and Drumburgh before then going on to Burgh by Sands and Kirkandrews-on-Eden on my way into Carlisle.

The main thing I remember about this section was the map had shown the road quite close to the estuary however it was based on Salt Marshes again and along the roadside there were warning signs of the water height at the flood tide and on the spring tide it looked as if the road I was riding on would be under 2ft of water, thankfully it was low tide anyway.

This was now the end of this sections riding, I had been going for the best part of 8 hrs and I had the idea of riding through the centre of Carlisle, getting on the A6 and following that down to Penrith and start looking for a campsite which would be sometime short of 7pm and get an early night before continuing my journey home in the morning, well that was the plan.

I passed Carlisle Castle (41) which once again brought parity between Airfields and Castles. The castle is over 900 years old and has been the scene of many historical episodes in British history. Given the proximity of Carlisle to the border between England and Scotland, it has been the centre of many wars and invasions. Today the castle is managed by English Heritage and is open to the public. The castle until recently was the administrative headquarters of the former King's Own Royal Border Regiment now county headquarters to the Duke of Lancaster's Regiment and a museum to the regiment is within the castle walls.

Carlisle Castle was first built during the reign of William II of England, the son of William the Conqueror who invaded England in 1066. At that time, Cumberland (the original name for north and west Cumbria) was still considered a part of Scotland. William II arrived and drove the Scots out of Cumberland to claim the area for England. He ordered the construction of a Norman style motte and bailey castle in Carlisle on the site of an old Roman fort, with construction beginning in 1093. The need for a castle in Carlisle was to keep the northern border of England secured against the threat of invasion from Scotland. In 1122, Henry I of England ordered a stone castle to be constructed on the site. Thus a keep and city walls were constructed.

The act of driving out the Scots from Cumberland led to many attempts to retake the lands. The result of this was that Carlisle and its castle would change hands many times for the next 700 years. The first attempt began during the troubled reign of Stephen of England. The Scottish King, David captured the city, exploiting the domestic troubles of England. It was he who completed the walls and stone keep. However the English seized back the city and castle several years later.

For a few months in 1568, Mary, Queen of Scots was imprisoned within the castle. Later the castle was besieged during the English Civil War in 1644 by the Parliamentary forces which lasted 8 months.

The most important battles for the city of Carlisle and its castle were during the second Jacobite rising against George II of Great Britain in 1745. The forces of Prince Charles Edward Stuart travelled south from Scotland into England reaching as far south as Derby. Carlisle and the castle were seized and fortified by the Jacobites. However they were driven north by the forces of the William Augustus, Duke of Cumberland, the son of George II. Carlisle was recaptured and the Jacobites were jailed and then executed. That battle marked the end of the castle's fighting life, as defending the border between England and Scotland was not necessary as both countries were again one in Great Britain.

Some parts of the castle were then demolished for use as raw materials in the 19th century to create more or less what is visible to the visitor today. The Army moved in to take hold of the castle, which was the regimental depot of the Border Regiment until 1959, with control for maintenance passing to the Department of Environment later English Heritage.

After refueling on the outskirts of Carlisle it was on to the A6 South. With the idea of getting to Penrith then finding somewhere, 20 mins late I reached the sign post for the M6 at Plumpton Head and it wasn’t 6.00pm yet so I decided to push on to Kendal, the roads were empty so I flew down within half an hour I was at the turn off to Kendal and I started to think I’m feeling good the roads are good and I’m making good time so let’s see how far I can get before it starts to be a problem. By 7.30pm I had actually passed Preston and still making good time, in fact I was just coming up on Wigan, I started to think about going all the way through.

Anyway I thought I would just go on until I couldn’t go any further and after another Fuel stop just above Birmingham, when I loaded up on Red Bull as well, I only had to stop one more time to rest my poor backside as it was killing me.

I eventually got everything off the bike and me indoors with a cup of tea at just before 11.00pm over 13 hours of riding and lot of miles covered in fact the best part of 1,300 in the weekend. Despite the weariness and the pain I also felt a huge amount of achievement.

All that is left to do now is spend the best part of two weeks writing up my notes and rebuild the bike again. It sounds as if she is knackered, far from it, it is just the case that all the miles I am doing do take a toll of the bike and things like tyres wear out, but more of that in the next post.

Take care and as Mick says ‘You don’t stop riding when you get old, you stop because your rear tyre is no longer legal!

Another beautiful days riding ahead!

2009-06-30T02:01:00.000-07:00

I was woken once more by the announcement about vacating the cabins and returning your keys; to be honest I could have stayed there for another couple of hours easily. Even snoozing for a couple of minutes was soon broken up by the announcement that the restaurant was open for breakfast. So I reluctantly got out of bed and got my gear sorted.

On reaching the restaurant there was a fairly large queue waiting to be seated, luckily being on my own, I was shown through to the Road Kings part of the restaurant where I dumped my gear and went through to get a plate of bacon and toast and a mug of tea, sitting down I could see through the windows our slow but steady progress up the Mersey to the pontoons at 12 Quays.

Whilst waiting to go down to the bike I was met by two other couples waiting to go down to their bikes, they were off to Donnington Park for the Superbike racing, I was off North towards Scotland, how far would I get?

I had the same problem as when disembarking in Belfast, my bloody tank bag. I have a replacement baseplate on order, but it is always a problem trying to get a spare part from a manufacturer in another country when all they really want to ship to the distributor is full sets. So once again I strapped it on to the rear seat and stopped in the car park to fiddle about with it, I had found one trick which meant using a very threatening camping knife I have in my kit, but it is not something I would feel safe pulling out in public. By the time I had finally got it sorted I was the last to leave the docks once again.

My first stop was a bit out of the way but all the same it was worth doing it for the photo and the personal history, I pulled into the Woodside Ferry and Bus terminal. It has been joined earlier this year with the opening of the U-Boat museum.

It used to be part of a Historic Naval vessels museum that was based in Birkenhead Docks near 12 Quays but it had to move when the trust running the museum went out of business in 2006.

The German type IXC/40 long range attack submarine was sunk by Allied forces in 1945. She is the only U-boat to have been recovered after being sunk by the Allies.

Commissioned on 23rd December 1942, the U-534 had not sunk any ships by the time she was spotted by a British Liberator while sailing in the Kattegat, Denmark on 5th May 1945. The Liberator attacked and promptly sank her with ten depth charges. There were 49 survivors. Forty eight years later, in 1993, she was raised by a Danish consortium, with the ceremony being witnessed by her own surviving crew and those of the Liberator who sank her.

A little further on I passed the now rejuvenated Cammell Laird Shipyard. The ship repair and conversion company left the Birkenhead site seven years ago after going into receivership. A group of Cammell Laird's former management team built up a new company at the shipyard - and have now revived the Cammell Laird name. This is a great piece of news for me, given a family connection, my Father was a Master Welder at the yard and welded the Keel plate on the famous Ark Royal of the TV Series Sailing when she was originally laid down at the yard in 1943 and finally launched in 1950, when she entered service she was the Worlds first Aircraft carrier with an angled deck, beating the USS Forrestal by nine months.

Between 1829 and 1947, over 1,100 vessels of all kinds were launched from the Cammell Laird slipways into the River Mersey. Among the many famous ships made by the companies were the world's first steel ship, the Ma Roberts, built in 1858 for Dr. Livingstone's Zambezi expedition, Cunard's second Mauretania of 1939, and the first all-welded ship, the Fullagar built in 1920.

The Company was nationalised along with the rest of the British shipbuilding industry as British Shipbuilders in 1977. In 1986, it returned to the private sector as part of VSEL another of the nationalised companies. VSEL and Cammell Laird were the only British shipyards capable of production of nuclear submarines. In 1993, it completed HMS Unicorn (S43) – now HMCS Windsor (SSK 877) – that to this day that is the last ship completed at the yard.

After experiencing financial difficulties, partly due to the failure of a £50 million cruise ship contract with Costa Crociere, the company was forced to enter receivership, and the Birkenhead, Teesside and Tyneside shipyards were subsequently acquired by the A&P Shiprepair Group during 2001. A&P sold the 140-acre (0.57 km2) Birkenhead site to Northwestern Shiprepairers & Shipbuilders in 2005, The Cammell Laird brand continued in use through the Royal Dockyard facility in Gibraltar, which was acquired through a management buy-out in 2001.

Peel Holdings purchased the Cammell Laird shipyard, in January 2007, to facilitate the proposed Wirral Waters development and it was announced that the current occupiers of Cammell Laird Dock, Northwestern Shiprepairers & Shipbuilders had acquired the rights to the name. On 17 November 2008 Northwestern Shiprepairers & Shipbuilders officially renamed itself Cammell Laird, stating that recent economic success made the time right, and that "Cammell Laird is an internationally recognised brand which carries tremendous goodwill when bidding for contracts."

In February 2008 it was announced that the company had won a £28m Ministry of Defence contract to overhaul the Royal Fleet Auxiliary ship RFA Fort Rosalie.

At this time of the morning just after 7.00am there was very little traffic on the road and I headed off through Bromborough and through Eastham before going down the old Ferry Road, Eastham used to be a very important crossing point on the Mersey for a long time and a former owner of the Ferry and the Hotel that also carried it’s name open a Pleasure Garden to attract more users of the ferry. Eastham also grew in importance when it became the entrance port to the Manchester Ship Canal. The canal was opened by Queen Victoria in 1894 Eastham Ferry was known as the 'Richmond of the Mersey', but its popularity declined and the last ferry crossing took place in 1929. The Pleasure Gardens, Iron pier and Jubilee Arch were later dismantled. The area around the hotel and ferry pier now form Eastham Country Park. It was then down a back lane through the centre of one of the many Oil Terminals in this area, before getting on to North Road which takes you along behind the Vauxhall, Ellesmere Port plant, the interesting point about this road is that it used to be a perimeter road around my next ex-airfield.

RAF Hooton Park (32) I wouldn’t normally have spent so much time researching these details however it does have a significant historic past. Originally built for the Royal Flying Corps in 1917 as a training aerodrome for pilots in World War I. During the early/mid 1930s, it was one of the two airfields (with Liverpool Speke) handling scheduled services for the Merseyside region. Hooton Park was home to No. 610 (County of Chester) Squadron and, post WW2, to No. 611 (West Lancashire) and No. 663 (AOP) Squadron.

The aerodrome closed in 1957 after the disbandment of the Royal Auxiliary Air Force, but the three pairs of Belfast Truss hangars, erected in 1917, have survived the closure.

War was declared on 4 August 1914 and the British War Department requisitioned the Hooton Park estate for use as an army training ground. The hall became a headquarters, hospital, and officers’ mess. Lord Derby recruited the first Pals regiments and Hooton became the training ground for the 18th Battalion of the Kings Liverpool Rifles. They left for France and fought in the Battle of the Somme on 1 July 1916.

Hooton Park then became the No.4 Training Depot Station. The Royal Flying Corps moved in to form the fighter squadrons so badly needed in France using Sopwith Scouts, Sopwith Dolphins and Avro 504s. Some of the pilots killed in training accidents were buried in the local churchyard at nearby Eastham. A large number of American and Canadian pilots were also trained at Hooton Park.

On April 1, 1918, the Royal Flying Corps became the Royal Air Force. By the end of the First World War, the 37 aircraft on charge were moved to RAF Sealand and RAF Hooton Park was closed. During the following years the aerodrome reverted to farmland. The hangars were empty and the hall was so damaged by military use it was sold as a redevelopment opportunity and subsequently demolished (although the racecourse and polo ground remained).

The airfield site was purchased by a Mr. G. Dawson, an air enthusiast. In the summer of 1927, the Liverpool Corporation held an air pageant at Hooton as part of its civic week. This show was such a success that the Liverpool and District Aero Club was formed. Dawson allowed the new club to use his aerodrome for a fee. The club became one of the most successful in the country in only twelve months and was the centre for aviation in the north. For three years the aerodrome served as Liverpool’s airport.

Dawson persuaded two RAF engineering officers to resign and set up companies at Hooton – Nicholas Comper, who as the Comper Aircraft Company designed and built the Comper Swift single engined sporting monoplane; and Douglas Pobjoy, who supplied the Pobjoy radial engines. Dawson ran into financial trouble and died in 1933. In the same year, Liverpool Corporation opened Speke airfield across the Mersey as its permanent airport. The flying club subsequently moved there for cheaper hangarage and clubhouse facilities. Comper moved to Heston and closed his company. He died as the result of a practical joke in 1939. Pobjoy went to work for Short Brothers at Rochester, but was killed in a mid air collision in 1946. Despite these setbacks Hooton was still an important aerodrome with many private owners and several small airlines continuing to operate out of it.

In 1935, Martin Hearn, an ex-pilot and -ground engineer and who had previously worked for Cobham’s Flying Circus as a wing walker and aerial trapeze artist, created Martin Hearn Ltd., employing a few mechanics to service the aircraft using the aerodrome. In, 1936 number 610 (County of Chester) Squadron Auxiliary Air Force was formed at Hooton Park. Most of the pilots took private flying lessons to qualify. One person said, "Never have I seen so many Rolls Royce cars in one spot at the same time’ – an indication of the pilots' typical social status. The unit was initially a bomber squadron equipped with Hawker Hind and Hart bombers and Avro Tutor trainers.

In 1939, the squadron took charge of a flight of Hurricanes that were quickly replaced by Mark 1 Spitfires. At the outbreak of the Second World War on September 3, 1939 the squadron was mobilised and sent to RAF Wittering for final training. At the same time, Martin Hearn obtained a contract from the Ministry of Aircraft Production to repair large numbers of Avro Ansons, and later for De Havilland Mosquito fighter-bombers. As No. 7 Aircraft Assembly Unit, the work also included the assembly of various types of American aircraft that used to arrive at the Mersey docks. Aircraft included the Mustang, Lightning and Thunderbolt fighters as well as Boston Havoc and Canadian built Handley Page Hampden bombers and Harvard trainers.

The first helicopters used by the Allies were also assembled and tested at Hooton towards the end of the war. During the war years, Hooton assembled and repaired thousands of aircraft. The RAF operated a flight of Coastal Command Avro Ansons, Tiger Moths and Hornet Moths on anti submarine patrols during 1939 and 1940. No. 11 Radio School and No. 3 General Reconnaissance School flew from the airfield.

In 1941 the grass airfield was transformed to include a 6,000 foot concrete runway – one of the longest in Europe at that time. As aircraft became redundant they were sent from all over the country to No. 100 Sub Storage Site at Hooton to be scrapped. In 1947 Martin Hearn’s company was re-named Aero-Engineering and Marine (Merseyside) and Martin Hearn was no longer connected to it. The engineering company survived until 1955, latterly servicing Canadair Sabre jet fighters for the RCAF.

In 1946 No. 610 Squadron Royal Auxiliary Air Force returned to Hooton Park after valiant war service flying Spitfires in the European theatre. No. 663 (AOP) Squadron was reformed at Hooton Park in 1949 using Auster spotting aircraft. In 1951 No. 610 Squadron received Meteor twin jet fighters and No. 611 Squadron (West Lancashire) relocated from Woodvale to use the longer Hooton runway required for this type of aircraft. The three squadrons operated as R.Aux.AF units from the airfield until all Auxiliary flying squadrons were disbanded in March 1957. At this point the station was closed and all flying ceased at RAF Hooton Park.

The closure of the aerodrome was not the end of the story for Hooton Park as the runways continued to be used by Shell Research for testing cars at high speed. In 1960 the site was purchased by Vauxhall Motors for the construction of a vehicle production plant at Ellesmere Port – the first car to roll off the production line being the Vauxhall Viva.

In the summer of 1986 Hooton opened its gates for two days to host the ’Wheels 86 Transport Extravaganza’. This event was so successful that four other ‘Wheels Shows (’88,’92, ’94 and ’96) were held. Over 80,000 people attended these events and many thousands of pounds were donated to charities from the proceeds. For the first time since 1957 the runways were used. Harrier Jump jets thrilled the crowd and for a few precious hours, cutting edge aviation technology paid homage to this pioneering aviation site. Now people chase down the M53 motorway and have no indication of what went on over the fence for over 40 years.

It was now a case of getting on that Motorway for one junction before going down by Ellesmere Port docks, one part of the Manchester Ship Canal that is still in day to day use, with ships coming and going from the various plants that spin off from the massive Shell Stanlow Refinery. Bypassing the Boat Museum I took Oil Sites Road, having researched the route on the map and a bit of 30 year old experience, I wrongly thought I could make my way through to Ince and Elton unfortunately part way down it I found my way blocked by a Shell Security gate, so I had to retrace my steps and go around, even the Ordnance Survey maps show it as a route through but it turns out to be a private road. Back on to the M53 I took it to the next junction and came off and went along the A5117 up to a junction with the M56 for the run up to the next junction which would take me off along the A557 past the major chemical plants at Weston Point and then into Runcorn.

The Silver Jubilee Bridge crosses the River Mersey and the Manchester Ship Canal at Runcorn Gap between Runcorn and Widnes in Cheshire, England. It is a compression arch suspended-deck bridge (or through arch bridge) which was opened in 1961 and widened in 1975–77. It carries the A533 road and a cantilevered footway. The bridge is a grade II listed building, when ever I look at the bridge it reminds me of ‘Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps’ as it is featured in the initial title shots.

It was then up to Warrington and come back down the road on the other side of the Fiddlers Ferry Power Station. But the following was taken from next to the bridge.

Quickly in and out of Widnes and through Halebank and then Hale before stopping over to check my maps which showed me I had to keep on towards Speke Hall Avenue, which would take me out to the new entrance to Liverpool John Lennon Airport.

Built in part of the grounds of Speke Hall, Liverpool (Speke) Airport (33) as the airport was originally known started scheduled flights in 1930 with a service by Imperial Airways via Barton Aerodrome near Eccles, Manchester, and Birmingham to Croydon Airport near London. However, it was not "officially" opened until the summer of 1933. By the late 1930s, air traffic from Liverpool was beginning to take off with increasing demand for Irish Sea crossings, and a distinctive passenger terminal, control tower and two large aircraft hangars were built.

During World War II, the airport was taken over by the Royal Air Force and known as RAF Speke. Rootes built many bombers in a "shadow factory" here, including Bristol Blenheims and 1,070 Handley Page Halifaxes. Lockheed Aircraft Corporation assembled many types including Hudsons and Mustangs that had been shipped from the United States to Liverpool Docks. The airport was also home to the Merchant Ship Fighter Unit.

On 8 October, 1940, Speke was witness to what is thought to be the fastest air to air combat "kill" in the Battle of Britain and possibly of all time. Flight Lieutenant Denys Gillam took off in his Hawker Hurricane from Speke to be confronted by a Junkers 88 passing across him. As his undercarriage was still retracting he shot the Junkers down, and, along with Alois Vašátko and Josef Stehlík, all of 312 Squadron, was credited with the kill. The moment has been caught in a painting by Robert Taylor called "Fastest Victory".

The city took over control of the airport on 1 January, 1961 and prepared development plans. In 1966, a new 7,500 ft (2,286 m) runway was opened by Prince Philip on a new site to the southeast of the existing airfield. It enabled the airport to be open for business around the clock and is in use to this day. Control of the airport transferred to Merseyside County Council from Liverpool Corporation in the mid 1970s and then, ten years later, to the five Merseyside councils following the abolition of Merseyside County Council. A new modern passenger terminal, adjacent to the runway on the southern airfield site, opened in 1986, and this was followed by the closure of the original 1930s building.

The original terminal building dating from the late 1930s, famously seen on the television footage with its terraces packed with Beatles fans, was left derelict for over a decade after being replaced in 1986. However it has recently been renovated and adapted to become the Crowne Plaza Liverpool John Lennon Airport Hotel, preserving its Grade II listed Art Deco style. The main focus being the DH Rapide on the forecourt.

The former apron of the terminal is also listed and retained in its original condition, although it is no longer connected to the airport or subject to airside access control. It is the home of several aircraft, including BAe Jetstream 41 prototype G-JMAC and Bristol Britannia G-ANCF, preserved by the Jetstream Club.

In 1990 ownership of the airport was privatised, with British Aerospace taking a 76% shareholding in the new company. Subsequently the airport has become a wholly owned subsidiary of Peel Holdings Ltd. In 2000, work on a £42.5 million modern passenger terminal began; tripling its size and passenger capacity, and this development was completed in 2002.

2002 saw the airport being renamed in honour of John Lennon, a founding member of The Beatles, twenty-two years after Lennon's death. A 7 ft (2.1 m) tall bronze statue of the local icon stands overlooking the check-in hall. On the roof is painted the airport's motto, a line from Lennon's song "Imagine": "Above us, only sky". In 2005 the Yellow Submarine, a large-scale work of art, was installed on a traffic island at the entrance to the airport.

Back on the A561 it was down towards the City Centre and after a quick stop in Otterspool by the site of the old Liverpool Garden City site of the 80’s this part of Liverpool was the site of a major regeneration unfortunately when I passed through this time, it obviously didn’t work and is now a still a demolition site behind fences it is really a shame to see what had great hope reduced to a wasteland. When I lived in Chester I heard and read about the plans and now they have come and gone.

I was now close to the Echo Arena and able to take a couple of photo’s but as a life long Evertonian, this is where the new Stadium should have been, never mind the protracted discussions about Kirkby.

What it gave me was the opportunity to take the following photo of the Lagan Viking less than 2 hours after disembarkation.

Then it was a photo of the Cammell Laird shipyard from over the water.

It wasn’t even 8.30am and a lot of people were out on this lovely morning either running or walking their dogs along the front by Albert Dock and the new Echo Arena. I rode off down through the docks towards Crosby and came across the alternative freight route to Belfast. There are no frills on this boat, trailers of all shapes and sizes were being loaded on. One thing that amazed me during this trip was the speed and accuracy that the tugmaster drivers can move 40ft trailers around. The ones I witnessed in Belfast harbour were incredible, with the flick of a lever the drivers seat and control would completely spin around by 180 degrees so the driver that was facing forward pulling a trailer within seconds would be pushing it backwards into place whilst facing in the same direction, when you see 3 or 4 of these operating at the same time it is almost like a well rehearsed ballet.

There didn’t appear to be much accommodation on this vessel, so as I said it would be the no frills service for freight only.

I had to do a U turn a little further along the dock road as one of the old bridges was closed for all traffic; it looked as if it needed some major work doing to it. However I was soon back on the road passing Seaforth Container port and through Waterloo, Brighton-le-Sands before taking The Serpentine to the edge of West Lancs Golf Club. I had made this journey down a dead end route for one major reason.

The Car Park is the main viewing point for ‘Another Place’ by Anthony Gormley. It is an awe inspiring sight on a warm and sunny morning.

Another Place consists of 100 cast-iron, life-size figures spread out along three kilometers of the foreshore, stretching almost one kilometre out to sea. Contractors spent three weeks lifting the figures into place and driving them into the beach on the metre-high foundation piles. The Another Place figures - each one weighing 650 kilos - are made from casts of the artist's own body and are shown at different stages of rising out of the sand, all of them looking out to sea, staring at the horizon in silent expectation. In November 2006 the statues were expected to move to New York but after a successful appeal they will now permanently remain.

It is a strangely moving sight. He did something similar in the City of London in 2007, called Event Horizon where he sited 31 statues around the rooftops all facing towards one of that was placed into the pavement on Waterloo Bridge, outside Haywards Gallery. It was how I first realised that this work was under way, I just looked out in the direction this statue was facing and started spotting others on the tops of buildings all around the skyline.

Then I got a bit lost, I had mapped out a route and with the aid of the Sat Nav was able to find the roads, unfortunately I found that two of them are not much more than overgrown dirt tracks, given the state of my rear tyre and the load I had on, I decided to wimp out and go around Hightown and into Formby to refuel, before coming back on to the A565 to pass the 3rd airfield of the day and my 34th overall. RAF Woodvale. Although constructed as an all-weather night fighter airfield for the defense of Liverpool, it did not open until 7 December 1941. This was just after the Liverpool Blitz, which had peaked in May. Squadrons were brought up from the south of England to 'rest' for short periods, whilst defending Merseyside. 308 (Krakowski) Squadron was the first to arrive, on 12 December 1941, from RAF Northolt. Squadrons were rotated regularly. Several were Polish, including 315 (Dęblinski) Sqn and 317 (Wilenski) Sqn. Spitfire IIs and Vbs were operated by these units. Support units working with all three Services also served there, calibrating anti-aircraft guns and towing targets for the Royal Navy. In April 1945, Woodvale briefly became a Tender for the Royal Navy's Fleet Air Arm airfield at Burscough, HMS Ringtail, to become HMS Ringtail II. an airfield I didn’t get near unfortunately as it was actually too far from the coast route I took.

After a period of uncertainty, Woodvale reopened on 22 July 1946, when the Spitfire F14's of No. 611 (West Lancashire) Squadron, Royal Auxiliary Air Force, moved here from Liverpool Airport at Speke. The squadron re-equipped with Spitfire F22's in June 1948. Gloster Meteor F4 and T7 jets were flown between 1950 until 9 July 1951. The Squadron moved to RAF Hooton Park, where it remained until its disbandment on 10 March 1957.

No.5 Civilian Anti-Aircraft Co-Operation Unit moved to Woodvale on 1 January 1958, and operated target-towing Meteors until 30 September 1971 when the unit was disbanded.

Since 1971, RAF Woodvale has remained a training station and is currently home to:

Liverpool University Air Squadron- LUAS moved in from RAF Hooton Park 2 July 1951.
Manchester and Salford University Air Squadron (then named Manchester University Air Squadron), MASUAS moved in from Manchester's Barton Aerodrome in March 1953.
10 Air Experience Flight - 10 AEF was formed at RAF Woodvale 25 August 1958.
[631 Volunteer Gliding Squadron] - 631 VGS moved in from RAF Sealand in March 2006.
Merseyside Police Air Support Group - MPASG.

Shortly after the airfield I turned off down the Coastal Road which takes you down between the dunes and around the back of The Royal Birkdale Golf Club, home of many great Open Championships, to give it the correct title. Then onto Marine drive passed the big Pontins Holiday Camp. I did a quick run along the front beyond the Marine Lake before stopping off for a photo looking back at the pier, before heading back into town to get a cup of tea.

I finally got myself a take away tea from an amusement arcade next to the pier entrance, which actually starts well inland on the land side of the Marine Lake. I had tried a café/restaurant only to find it wasn’t open yet, then, I looked at my watch and saw that it wasn’t even 10.30 yet. There were a number of bikers already there and obviously meeting up ahead of a ‘ride out’ with friends.

After a quick break I was off again and back on to the Marine Drive which looped around and into Crossens then in to Banks before getting onto the A59 for the run up to Higher Penwortham then into Preston on Liverpool Road. Then taking to A583 towards Blackpool before turning off down the A584 through Freckleton and Warton and airfield 4 of the day and (35) overall. In 1940 new runways were built at Warton so that it could act as a "satellite" airfield for the RAF Coastal Command station at Squires Gate airfield in Blackpool.

The airfield was first operated as an air depot of the U.S. Army Air Force during World War II, as thousands of aircraft were processed on their way to active service in Britain, North Africa, the Mediterranean and mainland Europe. It then became an RAF Station.

In 1947, English Electric took over the site moving their design office there from Strand Road Preston in 1948.

With the merger of English Electric Aviation with other aircraft divisions of the major manufacturers it became a British Aircraft Corporation site and then privatised as British Aerospace until its final transformation into BAE Systems. As such the airfield has been the testing ground for several front line aircraft including the Canberra, the Lightning, the Panavia Tornado and BAE Hawk (formerly the Hawker Siddeley Hawk) and most latterly the Eurofighter Typhoon. I remember visiting the site in the 1980’s when I was selling CAD and graphics systems.

Carrying on down the A584 I entered Lytham through east Beach. Central Beach and then West Beach, following a line of Minis all of which were on the way to Blackpool. If you remember a few posts ago during May this crowd had their ‘Run to the Sun’ in Newquay, now they were all off to Blackpool. I filtered my way through before pulling into the car park at the end of Church Road to be met with the following sight; thankfully I was able to feed my bike through the vehicles to be able to tae the following photo.

The guy in the hard hat is the local councillor John Coombes and the gentleman with the grey hair to his right Flt Lt Peter Brearley DFC, Spitfire pilot. The whole appeal was about the brainchild of Fylde Borough Council Leader John Coombes. The fund hopes to raise £39,000 for the production of the Lytham St Annes Spitfire W3644. The scale replica model will be exact in every detail with the original aircraft carrying the 19 Squadron RAF markings and the name of Lytham St Annes. The Mark Vb Spitfire W3644 which was shot down over Start Point in 1942.

What they want to recreate is as follows, based on a roundabout on the outskirts of Lytham St Annes.

This would be done in conjunction with Gateguardsuk.com, I would really like to travel up to the opening when it comes about. I had mentioned the base for Gateguards UK in a previous posting.

It was a real pleasure over for a short time, take a couple of photos and buy a collection of postcards but I was desperate for one thing, to find a Gents and thankfully I found that a little further on at Fairhaven Lake. What I thought would be a very quick stop turned out a bit longer as on my return to the bike, I was met by a couple admiring it. It turns out he had ridden down to L’Agulhas which is the Southern most part of South Africa, next stop being the South Pole.

It was really great to talk to him and his wife, however it did as always add time to my day, during my ride I now have to allow time for this, each and every day someone wants to come and chat for a while, which don’t get me wrong is wonderful as long as I get the message about the Charity over. Back on the A584 I headed off to experience the lights of Blackpool in broad daylight, however on my way I passed Airfield (36) Blackpool Airport or the former RAF Squires Gate. The airport site's first aviation use was in October 1909, when the UK's first official public Flying Meeting was held on a specially laid out site at Squires Gate, followed by another in 1910. By 1911 the site had become a racecourse and it was used as a military hospital during World War I and until 1924. Flights from the site resumed in the early 1930s. Small UK airlines used the airfield during the mid 1930s. Railway Air Services commenced schedules to Blackpool from 15 April 1935, linking the airport with the Isle of Man, Manchester and Liverpool. Connections could be made at the two cities to London and the south and west of England. In June 1937, airline operations were transferred to Stanley Park Aerodrome.

Work on enlarging and improving the airfield and facilities began in late 1937, but the aerodrome was requisitioned by the Air Ministry in 1938. During World War II, Vickers operated an aircraft production facility at Squires Gate, producing 2,584 Wellington Medium bombers, several hundred of which were assembled and flown from Stanley Park Aerodrome (I didn’t get anywhere near this as it is a few miles inland and now the home of Blackpool Zoo.) Three bituminous runways were laid to support operations by Vickers and the based units of the Royal Air Force.

Scheduled flights were resumed by Isle of Man Air Services in summer 1946. Lancashire Aircraft Corporation and other private airlines established their bases at the airport from 1946 onwards. By 1949, the airfield was controlled by the Ministry of Civil Aviation and renamed Blackpool Airport. In the mid 1950s, Hawker Hunter jet fighters were produced in the WW2 factory at the north-east edge of the airfield.

Until January 2006 an Avro Vulcan bomber (Registration: XL391) was on static display outside the entrance to the airport, it was originally put up for sale in October 2004 on eBay and purchased by pub landlord Chris Ollerenshaw for £15,102.03 who had intentions to transport it to his pub and display it in his beer garden. However after finding out that the condition of the aircraft was so poor that moving it would be extremely challenging and that it would cost over £20,000 in addition to the reported £1000 a week storage charge, Mr. Ollernshaw pulled out of the deal and demanded his money back and later relinquished ownership of the plane back to the airport. It’s a shame when something like this happens and being someone who donated to get the last flying Vulcan back in the air, I am glad there is a least one of them left. Believe me if you get chance to see a Vulcan at an air show, GO it is a must, it is the most awe inspiring sight you will ever see, I remember an open day when I was still in the RAF when I saw one of these climb to 5,000 ft almost vertical from take off, just stood on it’s tail before rolling out to level.

In recent years the airport has been steadily expanding, accommodating helicopter operations for British Gas, and attracting scheduled flights from budget airlines, Jet2.com and Ryanair and also scheduled services by smaller operators to the Isle of Man. Since World War II, the airport has also been a thriving centre for private, club and general aviation.

Back to the ride I stayed on the A584 or had planned to until I was directed off around the back streets due to the promenade being closed so they could hold a Classic Vehicles Rally, although I was interested I didn’t stop and pushed on to just before the Tower, in amongst all the noise and the lights of the amusement arcades I stopped for the following photo.

Even here I was stopped by a couple of interested passers by. Fellow bikers who had owned an Africa Twin in the past and was keen to find out what I had done to mine.

I didn’t stop for long for the obvious reasons the traffic was manic and I was about to get shouted at by one of the carriage drivers, as I was actually stopped in a bay for the Horse Carriages, that charge a fortune to take you through this vehicle fumed ‘pleasure ride’ I could only feel sorry for the horses.

It looked really grey but it actually wasn’t that bad, the good weather seemed to be following me up the coast, further up and through North Shore and then turned off at Bispham onto the A587 and then off along on to the Sea Wall which took me all the way around and into Fleetwood where I got diverted once again due to festivals near the docks, I didn’t stop long as it was getting close to Lunch for me anyway, that and my back side was aching, I wanted to get something to eat and drink and get off the bike for a while, thought I had done enough to get an hours snooze in some nice layby and after keeping as close as possible to the Fylde Estuary as possible I finally pulled into a service station with an attached Spar store just outside Thornton before crossing over and then through Staynall and eventually into Knott End-on-Sea overlooking the ferry crossing back to Fleetwood.

It was actually a lot brighter than this photo makes you think. There were a number of bikes in this car park enjoying an ice cream from the local café I set myself down on the earth bank and ate the meat and potato pie I had bought a few miles before. And just as I was laying back to rest my body and hopefully catch a few ZZZd’s IT arrived.

A couple appeared on a mobile juke box, shorts, shades and no idea, unfortunately it park right next to my bike, thanks to it’s reverse gear. God knows where they came from but she appeared in the car park accompanying the soundtrack from one of the 50/60’s rock and roll compilations, yeah right!.

They went off to get an ice cream and rediscover their youth walking hand in hand, nothing wrong in that, but if you are going to turn up emulating bikers, Turn up on a BIKE not a Reliant Robin.

The amount of cooing I heard about this wonderful machine was almost making me sick. They had turned up on a Honda Gaywing (sorry Goldwing) but what made it worse, it was a bloody Trike. Reliant Robin’s were built for people that couldn’t drive a car; Gaywing Trikes were built for those who couldn’t ride a bike.

If I remember rightly from when I was a toddler, Trikes are there for those that can’t ride bikes, before being taught by their dads what two wheels is all about. Admittedly I have seen a few for bikers that have been injured or born with physical limitations that don’t allow them to ride a bike, fair enough but this couple were out and out posers and each an every time someone made a comment whilst I was snoozing, I felt like shouting out like Brian Connelly in his ‘It’s a puppet’ sketch. ‘IT’S a RELIANT ROBIN’. Sorry I have a particular issue with this bike, despite riding Dougal’s maniac machine. Which was a 1200 GoldWing fitted with a Kawasaki front end and knobbly tyres for off road use, that was crazy but whilst competing in the Coast to Coast Challenge a few years ago, I along with at least 10 CARS, were held up by four GoldWings playing there stereos full blast at 30 mph in The Lakes, get a life!!.

After the chattering I got back under way feeling an awful lot better and much refreshed, I ended up on the A588, which tool me via a number of small villages before turning off on the B5290 towards Glasson Dock, I’d heard about this place and there were a lot more bikers there but it was a beautiful location the sun had fully come out and I was held up by a couple of yachts going the lock system out to sea.

After the brief imposed halt whilst the road was closed for these two beautiful yachts to get through I went for a quick loop around Glasson before going back to condor Green to get on the A588 into Lancaster, then initially on the A683 towards Heysham before turning off and going through Heaton, Overton and Middleton before entering Heysham, passing by Heysham Golf Club, it looked a lovely layout but I could help think about the overpowering view of the two Nuclear Power stations and the mass of power lines that ran across it.

I rode down the entrance road to both the Power Stations and the ferry terminal that runs to both Northern Ireland and the Isle of Man.

Construction of Heysham 1 began in 1970, with the first reactor commencing operations in 1983 and the second reactor following in 1984. However, initial production levels were low, and full commercial operation was only declared in 1989. It is likely to remain in operation until 2014. Its generating capacity is 1150 MWe. The reactors were supplied by National Nuclear Corporation and the turbines by GEC.

Heysham 1 shares its reactor design with Hartlepool power station, which introduced the replaceable pod boiler design. The CEGB specified a compact design for the Heysham 1 and Hartlepool power station reactor islands in comparison to the design of the two preceding stations at Hinkley Point B and Hunterston B in order to reduce the capital cost, but this caused expensive construction delays because of restricted access. The lesson was learned and the Heysham 2 reactor island occupies a much larger footprint than Heysham 1 for a similar design output of power.

Construction of Heysham 2 began in 1979, and the station opened in 1988. Its generating capacity is 1250 MWe, and it is estimated to keep running until at least 2023. Heysham 2 shares its reactor design with Torness nuclear power station and is a development of the reactor design used at Hinkley Point B. The reactors were supplied by National Nuclear Corporation and the turbines by NEI.

What amazed me about these two, is how close they are to the centre of the town and Ferry Terminal, all the others I’ve past on this trip have been down a long entrance road miles from the nearest village never mind town.

Time was still good and just after 3.00pm so it was up through Morecambe on the A589 Marine Rd. at the top end of town are two icons, the first being statue of one of it’s famous son’s Eric Morecambe.

The other I didn’t take a photo of but it is the famous Grade 2 listed Art Deco Jewel. The Midland Hotel, In January 2003 the Midland Hotel was purchased by the Manchester based development company Urban Splash with the intention of restoring it as a hotel.

Nearly two years were spent preparing detailed plans and acquiring the necessary financial resources for the project. In December 2004 Urban Splash announced that, thanks to grants from the Northwest regional Development Agency and English Heritage, £7.2 million of funding had been secured and refurbishment of the Midland could begin. Essential repair work to the fabric of the building was carried out first, and the main programme started in spring 2005. Restoration took over three years to complete and the Midland Hotel finally re-opened for business in June 2008.

Leaving Morecambe on the A5105, you can see how this was once such a thriving resort, it is much smaller and therefore far less tacky than Blackpool that it used to be compared with, I joined the A6 near Bolton-le-Sands and then up to Carnforth before turning off to Millhead and Silverdale. It was starting to get quite narrow and hilly in this area and I had spotted on the Ordnance Survey Map the signs for a couple of Campsites in Silverdale, and was seriously, seriously tempted as my backside was really starting to ache, I had been on the bike for over 10 hrs now and I wanted stop soon.

I then came across the dreaded ‘wife driver’ I really do struggle to understand how people can be so spatially unaware of the size of their car, she was closer to the hedge on my side of the road than she was to hers yet still blamed me for not disappearing over the hedge to get out of her way, even her husband looked sheepish. I pulled over for a rest once I got into Arnside I stopped next to the horse trough and water fountain next to were a number of other bikers had stopped to take in the views over the estuary and the railway line, in the foreground there were two members of the RNLI practising rescues using a jetski and raft towed behind it.

I then had another detailed look at my map and decided I was going to try and make it to Grange-over-Sand and just beyond where it looked as if there were a couple or more Campsite. Through Storth and Sandside before getting back on the A6 at Milnthorpe before coming off again at Levens Hall and on to the A590.

Coming off at Meathop and then into Grange-over-Sands riding through I initially passed the lane that was signposted as the route to my eventual campsite and I pushed on through Allithwaite and into Flookburgh before following the signs for a campsite near a Cark Airfield. When I got there it was one of those Holiday Villages from hell a massive site with clubhouse and entertainment etc. the sort of places that end up being noisy until midnight and beyond, not my sort of place. So I retired back up the road to Flookburgh and passed Airfield (37), Airfields would pass Castles on this leg but would it stay that way when we come to Scotland.
There is not much to say about RAF Cark, it was a small site that was opened in 1941 and closed in 1945 it was used as a navigational and staff pilot training base as well as an anti aircraft cooperation unit, the latter meaning it was a base for aircraft acting as target tugs helping to maintain the training of the Anti Aircraft crews in the area. It is now the base for the North West Parachute Club.

I decided against going on and retraced my steps to Grange over Sands and the sign to the campsite I have passed less than 20 mins ago, I had decide on banking on my luck of finding decent campsites which hadn’t deserted me so far.

With that I pulled into Low Fell Gate Caravan Park. The initial impressions were mixed as apart from a sign there was no indications at all that this place was anymore than a static caravan park however with the steep gravel driveway I didn’t want to try turning around on that I carried on to flatter area I could see at the top of the drive, which turned out to be the area surrounding the toilet block, I parked up and after walking around for 5 mins to try and find a reception area, I then went over to see a couple who ended up being my neighbours for the night, who informed me that they had had the same problem and they told me that they phoned up and actually paid on the following morning. I decided to do the same although I couldn’t get through so I eventually paid up the following morning.

I pitched close to a tree as I had felt a few drops of rain and wanted to create an area to cook by putting the Basha up but that proved to be a challenge in itself as I even toppled the bike over tying the guy ropes between the bike and the tree. Such was the steepness of the slope, in the end the rain didn’t appear and I was able to cook without getting under cover. I had arrive just after 5.30, 11 hrs after starting out. So I was able to get a shower and get myself sorted in reasonable time, which meant I went for a quick walk before finally climbing into my new tent. I had splashed out in the sales and I think it was well worth it.

I had hoped to stay awake long enough to take a picture of Morecambe across the sands, unfortunately as it was the longest weekend of the year in daylight terms I was beaten on that task.

Take care and as Mick says ‘You don’t stop riding when you get old; you stop to have an early night!.

Some of the best roads and certainly the best coastal roads anywhere in the World!

2009-06-28T09:17:00.000-07:00

I had been told Northern Ireland would bring some of the best roads I’d ever ridden on, so with much anticipation I was roused from my slumbers at 5.30 as the ferry Mersey Viking was nearing Belfast Harbour. What was to follow was the longest days riding and the longest post to date.

A young lady , gently but firmly advised all passengers to get their gear together and get down to breakfast, which was plentiful and served with efficiency, I suppose it had to be when you have a ferry full of passengers that need to be fed and watered in approx 30 mins.

The cabin I had been allocated was excellent, I had been slightly worried by the fact that is was an inside cabin with no windows and I am somewhat claustrophobic, so I wasn’t sure how I would sleep, I needn’t have worried I had a great night’s sleep, so I was ready to go when we were called down to our vehicles almost bang on 6.30am only for the problem tankbag zip to strike again, this time it was a real pain, so I used one of my spare shock cords to strap it in place until I got off the boat.

I went out through the gate and pulled over to get it attached, it took so much fiddling around the last of the lorries had departed and the gate closed before I finally got it sorted. I soon caught them up however as just up the road there were major roadworks under way on the harbour roads, which was delaying everyone, it amazed me that they were under way at this time in the morning, they were still under way 6-7hrs later when I passed through again.

The plan was to head over to Londonderry and up to Culmore on Lough Foyle which marks the border with the Republic of Ireland and start my day-long affinity to the A2 coast road around Northern Ireland, after a quick refuel part way I actually arrived just after 8.00am. I had spotted that the Camping and Caravan Club have a site at Downpatrick on Strangford Lough and thought I would make my way around and stay overnight there before finishing off on the following day before catching the Sunday Night sailing back to Birkenhead.

After a quick ride in and out of Londonderry I was soon out of town again and passing the City of Derry Airport, (27) The airport has its origins in World War II. In 1941 RAF Eglinton air base was established as the home to No. 133 Squadron RAF which flew Hurricane fighters in defence of the city. In 1942 the base was occupied by the No. 41 Squadron RAF. In 1943 the airfield became a Fleet Air Arm base called HMS Gannet and was home to the No. 1847 Fleet Air Arm Squadron which provided convoy air cover as part of the Second Battle of the Atlantic.

After the war the base remained a military establishment until the 1950s when the Ministry of Defence returned much of the land to the original landowners. The original name of the airport was Londonderry Eglinton Airport and was usually just referred to as Eglinton. Some limited commercial activities were undertaken at the airfield during the 1960s when Emerald Airways operated a Glasgow service. During most of the 1970s the only flying at Eglinton was carried out by Eglinton Flying Club which is still based at the airport. In 1978 Londonderry City Council decided to purchase the airfield with a view to improving the transport infrastructure for the North-West of Ireland. The airport has slowly developed since then with private short-haul charters to various destinations within the British Isles, a service which still continues including the recent addition of helicopter pilot training and charter services. Loganair introduced the first scheduled flight between Derry and Glasgow in 1979, a route which was recently dropped due to rising fuel costs. This route was the only route for ten years until Loganair introduced an additional daily Manchester service in 1989.

In January 2009 the council appointed Albert Harrison, the former head of Belfast International Airport, as the new manager of the airport. He has been tasked with turning the loss making facility around and has been given just six months to implement savings of £600,000 per annum and increase the number of carriers, destinations and passengers.

In April 2009 the council issued tender documents for a multi-million pound expansion of the terminal to improve passenger flow and meet current EU customs and immigration regulations. It is planned to increase the size of the arrivals hall and open two shops and two additional diners in the departure lounge and to build a business and VIP lounge. Currently only Ryanair has any scheduled flights from Derry City and it’s future seems to be constantly on the edge of existence.

Further down the A2 I came to former airfield number (27) at what once had been RAF Ballykelly. 29 March 2006 - the Irish airline Eirjet issued an apology after a flight it operated from Liverpool John Lennon Airport to City of Derry Airport on behalf of Ryanair landed at the wrong airfield, touching down at Ballykelly Airfield, a former RAF base and more recently an Army base some 10 kilometres (6 miles) away from its intended destination. The statement explained that the incident was caused by an "error by the Eirjet pilot who mistakenly believed he was on a visual approach to City of Derry airport". An air accident investigation report in January 2007 reported that the pilot had been unable to obtain the correct set of charts prior to the flight, only obtaining them the day after the incident. The pilot stated that if he had seen the charts, he would have been fully aware of the existence of Ballykelly and would not have landed there. The crew believed the instrument landing aid system at City of Derry was malfunctioning as what they saw of the runway did not match the instrument readings and the presence of an instrument calibrating aircraft close by added to their belief that there was a technical fault. The report also stated that although an air traffic controller thought the jet was "slightly low" he did not warn the crew about the other runway.

RAF Ballykelly opened in June 1941 as a base for RAF Coastal Command. In 1943 the main runway was extended and acquired an unusual characteristic in that it crosses an active railway line. Rules were put in place giving trains the right of way over landing aircraft. The base was used to carry out anti-submarine patrols and escort convoys over the Atlantic Ocean. At various times B-24 Liberator aircraft flew from Ballykelly in the fight against the U-boats, ranging from the Bay of Biscay to northern Norway. By the end of the war, Ballykelly-based squadrons had been responsible for sinking twelve U-boats, sharing with other aircraft and surface ships in the destruction of several others, and damaging many more.

The base was closed at the end of World War II, but re-opened in 1947 as the home of the RAF Joint Anti-Submarine School, a training flight flying Avro Shackleton aircraft. It closed briefly in 1951 to allow preparatory work to be done for the arrival of the Shackleton aircraft in 1952. In 1955, RAF Ballykelly was home to three squadrons of Shackletons, 206 Squadron (MK I's), 204 Squadron (MKII's) and 240 Squadron (MK I's). There was also a flight Squadron with 2 Lockheed Hudsons, 2 Douglas DC-3s and one Auster. In 1957 and again in 1958, 240 Squadron was among those involved in Operation Grapple, nuclear weapon testing on Christmas Island in the Pacific.

By 1961, Ballykelly was home to three Squadrons flying Shackletons MR2's: 203 Squadron, 204 Squadron and 210 Squadron. 203 Squadron later re-equipped with Mk3 Phase3 aircraft and the other squadrons with Mk2 phase 3s. (some of these Mk2s were later converted to the AEW function, becoming the last Shackletons in RAF service). These three Squadrons were part of the ASW (Anti-Submarine Warfare) force. They also covered SAR (Search and Rescue) standby duties together with their counterparts at RAF Kinloss and RAF St. Mawgan.

Some Fleet Air Arm units, including 819 Squadron moved onto the station in 1962 and they referred to it as HMS Sealion. The runways were extended again in 1963 to allow for potential dispersal of the V-bomber force. In 1968, a 204 Squadron Shackleton flying from Ballykelly suffered the last loss of a Shackleton when Sqn Ldr Clive Haggett and his crew, a total of 12 men, were killed when their aircraft flew into the Mull of Kintyre early one rainy morning.

The last of the Shackleton aircraft left RAF Ballykelly on 31 March 1971, the base closed and the site was handed over to the Army on 2 June 1972, who renamed it Shackleton Barracks.

Before long it was into Limavady and back out again on one of the few detours from the A2 down the B69 through Crindle and then towards Magilligan Point.

Okay it may appear a bit grey at this stage, however you have to consider the roads were empty and it was still before 9.00am. without going down to the point itself as it was a dead end once back on the A2 I kept to it.

I stopped off briefly at Downhill House and Mussenden Temple but it was still so early nothing was open so I had to relive myself behind a tree, having said that, I could have done it without being so bashful as no one was around. It was still way before this National Trust site was due to open. Downhill House was a mansion built in the 18th century for Frederick Hervey, 4th Earl of Bristol. Much of the building was destroyed by fire in 1851 and rebuilt in the 1870s, but fell into disrepair after the Second World War. It is now part of the National Trust property of Downhill Demesne and Mussenden Temple.

During World War Two, the house was used to billet RAF servicemen and women. Which is very hard to believe when you see it’s condition today.

The Bruce family continued to own the house until 1946; by 1950, it had been dismantled and the surrounding land sold. The house was acquired by the National Trust in 1980; the temple had become a Trust property in the 1940s.

Back on the road it was briefly into Coleraine before coming down the other side of the Bann Estuary and into Portstewart, after a quick stop overlooking the harbour, it was off to somewhere a bit special.

I had been looking forward to the part as it is the home of the North West 200. Many people ask why the North West 200 is called the North West 200. The answer lies in the spawning of the event. History reveals that although the Club’s original choice of name for the race remained, their original choice of venue did not. The name has continued to generate some confusion amongst those who are unaware of the event’s origins. The inclusion of “200” simply indicates that the event was originally run over a distance of 200 miles. “North West”, reflects the original intended, location of the race, i.e. on a public roads course in the North West of Ireland.

The North West 200’s first organisers could not have imagined how the event would grow over the years. In 1964, the North West 200 event was handed over to the Coleraine & District Motor Club which continues to run the event today. In 2007, around two million people logged on from nearly every part of the world to watch what has become Ireland’s largest sporting event and one of the world’s fastest road races.

Having ridden around some of the roads these guys race on as I can say is they are heros.

This is the starting grid and pit area for the races, and just up the road there are islands in the middle of the road, with large central light posts, all of which are removed during race week, one thing that isn’t removed are the kerb stones, throughout the circuit, they are painted white in a checker pattern to show they are there, so you cannot afford to run wide at all.

The other thing that this part of the Coast is also known for is just a bit further up the road, at Portrush, every few miles there is yet another great golf course and probably the most famous of the lot is Royal Portrush, certainly it is the one that Peter Allis waxes lyrical about, maybe one day I‘ll come back to re-create my steps but playing the golf courses of the Northern Ireland Coast, given how many I’ve passed so far I will need weeks rather than days, if I was to do that.

Just after Portrush I came to my first castle of this section at Dunluce it is also the site of Magheracross, I tried the internet to do some research on the latter and came up blank but fared much better when looking at details of the Castle (33) In the 1200s Richard de Burgh, Earl of Ulster, built the first castle at Dunluce.

It is first documented in the hands of the MacQuillin family in 1513. The earliest features of the castle are two large drum towers about 9 metres in diameter on the eastern side, both relics of a stronghold built here by the MacQuillins after they became lords of the district, the chieftan of which was known as Lord of the Route, in the late fourteenth century.

Later it became the home of the chief of the Clan MacDonnell of Antrim and the Clan MacDonald of Dunnyveg from Scotland. Chief John Mor MacDonald was the second son of Good John of Islay, Lord of the Isles, 6th chief of Clan Donald in Scotland. John Mor MacDonald was born through John of Islay's second marriage to Princess Margaret Stewart, daughter of King Robert II of Scotland. In 1584, on the death of James MacDonald the 6th chief of the Clan MacDonald of Antrim and Dunnyveg, the Antrim Glens were seized by one of his younger brothers called Somerled or Sorley Boy MacDonnell known also as Sorley Buy. Sorley took the castle, keeping it for himself and improving it in the Scottish style. Sorley Buy swore allegiance to James IV of Scotland and his son Ranald was made Randal MacDonnell, 1st Earl of Antrim by Queen Elizabeth.

Four years later, the Girona, a galleass from the Spanish Armada was wrecked in a storm on the rocks nearby. The cannon from the ship were installed in the gatehouses and the rest of the cargo sold, the funds being used to restore the castle. MacDonnell's granddaughter Rose was born in the castle in 1613. At one point, part of the kitchen next to the cliff face collapsed into the sea, after which the wife of the owner refused to live in the castle any longer. According to a legend, when the kitchen fell into the sea only a kitchen boy survived, as he was sitting in the corner of the kitchen which did not collapse.

Dunluce Castle served as the seat of the Earl of Antrim until the impoverishment of the MacDonnells in 1690, following the Battle of the Boyne. Since that time, the castle has deteriorated and parts were scavenged to serve as materials for nearby buildings. It is now in the care of the Northern Ireland Environment Agency.

In 1973 the castle appeared on the inner cover of the multi-million selling Led Zeppelin album Houses of the Holy. Keanu Reeves's character makes reference to this in the hit comedy film Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure when they travel back in time to meet Socrates. The castle also appeared in Jackie Chan's - The Medallion (2001) when it provided an exterior setting for the 'villains lair'. And looking back from this car park, I was able to see the dunes that separate Royal Portrush GC from the sea, that and The Skerries just off shore. I did a search on the word Skerries but only found details of a number of sites around the UK that carries the name, into my second page of searching on Google I finally found. - The word "Skerry" is the Scottish diminutive of the Old Norse word "sker", meaning a small rocky reef or island.

It was then into Portallintrae and then Bushmills, bypassing the railway that runs from the town to Giant’s Causeway, I was more interested in passing the Old Bushmills Distillery, the home of my nightcap on the Mersey Viking last night.

I then took the B146 one of the very few occasions all day when I deviated from the A2, I missed the Giants Causeway on purpose, as it was a dead end, that and I was starting to cover some serious miles on this trip and I was starting to think that, Maybe I could make it all the way round in one day and head back on tonight’s ferry if they would let me. It wasn’t long however before my next stop to take in Castle (34) Dunseverick Castle is situated near the small village of Dunseverick and the Giant's Causeway. Dunseverick Castle and earthworks are Scheduled Historic Monuments in the townland of Feigh, in Moyle District Council. Dunseverick Castle and the peninsula on which it stands were given to the National Trust in 1962 by local farmer Jack McCurdy. The Causeway Cliff Path also runs past on its way to Dunseverick Harbour to the east and to the Giant's Causeway to the west.

Saint Patrick is recorded as having visited Dunseverick castle in the 5th century AD, where he baptized Olcan, a local man who later became a Bishop of Ireland. The original stone fort that occupied the position was attacked by Viking raiders in 870 AD.

The castle was occupied by various Irish chief's and lord's until its capture and destruction by General Robert Munro and his Cromwellian troops in the 1650s, and today only the ruins of the gatelodge remain. A small residential tower survived until 1978 when it eventually surrendered to the sea below.

It was a 'key' ancient site in Ireland. One of the royal roads from Tara, seat of the Kings of Ireland ended at Dunseverick castle.

From this point I was also able to take this following one of Rathlin Island, Rathlin is the only inhabited offshore island in Northern Ireland, with a rising population of now just over 100 people. It is home to tens of thousands of seabirds, including common guillemots, kittiwakes, puffins and razorbills – about thirty bird families in total. It is a popular place for birdwatchers, with a Royal Society for the Protection of Birds nature reserve offering spectacular views of Rathlin’s bird colony. The RSPB has also successfully managed natural habitat to facilitate the return of the Red-billed Chough. Northern Ireland's only breeding pair of choughs can be seen during the summer months. The cliffs on this relatively bare island are impressive, standing 230 feet (70 m) tall. Bruce's Cave is named after Robert the Bruce, also known as Robert I of Scotland: it was here that he was said to have seen the famous spider.

Back on my way I pushed on a little further to take the B15 and then pulled in to Carrick-a-Rede Rope Bridge, yet another National Trust site, The National Trust have a huge amount of involvement on this Northern Island coast, and it had the double benefit, as they DO NOT charge motorbikes to park, so you can actually visit a lot of places, okay you would have to pay if you wanted to enter most of them but the views on these sites are always some of the best.

Sorry you can’t really see it from this photo but the Rope Bridge is situated above the nettle that is the right of the two central ones. The rope suspension bridge links the mainland to the tiny Carrick Island. The site is owned and maintained by the National Trust spans twenty metres and is thirty metres above the rocks below. Today the bridge is mainly a tourist attraction, with 227,000 visitors in 2007. The bridge is now taken down every year in late October or early November, depending on weather conditions, having been put up in March.

Carrick-a-rede means 'rock in the road'. It is thought salmon fishermen have been erecting bridges to the island for over 350 years. It has taken many forms over the years. In the 1970s it featured only a single handrail and large gaps between the slats. A version of the bridge, tested up to ten tonnes, was built with the help of local climbers and abseilers in 2000. The previous design was engineered in 2004 and offers visitors and fishermen alike a much safer passage to the island. The current wire rope and Douglas fir bridge was made by Heyn Construction in Belfast and erected early in 2008 at a cost of over £16,000. Although no one has fallen off the bridge, there have been many instances where visitors, unable to face the walk back across the bridge, have had to be taken off the island by boat

This view alone makes me think they weren’t that much of a wimp after all.

At the end of the B15 was Ballycastle which was a lovely little town with the Golf Club Clubhouse right on the crossroads, I was met with the sight of a number of members teeing up on the first, however it was another sight a little further up the A2 that made me pull over and climb an earth bank to take the following photo. The wall you see surrounds the graveyard and Friary Bonamargy Friary was built close to the mouth of the Carey and Shesk rivers by Rory MacQuillan in 1500. The rival MacDonnell clan fought for and claimed the friary from the MacQuillans in 1588. The cloister, gatehouse, altar and church are well preserved except for the thatch roof. There are many interesting features including the east window, a staircase and a sealed burial vault. The coffins of several Earls of Ulster and the aforementioned chieftain, Sorley Boy MacDonnell, lie within.

Personally as a single figure handicap golfer this course looked in wonderful condition and I have not seen a natural obstacle quite like this for some years, I once remember having to duck, and quick, when a playing partner took his second shot at one of the holes at Churston Golf Club in Devon, the hole in question had a medieval stone wall dissecting the fairway, my erstwhile playing partner decided to go for the green and ‘thinned’ his shot into the wall, the ball ricocheted almost all the way back to the tee and left the rest of the party incapable of getting back up from the fairway due to incontrollable laughter. Well it was part of a Cricket tour when we ended up playing more golf than cricket due to the weather.

What was to come next is something that I have since described as the best biking roads I have ever encountered and this was after missing out on the Glendun Viaduct and the ride up the Glendun River which I believe is also world class. However this was made up by the fact that I met up with a crowd of guys in Cushendun or should I say the Northern Ireland Vintage Motorcycle Club and their friends who had traveled over from Heysham. This small car park next to some conveniences was full of approx 100 bikes of various ages and makes, thankfully mine wasn’t the newest and did attract a fair amount of attention and comment, mainly because of all the kit fitted to her.

The villages of Cushendun and Knocknacarry are very, very special. The photo above does not do it justice in anyway possible.

Back out on to the A2 it was through Cushendall and Red Bay before heading off for the run into Larne, this mazy sound straightforward however the following 20 miles are the reason why I have waxed so lyrical about my time in Northern Ireland and in that, I will probably offend the other hundreds of miles, please don’t, since I returned, all I have done is to tell people I’ve met is, that this is the place to go, it is awesome, Northern Ireland ‘Rocks’ in the words of my kids.

The A2 hugs the coast all the way around to Larne and I have to admit I did get carried away with the riding, it is absolutely wonderful a quick stop at Garron Point for the following.

And then it was on to Carnlough, whilst on the surface not special but that could be put down to the grey weather.

All you have to understand is the road I am taking is literally as close to the sea as is possible, on average during this section I am within 20ft of the sea all the way to Larne and despite the grey overcast sky it remained dry and didn’t detract from the experience in anyway as the smell of the sea was in my nostrils all the way around this road.

A little further up the coast at Ballygalley I spotted the P&O Ferry emerging through the mist coming in from Fleetwood. Checking my watch I had now covered a large proportion of the route planned for the day and it was still before 12.00 noon. So I decided I was going to pull in at the harbour on my way through Belfast and ask if I could change my return journey, otherwise I would be kicking my heels all Sunday, waiting for the night sailing.

A quick refuel on the outskirts of Larne was my second for the day and gives a further indication of the miles covered. Larne came and went very quickly and after slight confusion which saw me coming out of the town on the wrong road, I quickly retraced my steps and headed out to Glynn where I saw a huge diamond shaped marker, with a light on it by the side of the road, a quick look out towards the sea immediately told me what it was for as I saw the ferry from Fleetwood obviously lining up on it as it entered the narrows of the channel.

I then turned left and out on to Island Magee, it is not really an island it is more a peninsular but the panoramic views were spectacular in the most part right up to the back entrance of the Oil Terminal at the tip, that looked back over Larne most of it was very rural with one down side, they had been out in the last few days, putting down a new road surface, by that I mean, bitumen and chippings, you know the sort of thing that does massive damage to your car’s paint work for days afterwards, unfortunately it does leave behind piles of loose stones right where you don’t want them on the riding line in a corner, I could feel the bike slipping and skidding on more than one occasion. The roads were also very narrow and didn’t leave me with any places to pull over and take any decent photos I’m sorry to say.

Back off the Island it was into Carrickfergus where I took the opportunity to pull over and take a much needed comfort break and eat the sandwich I had bought at the last refuelling. I also took the opportunity to adjust my chain as it was starting to really sag unfortunately I overdid it and had to go back a notch a little later on. I passed Castle (35) on the shore of Belfast Lough. Besieged in turn by the Scots, Irish, English and French, the castle played an important military role until 1928 and remains one of the best preserved medieval structures in the whole of Ireland. It was useful as 3/4 of the perimeter is covered by water.

Carrickfergus Castle was built by John de Courcy in 1177 as his headquarters, after he conquered eastern Ulster in 1177 and ruled as a petty king until 1204, when he was ousted by another Norman adventurer, Hugh de Lacy It appears first in the official English records in 1210 when King John laid siege to it and took control of what was then Ulster’s premier strategic garrison. Following its capture, constables were appointed to command the castle and the surrounding area. After the collapse of the Earldom of Ulster in 1333, the castle remained the Crown's principal residential and administrative centre in the north of Ireland. During the early stages of the Nine Years War (1595-1603), when English influence in the north became tenuous, crown forces were supplied and maintained through the town's port. And in 1597, the surrounding country was the scene for the Battle of Carrickfergus.

During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries a number of improvements were made to accommodate artillery, notably externally splayed gunports and embrasures for cannon, though these improvements did not prevent the castle from being attacked and captured on many occasions during this time. General Schomberg besieged and took the castle in 1690. This is also the place where Schomberg's leader, King William III first set foot in Ireland on 14 June 1690.In 1760, after fierce fighting in the town, it was surrendered to French invaders under the command of Francois Thurot. They looted the castle and town and then left, only to be caught by the Royal Navy.

In 1778, a small but significant event in the American War of Independence began at Carrickfergus, when John Paul Jones, in the face of reluctance by his crew to approach too close to the Castle, lured a Royal Navy vessel from its moorings into the North Channel, and won an hour-long battle. In 1797 the Castle, which had on various occasions been used to house prisoners of war, became a prison and it was heavily defended during the Napoleonic Wars; six guns on the east battery remain of the twenty-two that were used in 1811.

For a century it remained a magazine and armory. During the First World War it was used as a garrison and ordnance store and during the Second World War as an air raid shelter.

It was garrisoned continuously for about 750 years until 1928, when its ownership was transferred to the government for preservation as an ancient monument and it is open to the public. The banqueting hall has been fully restored and there are many exhibits to show what life was like in medieval times. It was built and re-built three times, and still stands today.

The road through Carrickfergus was okay before the mainly uninteresting trip along the M5 towards the centre of Belfast before coming off and heading for the docks and the Ferry Terminal, it was now 1.30pm and unfortunately no one was around, I would probably have to wait until about 6.30 before anyone would come back on duty for the night sailing, I also tried ringing them without success, which didn’t overly surprise me.

Back out on to the A2 again I passed Belfast City airport or George Best as it is now known and airfield (28) Heading towards the Ards Peninsular, taking the side road into Helen’s Bay then on to the B20 through Bangor, before rejoining the A2 at Groomsport.

Once again this was great riding the road through Donaghadee was wonderful and the view out to sea was very tranquil, as the sun was trying to break through yet the sea was very calm, hardly a ripple as I looked out towards Copeland Island. A little further on when coming into Millisle I passed a sign for a Classic Motorcross meeting and was very tempted to stopover and watch however having made up my mind I wanted to push on as far as I could. I passed a sign telling me it was 17 miles to Portaferry at the tip of the peninsular and worked it our in my mind, that it would probably take 25 mins to get there, then another 40 mins back up Strangford Lough into Newtonards and so on, at this rate I estimated that I would probably get back to Belfast just before 7pm which if I was lucky would be a good time to find out if I could get on tonight’s sailing, even if I couldn’t I had spotted some campsites around the peninsular that I could head back to in plenty of time.

I then passed airfield (29) at the former RAF Ballyhalbert Construction began in 1940 and the windmill stump at Clydesburn was demolished during the process. It opened in May 1941, prior to completion of the works, as a Fighter Command base where the primary weapon was the Supermarine Spitfire. The airfield was officially opened on 28 June 1941. The base provided local protection from Luftwaffe raids on Belfast and the rest of the province. Other aircraft operated from the base were the Hawker Hurricane, Bristol Beaufighter, P-51 Mustang and Boulton Paul Defiant night fighter. During its lifetime, Ballyhalbert was home to RAF, WAAF, Army, Royal Navy and United States Air Force (USAF) personnel. Servicemen from Australia, New Zealand, Canada and Poland also saw duty at Ballyhalbert.

On 19 May, 1944 General Eisenhower, Supreme Commander Allied Forces, visited the airfield en route for RAF Bovingdon. He later went on to become 34th President of the United States from 1953 to 1961.

As HMS Corncake the airfield was used by the Fleet Air Arm for squadrons working up for carrier duty. On November 13, 1945 the airfield was closed and placed on Care and Maintenance. By 1947, with no further use made of the site it was abandoned. The airfield was sold to developers in March 1960, and is in use for several popular caravan parks.

A short distance away from Ballyhalbert airfield, in two local churchyards, lie Canadian, Australian and Polish airmen who died whilst serving at Ballyhalbert. I have to say researching the details of this site it was probably one of the busiest during the Second World War

A little further on, on the outskirts of Portavogie I had a question I had asked myself at the start of the day answered. On the run to Londonderry I had passed loads of van and cars towing race cars of different shapes, sizes and formula on the way somewhere. Kirkistown Race Circuit is between Kirkistown and Portavogie, It is based at airfield (30) the former satellite airfield to RAF Ballyhalbert it was now just after 4pm and obviously the racing was coming to a close as I spotted some of the same vehicles on their way home.

A quick loop around the tip of the peninsular brought me back into Portaferry and then on to the A20 up the side of Strangford Lough and wow was that a bit crazy, there were some warning signs for ‘hidden dip’ and ‘humps’ on the road, well I found a few, when I got quarter of a tonne of bike and rider airborne on more than one occasion, I wasn’t going mental, probably just over the legal national limit, but such were the humps I couldn’t help but take off.

I stopped at one point at Kircubbin to take a couple of photos across the Lough, and you can see the extent of it as in the hazy conditions you could hardly see the other side.

It was now back on the road and in and out of Newtownards and back down the A22 in a blinking of an eye. Just taking the time to note another airfield on the way out of town (31). The former RAF Newtownards although it was closed officially in 1945 it is still used as a base for no 664 Volunteer Glider School. I can’t find that much more information about the base as it was mainly used as an Anti Aircraft communications unit and didn’t appear to have been used as a major base during the Second World War.

Through Balloo, yep that is the village name (and I did that on purpose) before heading into Killyleagh and then Downpatrick where I had thought of stopping over for the night at the Camping and Caravan Club site just North of Town but I wasn’t hanging around now it was off down the A25 to Strangford before rejoining the A2 once more within minutes I came to Castle (36) south of the village of Strangford. Kilclief is a hamlet of historical value on the Strangford to Ardglass road. This kind of tower-house is sometimes called the gatehouse type, because of its similarity to a castle gatehouse. It is among the oldest tower houses in Lecale. Kilclief Castle tower house is a State Care Historic Monument.

It was reputedly built by, and was the residence of, John Sely who was Bishop of Down from 1429 to 1443 (when he was ejected and deprived of his offices for living there with Lettice Whailey Savage, a married woman). Kilclief Castle was the earliest tower-house in Lecale, built between 1413 and 1441. It was garrisoned for the Crown by Nicholas FitzSymon and ten warders in 1601-2.

9 -10 miles further on I came to castle (37) at Ardglass, Jordan’s Castle, Its early history is somewhat obscure. The earliest authentic reference is to a defence of the castle by Simon Jordan against the O'Neills for three years, until relieved by Lord Deputy Mountjoy in 1601. The 18th century historian, Harris, says that "it is most probable that Jordan's Castle was erected by one of the family, whose arms (a cross and three horseshoes) are fixed in a stone near the top". In 1911 the Belfast antiquarian, Francis Joseph Bigger, bought the castle and restored it, using it for storage and to display a collection of antiquities. When he died in 1926, the castle was presented by his executor, Dr Joseph Bigger, to the state on condition that, with its contents, it should be preserved as an Ancient Monument.

Ardglass had at least six castles and remains of four of them can still be seen: Ardglass Castle, Cowd Castle, Margaret's Castle and Jordan's Castle. Unfortunately the I was only able to see the latter. Carrying on up to Clough and then I stopped to take the following photo of the Mountains of Mourne a little of further on.

Shortly afterwards there was yet another castle (38) at Dundrum. It was founded in 1177 by John de Courcy, following his invasion of Ulster. The castle, built to control access into Lecale from the west and south, stands on the top of a rocky hill commanding fine views south over Dundrum Bay and the Mourne Mountains, the lands west towards Slieve Croob and the plains of Lecale to the east.

The castle was captured by King John in 1210 and remained Crown property until de Lacy was allowed to return to his Earldom in 1226. It was probably during de Lacy's second tenure as Earl of Ulster (1227-43) that the twin-towered gatehouse, similar to the one at Pembroke Castle, was inserted in the curtain wall.

The stone curtain wall of the outer bailey is likely to have been built by the Magennis family of Mourne, who seized Dundrum in the late 1400s. The Earl of Kildare briefly captured the castle in 1517 as did Lord Deputy Grey in 1538. During this period it was referred to as Magennis Castle. Phelim Magennis later surrendered the castle to Lord Mountjoy in 1601. It was made over to Lord Cromwell in 1605 and sold to Sir Francis Blundell in 1636. The Magennis family recaptured Dundrum in 1642, but later lost it to the Parliamentarians, who dismantled the castle in 1652 after they withdrew their garrison.

After 1660 the Blundells returned and built a gabled L-shaped mansion in the south-west corner of the outer bailey. This dwelling was ruined by the time the property passed to the second Marquess of Downshire in the early nineteenth century, though the trees on the hill were probably planted at this time. The castle and grounds were placed in State Care by the seventh Marquess in 1954.

On entering Newcastle I was very pleasantly surprised, how clean and well maintained it was. Very much a seaside resort town it was in far better than some of the seaside towns I had ridden through so far on my journey and the view up Slieve Donard was stunning even with the cloud shrouding the top.

From Newcastle it appeared to be about 25 miles to Newry and then a further 35 to Belfast again, so I was on track to get back on schedule for me to go down on bended knees to try and get on to tonight’s sailing, however that was still well over an hour away and yet another fuel stop.

Once more the A2 didn’t disappoint it was wonderful riding round the coast that bordered the Mountains of Mourne, however shortly after leaving the town I came upon Bloody Bridge and it made me think about the name; originally a ford. The name refers to a massacre at the site at the time of the 1641 rebellion. The bodies of slain prisoners were thrown over the bridge into the river, turning it red and so the river became known as the Bloody Bridge River, Wow, well I did wonder.

I kept on pushing on through Kilkeel and Rostrevor before a quick stop at Warrenpoint to take the following pictures over towards the Republic of Ireland on the far side of Carlingford Lough. It was then a quick blast up the dual carriageway to Newry and then the A1 towards Belfast. I got a little wound up along this section for two reasons, one being the roadworks in parts that led to certain speed restrictions but more importantly one particular idiot that was trying to squeeze me with his car on more than one occasion, I couldn’t quite make out what he was trying to do, when ever I pulled over to let him through, he didn’t really take it, when he did get past, he would then ease off leaving me with no other alternative than to re-overtake him, this went one all the way from Banbridge to Hillsborough, at which pint I made a stupid error and went the wrong way on the M1 and travelled 7 miles in the wrong direction before retracing my steps.

I finally pulled back in to the Ferry Terminal, close to 7 o’clock and made my way to the reception, thankfully there was only a couple of cars in the queue so I was hopeful. 10 mins later thanks to the beautiful Lyndsey I was booked on to the Lagan Viking sailing at 10.30pm, I couldn’t believe my luck or the day’s riding I had just experienced. Over 12 hours of riding 3 tanks of fuel, two minor service stops meant that I had covered the complete coast of Northern Ireland, which amazed a couple of people who came over for a chat whilst we waited in the warm early evening sunshine to embark. Once again we would be going down about 9pm , that would give around an hour to shower and change and get something to eat before sailing.

Once on board one of the crew, passed me the tie down straps so I could secure my bike myself which most bikers would far prefer to do, so I made the basic assumption that this guy also rode a motorbike. Once again I encountered the same problem as the morning when the zip of the tank bag baseplate fell apart which delayed me a bit. I then went up the seriously squeeky escalator with two guys I had met the night before, they worked for a removals company out of Ipswich who had been moving someone back to Northern Ireland.

Due to the amount of vehicles disgorging at the same time meant that we had to queue for a while before collecting our cabin keys, even so it wasn’t that long and I was able to find my way very quickly this time to my allocated cabin (I was only one away from the one I left less than 15 hours before.

The new Lagan Viking entered service in July 2005. She was built by Cantiere Navale di Visentini Francesco & Co. of Italy. She is 27'000gts and can carry up to 700 passengers in her 2 lounges (passenger certificate is 970), and can sleep up to 480 passengers in cabins. She has 4 vehicle decks and room for around 200 lorries. Her maximum speed is 27 knots, but usually sails at 23 knots maximum. She sails on the Belfast–Birkenhead route on charter with her marginally newer sister ship the Mersey Viking. Her charter to Norfolk Line is to expire in 2009, although when the ship was first chartered it was charted with the possible intention of being bought outright by Norse Merchant, or as they are now known, Norfolkline, which I now believe has happened. As an aside I have now flown and sailed with Maersk the owners of Norfolkline.
The Belfast–Birkenhead route is invaluable to drivers, as it saves them driving through Scotland on poor single-carriageway roads and behind a great number of freight vehicles. In all, the total journey time on board the ship is 7 hours. I researched my routes in great depth and this is the one that really did offer the best options for anyone traveling from anywhere South of Manchester.

I had read before and after my journey about both the Mersey and Lagan Vikings. Of the reviews some of them were good some of them not so good, however reading the not so good ones. I may have been lucky with calm sailings in both directions but some people are really do have OCD to be polite, I have another word for it but I am too much of a gentleman to mention it here. I have traveled throughout the World for both business and pleasure and the visas in my passports will back this up.

These two vessels are providing an 8 hour overnight ferry crossing, you are not on a cruise ship. The only other overnight sailing in Europe that provide a better experience in my personal experience are the ones provided in the Baltic, the Silja and Colour Lines have massive Cruise Ferries, that are there to provide an overnight clubbing and tax-free experiences, which is not what these Norfolkline sailings are set up for.

I remember sailing in the mid-90’s from Helsinki to Stockholm on one of these massive floating clubs and to be frank all some of the Finns were interested in was a 24hr drinking experience. I was traveling on one of these ships as part of a Finnish Resellers Annual conference, I was booked to provide a presentation on the second morning. Despite my hangover I had been professional enough to have actually gone to bed (okay in the early hours). Standing on the stage to deliver my presentation at 9.30 the following morning in Stockholm, I was greeted by the sight of two of the Finnish contingent of our group walking in with a pint glass in each hand. That then told me what this was all about, at the same time this ship wasn’t due to sail back until 6.30pm that evening, which is another difference.

So there the Norfolkline provide an excellent service, one of the best I have come across, and if you add in the entertainment of a ‘Live Act’ on a Friday night it is as good as it gets. I’ve done the ferry from Holyhead to Dublin , it is Okay, I’ve done the Cross Channel ferries by P&O but to sum it up, I had two overnight sailings where I had a decent meal and breakfast and more importantly a good night’s sleep. I may have been fortunate with the weather but that doesn’t account for the quality of the crew and team that Norfolkline have both on board and on the quay, Thank You.

A quick shower, something to eat and I settled down with a drink in the lounge to write up of my notes but I was that tired it didn’t last long before I head back to my cabin and got my head down.

Take care and as Mick says ‘You don’t stop riding when you get old; you stop when you get back on board!.

On my way to heaven I had to endure purgatory first!

2009-06-27T08:09:00.000-07:00

I’ve ridden some good roads in my time and some great coast roads on this trip and I was told Northern Ireland would probably bring another league all together. However before I go into any detail, I have to first of all go through the 6 hours of almost hell it took me to get to the ferry terminal in Birkenhead.

I left home just after 10 pm with a forecast that wasn’t brilliant, however when I started despite being grey there was no evidence how bad it was going to get. I did immediately have one problem, I stopped for fuel in Tadley and straightaway realised I had left a couple of things at Home 40 mins later I was back under way.

I had seen a forecast on Breakfast News, that suggested it would start to rain by the time I got to Oxford despite it getting more oppressive by the minute, is stayed dry, what I couldn’t understand however was the weight of traffic on the A34, the sheer volume was compounded by selfish idiots that didn’t see the need to pull out of the outside lane, it therefore meant the run to the M40 which usually takes me about an hour to an hour and a quarter took me almost 2 hours.

Then the M40 didn’t turn out much better another hour later and I was approaching Warwick when to heavens opened and I mean opened, I immediately stopped on the hard shoulder underneath a bridge to put on my Waterproofs and in the couple of minutes that it took, I found one, I was soaked, it had gone through my jacket and was going through my trousers. I got going again but the traffic was now crawling at 10-20mph and the slower it went the wetter I got.

I then stopped a few miles further up the road, under another bridge, this time to try and clear my visor as it was getting soaked inside and out, which meant everytime I put it down to stop my face being pummelled by the heavy rain, it would immediately mist up again.

I did this twice more before I cleared Birmingham and got through the worst of the rain, it was now closing on 3 pm and I decided I needed to have a warm drink, and at the same time take my waterproof jacket off, as I was now starting to sweat up as the sun had come out near Stafford, so it was into Stafford Services and refuel both myself and the bike, at the same take my gloves and wring them out before attaching them to one of the dry bags on top of my panniers so they could dry in the sun and wind.

Back on the M6 it was still dreadfully slow with traffic crawling along, so I gave up and pulled off as soon as I saw the sign for queuing traffic after junction 17, so I headed off through Sandbach, Middlewich and picked up the A54 near Kelsall Hill, running down the hill I was greeted with the sight I didn’t want to see again this day, Black Clouds, big ones at that. I was hoping I would get through Chester before they opened up again. Back down on to The Groves again to pick up where I left off, I was greeted with the surprising sight of the River Dee in full flood on the summer tide, it happens two or three times a year and the guy that ran one of the Ice Cream kiosks, that it was expected to be even worse the Saturday, if that was the case then it certainly would have been over the steps and pontoons, which is a real pain for the guys running the running boats etc, as they are not allowed to hire them out in case someone goes over the weir, as in full flood, the river easily clears it by a good 3-4ft, that and it also brings with it fallen trees and debris it has been waiting to wash down for months.

With the black clouds gathering I didn’t wait around for too long, a quick cup of tea and a chat and I was on my way again, back out through Sealand, towards what used to be RAF Sealand (26) and is now a big industrial estate, It was originally a civilian airfield and was taken over by the military in 1916 for training. Two twin hangars, which were built in 1917, were used by the newly-formed Royal Flying Corps.

No 30 Maintenance unit was formed there in 1939. In 1951 the base was taken over by the United States Air Force, and handed back to the RAF in 1957. Sealand was a communications support base for RAF operations around the world. It functioned as a third line repair base for avionics equipment for all three services. No 631 Volunteer Gliding Squadron operated at Sealand between 1963 and 2006, most recently flying the Viking TMk1 conventional winch-launched glider. In March 2006, 631 VGS relocated to RAF Woodvale to operate the Grob109b 'Vigilant' self-launched motorglider.

After passing through the estate it was off up to Two Mills cross roads before heading West , through, Puddington, Burton, Little Ness and the World Famous Ness Gardens, run as an off shoot of Liverpool University. Then Neston itself, before heading out to Parkgate, I mentioned previously that it used to be a port and sailing ships used to tie up and load various cargoes, Parkgate was an important port from the start of the eighteenth century, in particular as an embarkation point for Ireland. The River Dee, which served as a shipping lane to the city of Chester, had silted up, creating a need for a port further downstream. A quay was built near the small town of Neston but further silting required yet another re-siting slightly further downstream near the gate of Neston's hunting park. Hence the settlement of Parkgate was born. However the inevitable happened, the Dee silted up even further, and Parkgate became unusable as a port, to be superseded by the Port of Liverpool.

One famous visitor was Lord Nelson's mistress, (Lady) Emma Hamilton, who was born in nearby Ness and who used to bathe at Parkgate, apparently as a cure for a skin complaint. The other was Handel who stayed in Parkgate before sailing to Dublin in April 1742 for the first performance of Messiah. He had finished Messiah in the summer of 1741 and at most he could only have added minor touches to the work in Parkgate.

Towards the end of the eighteenth century Parkgate was popular as a seaside resort with baths. But this diminished as the sands of the estuary were consumed with grass. With no beach and no direct access to the sea, Parkgate could manage only small subsistence from fishing.

Still popular with tourists, it boasts world-class bird watching. During seasonal high tides the water reaches the sea wall, and visitors arrive at the village to witness the unusual sight.

As I pulled off I passed by a restaurant that used to be a haunt of mine, Mr Chow’s I took my ex-wife there a couple times when we were dating and prior to that myself and a few mates used to end up in there on a Sunday night after we had been to on of the local pubs, whilst it wasn’t a club or disco as such, it did have one of the first video jukeboxes, which they always had linked up to special effects lighting on a Sunday night as an extra draw. Whilst the pub has long since closed, like so many others, Mr Chow’s seems to be thriving still.

It was now a case of heading on further, through Gayton and Heswall before entering West Kirby were I took a quick photo of Hilbre Island, the last time I was down here a couple of years ago, there were gangs of Cockle Pickers out on the sand, however they were not allowed to sell them in this country I was told due to the outfall from both Waste Treatment works at little up the estuary but also the various discharges from the Steel and Paper mills at Deeside.

West Kirby also has a fairly sizeable boating lake and it was there that I both learned to swim and Wind Surf the first was when I was five and messing around with my cousin and fell in, in that classic sink or swim episode. It also overlooks Hilbre Island.

Hilbre Island is approximately 47,000 square metres in area, and lies about 1.6 km from Red Rocks, the nearest part of the mainland of the Wirral Peninsula. The other two islands are called Middle Eye (or in older sources Middle Island), which is about 12,000 m² in size and Little Eye, which is considerably smaller. All three islands are formed of red Bunter sandstone. The main island and Middle Eye are several hundred yards apart with Little Eye being nearly 1 mile away from the main island.

The islands are tidal and can be reached on foot from the mainland at low tide. This is a popular activity with tourists, especially during the summer months. Until the end of the 1970s, there was a route from Red Rocks in Hoylake, but this has now been closed because of the danger of being caught by the tide and visitors are advised to set out from the town of West Kirby. Little Eye and Middle Eye are both unpopulated, but Hilbre Island has a few houses, some of which are privately owned, and some where the warden of the islands lives.
Coming out of West Kirby and Hoylake and pushing on to towards, Moreton and Wallasey, the darker and more foreboding it became, right up to the point, where I thought I’m not getting soaked again and shot off through Bidston and Oxton, back to my father’s house but not before another good soaking.

After spending some time with him a quick sandwich and cup of tea as well as confirming the details of his trip down to me next week, it was a all too short visit and I was back on my way, this time through Birkenhead, which sadly hasn’t changed much. I wonder if this may start to change now the docks are coming back into use and more importantly this once famous ship building town is now back making and repairing ships.

I checked in for my voyage to Belfast, with plenty of time to spare, met up with a couple going over for a weekend on his impulse buy, a Kawasaki GP900Z from the early 1990’s but with very low mileage it looked and sounded spot on. At the other end of the chart was a guy and his young son, travelling out to deliver a number of bikes, in fact 11 of them, all Honda 50,70 and 90 Cubs, 5 for one customer and 6 to another. For those of you that don’t know these bikes, they are a cross between a Scooter and a Bike, James May rode one around Vietnam on Top Gear and they are without doubt the biggest selling and copied machine anywhere in the world. He was taking them out to two guys who rebuild and sell them on, with the mileage and condition of them, it would be a bit of a task.

We finally were allowed to take our bikes down at about 9.15pm, these boats are a bit unusual for ferries, as I watched the single cars where being driven up on to the top deck, outside next to the funnel and the lorries and trailers were being put down below with caravans, vans and bikes.

We were directed to one side and where we were given the option of strapping our bikes down ourselves however the crew seemed to know what they were doing, so I left it to them, I took off what I needed and was on my way up the ‘Escalator’ to Reception, where I exchanged my boarding card for a key to a cabin. I got slightly lost finding it but then worked out the system.

After peeling off my ‘stinking’ gear, it is good that I am not writing this in Smell-o-Vision. You would switch off right now if it was. My boots had been wet since Warwick and my socks and my leggings had become dis-coloured by the dye from the boots as well as bringing out all the odours, shall we say from the last 4,000 miles. I immediately headed for the shower and also washed my socks and leggings before hanging them up in the cabin, thankfully I was on my own in a 4 berth cabin.

Then into the bar for a quick drink and then before an evening meal, headed back to my cabin to collect my camera as we were just pulling away from the quay. 12 Quays in Birkenhead is now a floating pontoon, to allow the ships and ferries to load and unload without any concern of the tide. So it is not one of the old docks however it does mean I could get a great photo just as the ferry sailed.

Take care and as Mick says ‘You don’t stop riding when you get old; you stop to dry out!.

June 21st – The longest day of the year and I needed it this weekend. Which produced a new bike for the rest of the trip.

2009-06-25T12:31:00.000-07:00

No it wasn’t about buying a new bike it was about rebuilding mine with some care and attention together with some fantastic new parts.

Before I do that I want to show you the state of the rear wheel bearing that was taken out a few weeks ago, sorry it is slightly out of focus, however all the covers had gone, given that it was meant to be a sealed bearing that is fairly fundamental. Also 4 of the balls were missing, on the reverse side there are a couple of bits of metal, that are the remains of at least a couple of them. From this you should be able to see how close this bearing was to seizing, if it had I doubt I would be writing this now.

One of the reasons why there has been a large gap between rides is the fact I ‘blew’ my rear shock last time out. It was therefore a major task to find a replacement, Well!! Thereby hangs a tale in itself. As the genuine Honda part is a sealed unit, it cannot be rebuilt. I looked on eBay for a replacement, a few were listed at a ‘Buy it now Price’ of £60-70 and one greedy idiot had one listed at £125, get real, why would I buy a 10 Year old part without any guarantee when I could go to Hagon and buy a new one for £275 that has a warranty. That may sound crazy but The Rear Shock is one of the most fundamental parts of your bikes.

However I had a drop of luck a few weeks before when I found out that a previous company I had worked for had made a mistake concerning my pension contributions and owed me some money. I therefore decided it was time to splash out on something decent, rather than a second hand part from eBay. I therefore had 4 options, a Genuine Honda part, which although alright, it was designed for the bike so should be. The second was to go one small step further and try one of the new Hagon shocks with remote pre-load, but again for the cost it doesn’t give me a massive improvement in performance and this is at a list price of over £400.

The next option was White Power and I was seriously interested in one of these as the Rolls Royce solution was seriously expensive.

I decided to write to each of the last 3 contenders, cap in hand and see what could be done. White Power came back very quickly with bad news they had actually stopped manufacturing the part for my bike, as the Honda Africa Twin had gone out of production 6 years ago.

I have still to hear from Hagon and finally after a couple of phone calls, I got a response from the UK importer of the Rolls Royce of shock absorbers Harris Performance came up with a deal to die for, I could not believe my luck. These guys are genuine diamonds. I left a message for Steve Harris, which he did return, unfortunately my calls coincided with the IOM TT so no wonder it took him a while. I did speak with one of the other Directors Steve Bayford, what a saint. He then put me in touch with one of his Sales guys, Mark to look after me.

All I can say is I have now got an Ohlins high performance rear shock, with a custom spring build to my specifications and requirements. They also donated a number of specialist oils, brake and fork when they heard the rest of my rebuild plans.

I went over to collect the shock and came away with far more than I had ever dreamed of. As far as equipment and part sponsors are concerned Harris Performance deserve the greatest credit for their contribution as the biggest to my maintenance is the biggest to date, apart from the blood sweat and tears of West Wales Motorcycles.

Given one of the donations from Harris was some Ohlins Fork oil, I decided I was going to do the front end as well, as it had become a bit ‘spongy’ to say the least. I didn’t realise how much until I had carried out the work.

Finally I bought a set of HEL, race brake lines from eBay, the almost 10 year old rubber ones must have been well past their best, so having steel braided ones must be better given I paid less than £40 for them. And while doing that it was a case of changing the Brake fluid and Brake seals.

Finally, finally given the fact I had to remove the Tank Set to get at the all the parts I needed, I decided it was time to check the air filter, given this is a K&N it meant it can be serviced and I had the cleaner and oil to do that.

I also took the opportunity to adjust my headlights as riding home on the last outing the last 100 miles was in the dark and I noticed that one of them was somewhat high, no wonder some car drivers weren’t happy with me, however they should also note that when I am behind you my headlights are probably 2 ft higher off the ground than a normal car headlight so they will appear brighter in your mirrors, that and they are ‘Ice Blue’ bulbs which are also designed to be 15% brighter. The picture below shows her in a state on undress on the ‘bike-lift’.

So almost a month after finishing the last section it was time to rebuild the bike. Now I haven’t been slacking, I’ve got a major garden to look after but to be frank it is a mess, what was more important was sorting out ME, I have had a number of injections in my legs for various reasons. A problem around the Hamstring in my right leg, however they are a long standing problem of Varicose Veins, now before you say anything, it is not a pregnant or old women’s problem. If you are like me, it is hereditary, my Grandfather had it, my Mother had it, I have it. Unfortunately the NHS do not recognise it as a problem, (IDIOTS they have never suffered) I have been described by the consultant treating me as a freak. As I am the only person he knows that has gained PCT funding to get his Veins treated.

The secret has been persistence, not going away and keep pushing, to give you a brief idea. I have now had 2 operations and 2 injection procedures to treat them, the first op being almost 30 years ago. But in each and every case they have fiddled with whilst Rome has burned rather than sorting the problem properly. Hopefully the last session has now sorted me out, I hope so as the pain from the bruising is not pleasant and I know I am going to be in for some grief as I set off for my next leg, which includes Northern Ireland, compliments of Norfolk Line. So I am taking a few days off going up on Friday to see my Father then taking the night ferry from Birkenhead to Belfast, then coming back on Sunday night on the overnight ferry, I’ll then look to head up the coast of Lancashire before heading back on Tuesday morning, first thing.

I would really like to pass my thanks on to Martina McCotter of Norfolk line for all her help arranging this for me, in return I will be writing a special report that Norfolk Line are more than welcome to use if they find it good enough.

This brings me on to one of the biggest challenges and that is writing up my notes after each part of the ride and to be quite frank it can take me longer than actually doing the ride itself, since setting out for the last long weekend which included 4 days of riding and then this particular post I have written nearly 24,000 words, if you then consider it is also 96 pages of A4 pictures and prose. If that is then averaged out over all of the posts I have put up so far it is 600 pages and 140,000 words. I am only just getting this post up before heading off to start again.

The thought of getting someone to edit all of this properly, cleaning up some of my grammar and spelling to turn it into a book, is not such an outlandish idea as I first thought.

After completing all my rebuild work and giving her a decent clean and polish, it was time for a quick ride down the lane to test out the brakes and suspension. WOW! Is all I can say, everything is so much ‘tighter’ the brakes appear to be far more direct and effective, The suspension is an absolute revelation particularly the front forks, I fitted a set of Touratech Progressive springs a few years ago and changed the oil, I had never realised how bad that oil had become, the Ohlins fork oil, means the front end no longer dives and comes back without any bounce whatsoever, brilliant.

The new Rear Shock again means the bike stands proud and no wallowing anymore she is tight and really nice and planted, the most noticeable fact about this is I need to stand on my tip toes once again to move her around, the saddle is at least 3ins higher then I can ever remember so that is one thing I will have to get used to all over again.

After all this work, I also took a relaxing walk to take in the sunset from my place. At this time of the year I am extremely lucky, I posted some pictures of the snow that had me blocked in earlier in the year, this is totally the other side of the story.

Take care and as Mick says ‘You don’t stop riding when you get old; you stop to build a new bike!.

25th of May – A Bank Holiday in North Wales and over 12 hours in the saddle later, I fall off the bike!, the longest post yet.

2009-06-04T14:23:00.000-07:00

I woke yet again to another bright morning but again I was slow to get sorted, despite being up and awake at 7.30 (it may be because I have set the alarm on my watch for that time) the condensation on my tent was even worse than the previous night and I have to make sure that during the off time I get this sorted. I am quite worried that if I don’t, I am going to sleeping in a right stinky mess.

This Camping and Caravan Club site has really, really impressed me not only the site but it’s friendliness. Absolutely spot on.

Now here is an admission, myself, my ex-wife and children used to be members of the Caravan Club, which stopped when we sold the caravan during the divorce. But we had, had many great summers in the caravan, both my children although they are 17 and 15 still ask when we can go again.

There is one slight problem to doing some major work washing the tent then hanging it inside the garage have been scuppered by family of Robins that have nested in one of the tool and part trays I’ve fitted to the wall, while the Hen is as bold as they come and wouldn’t move when she was sitting on the eggs, now they have hatched and appear to be doing well, the Cock takes over at this stage but tends to do a runner every time I open the garage door.

Anyway back to the ride. I got packed up relatively quickly and I had made up my mind that I was going to get going straight away and then stop at Abersoch for breakfast. So if I even got moving before some campers had even emerged form their tents. It was a pretty quick run from the campsite to Abersoch, which has a weird feel to it. Not bad in fact very nice, lovely little port that has been overrun by yachties the whole feel of the place is all around ‘being the place to be seen’ It is alright and the facilities okay but small but this doesn’t stop some really famous seaside names having boutiques there.

Don’t get me wrong it is not a nasty place and the coffee shop I stopped at for Breakfast was pretty good, but the whole place is on the small side for all the trendy name shops, just around the from the café and deli I took the following photo. Around the head from Abersoch is Sarn Bach and then Llanengan before entering Towyn one of three villages with the same name I would travel through inside 36 hrs. before a quick trip inland before coming back out to Rhiw and then Aberdaron.and the view of the headland.

I wasn’t the other one that had stopped in a passing place to take the photos but at least I hadn’t parked it and locked it up and gone for a walk. At least I kept the engine running. This is not the first time I have come across this on my journey, in fact I’ve lost count on how many times I’ve come across this. I passed through Bodermid before heading out to the National Trust Car Park at the headland overlooking Bardsey Island, unfortunately I saw the first signs of the problems that I would face later in the day as the first signs of the sea mist was rolling in. I then pushed North again which always makes me feel better as for some strange reason I start to feel as if I am achieving much more than when I am travelling West, I think has something to do with getting to John O’Groats as after that it is all downhill back home.

Uwchmynydd was soon followed Capel Carmel. As I have mentioned I did a bit of a recce trip a couple of years ago around this part of the Coast and remember spotting a large dive support boat in a back garden next to the Chapel, it was a bit of a bizarre sight as it would have taken a major effort to get it to the sea, as there were signs saying unsuitable for large vehicles and caravans and this thing was far bigger than any caravan I’ve ever seen.

I stayed as close to the coast as possible for the half and hour to 40 mins before getting back on to the B4417 which was a wonderful ride up passed Morfa Nefyn and Nefyn. Anyone fancy a development opportunity. I don’t know what this building in Pistyll used to be, possibly a hotel but now it is pretty much derelict, all the windows gone, all the slates on the roof missing a really forlorn sight, in the background there are a collection of luxury wooden cabins being built next to the farm next to the ‘old hotel’. Further along I took a chance look over my right shoulder when going up around Yr Elfi towards the junction with the A499, I was greeted by the wonderful panorama across the Peninsular of Cardigan Bay behind me. When I joined the A499 I met by some major roadworks for the next approx 4 miles, they are building a whole new bypass and potential dual carriageway closer to the coast, but missing out on the villages along this part of the coast, the only problem being the speed was held at 40mph despite no work going on. When it finally cleared it was time to turn off at Llandwrog which took me to Caernarvon Airport, ex RAF Llandwrog (23) from one map it looked as if I could get through a back lane however it was blocked off by a Static Caravan Park.

RAF Llandwrog was opened in January 1941 as a Royal Air Force Bomber Command airfield for training gunners, radio operators and navigators.

It was the largest World War II airfield in Wales. The Air Observers School flew Avro Anson and Westland Lysander aircraft. On 10 October 1941 two planes collided at RAF Llandwrog, killing seventeen people.

Early in 1942, prompted by an increasing number of aircraft accidents in the North Wales mountains, the RAF Llandwrog Mountain Rescue Section was formed on a local, volunteer basis. The initiative came from the medical officer at the base, Flight Lieutenant G V Graham. The team at Llandwrog, and other similar teams elsewhere, were officially recognised towards the end of 1943. The Royal Air Force Mountain Rescue Service was formed in January 1944.

Almost 71,000 bombs containing the nerve agent tabun had been seized in Germany following WWII, and these were stored in the open at RAF Llandwrog, until 1954 during the handover to civilian use, as part of Operation Sandcastle, they were transported to Cairnryan for disposal aboard scuttling ships at sea 120 miles (190 km) north-west of Ireland. One further note on the Gate Guard of Caernavon Airport and Museum is a Hawker Hunter T4 trainer. It has certain markings that would lead the un-informed to think that it was once based at the nearby RAF Valley, however with the lack of a serial number that is usually hard to prove, However looking at her, there was something not quite right. I couldn’t see the bay which we used to shove our arms up to change the 3inch blanks shells that were used to start the motors, also the drop tanks were missing, she may have been there but I doubt it. I spent a fair amount of time working on Hunters at RAF Valley, hence my statement. To be honest she looked something of a 'bitsa' (bits and and pieces of a number of things)So with that it was a loop back and then up to Llanwnda and Llanfaglan and then into Caernarvon through the back lanes and to be met by Castle (28) Caernarfon Castle. Now the following may well be the longest piece of history, however it does reflect how important this castle has become.

Edward I built castles and walled towns in North Wales to control the area following his conquest of the independent principality of Wales, in 1283.

Llywelyn ap Gruffudd, prince of Wales, having rejected a bribe of one thousand pounds a year and an estate in England, if he would surrender his nation unreservedly to the king of England, had been lured into a trap on 11 December 1282, and put to death. His brother Dafydd ap Gruffudd had continued the struggle for continuing independence, but had been captured at Bera Mountain in the uplands above Garth Celyn, in June 1283.

Edward surrounded and overshadowed Garth Celyn, the royal home and the headquarters of resistance to English domination, with Caernarfon and Conwy castles, and later Beaumaris Castle. The other fortress in the iron ring encircling Snowdonia was Harlech Castle.

The site selected for Caernarfon was strategically important, located on the banks of the River Seiont where it flows into the Menai Strait. It had been the site of a Roman fort, and a later motte and bailey castle built c. 1090 by Hugh d'Avranches. The castle was, at the time, surrounded on two sides by water, and the other by the Caernarfon city walls, but in the 19th century, the area on the River Seiont was filled in to enlarge the port of Caernarfon, and is today part of the castle's car park.

Begun in 1283 after Snowdonia - the heartland of Gwynedd - had been overrun by the massive army, it reached something like its current state in 1323. It was never completed, and even today there are joints visible in several places on the internal walls ready to accept further walls which were never built. Contemporary records note that the castle's construction cost some £22,000 – an enormous sum at the time, equivalent to more than a year's income for the royal treasury. The castle's linear design is sophisticated by comparison with earlier British castles, and the walls are said to have been modelled on those of Constantinople, Edward being a keen Crusader. The castle dominates the Menai Strait.

Edward II of England was born here, during the initial stages of the castle's construction in 1284. In the uprising of 1294–1295, Caernarfon was taken by the forces of Madog ap Llewellyn, but recaptured in 1295 and its defenses brought nearer to completion. In 1403 and 1404 it withstood sieges by the forces of Owain Glyndŵr. During the English Civil War its Royalist garrison surrendered to Parliamentary forces in 1646.

The tradition of investing the heir of the monarch of Britain with the title of "Prince of Wales" began in 1301, when King Edward I of England, having completed the conquest of Wales, gave the title to his heir, Prince Edward (later King Edward II of England). According to a famous legend, the king had promised the Welsh that he would name "a prince born in Wales, who did not speak a word of English" and then produced his infant son to their surprise ; but the story may well be apocryphal, as it can only be traced to the 16th century. However, Edward II certainly was born at Caernarfon while his father was campaigning in Wales, and like all infants, could not at the time speak English. (Indeed, growing up in the royal court over the succeeding years his first language may well have been Anglo-Norman, not English.)

The castle was used again in 1911 for the investiture of the then Prince of Wales, the future Edward VIII of the United Kingdom, because of its past associations with the English crown. This set a precedent which was to be repeated in 1969 with the investiture of Charles, Prince of Wales.

The castle houses the Royal Welch Fusiliers Museum, and is part of the World Heritage Site "Castles and Town Walls of King Edward I in Gwynedd". A diesel locomotive on the nearby Welsh Highland Railway bears the name Caernarfon Castle.

I wanted to push on to Rhosneigr to have my lunch, thankfully I knew the next section was pretty straightforward, I knew the roads around Anglesey well so had a good idea how long it would take me, so was feeling fairly confident. So it was onto the A487 before taking the road to Y Felinheli, I had always known this place as Port Dinorwic, into Bangor to then on to the A55 to take the Britannia Bridge to Anglesey which was the World’s first Box Girder Bridge designed by Robert Stevenson and which sadly (or not) burnt down in 1970 as it led to the re-construction during the 1970’s which gave us today’s bridge when a road running over the old railway line and into the town with the Longest Village name in Britain or Llanfair PG for short.

Before reaching the village centre I took the A4080 that would take me around to Rhosneigr but before that it was couple of points of note along the way, after leaving the village of Brynsiencyn and then around by Newborough Warren and into Malltraeth on the edge of Malltraeth Sands and the outlet of Afon Cefni which has a huge man made section that runs inland to Pentre Berw and the marshes around there and ultimately up to Cefni Reservoir north of Llangefni.

I stopped to take some photos in Malltraeth as it has some bitter sweet memories for me. I went out with and ended up getting engaged to a beautiful girl called Janet Roberts who came form the Village her Mother and Father and what a pair they were, used to run the Royal Oak public house at none end of the village. Bitter sweet in the sense that I made a mess of things, which seems to be my way when it comes to romance. In the off chance that she may one day read this; Sorry your big Sister was right I didn’t deserve you and I hope life has worked out well for you. My only excuse is that I was a naïve 20 year old, who thought he was smarter than he was.

Heading out of Malltraeth I took the road round to the left, if I had carried straight on and into Bethel where I had spent a couple of nights in a tent guarding the wreckage of an aircraft that had crash landed in a field shortly after taking from Valley due to fuel problems.

I took the lane at Hermon and into Bodorgan and then to the dunes at Aberffraw It was now lunchtime a there were large crowds looking for somewhere to park their cars, then to walk the dunes. From Aberffraw the road takes you passed the Anglesey Race Circuit based at an old RAF Base, RAF Bodorgan (Aberffraw) however it was not an airfield but used as a Anti Aircraft and Radar base, hence when you see Fifth Gear on Channel Five, you will hear about a corner called ‘Radar’ (it doesn’t actually appear on the circuit map so may be some journalistic licence), it was closed in 1945 as a military base. Since it’s inception as a Race circuit a lot of developments have been made and quite frankly, if this circuit was closer to a main centre, people would be trying to push this for major international events. It is a very interesting and challenging layout, with the scope for further development.

Into Rhosneigr I could see the sea mist I had encountered earlier in the day had reached Anglesey, which didn’t surprise me in the least, having been stationed at RAF Valley which was my next major stop, it was known at as an MDA or Major Diversion Airfield, when the country was fogged in RAF Valley was clear and when the mainland was clear we used to get a major sea mist, that although it used to disrupt operations never stopped them, as the mist never really got above 100ft. On one occasion I remember 3 tourist aircraft on route to Manchester got diverted to RAF Valley due to the bad weather there, we had clear blue skies. I was on Station Flight then and tried to invite some of the flight crew from Monarch Airlines to the Enlisted NAAFI, I was quickly out trumped when they were offered accommodation in the Officers Mess, the term ‘Pulling Rank’ seems to come to mind, when these starry eyed stewardesses saw a set of ‘Wings’ it was game over, C’est la Vie. I stopped briefly in Rhosneigr as I found it difficult to find a spot to stop near one of the few cafés they have, so after a couple of photos it was on towards RAF Valley. But before I did, I had to avoid some idiot in an init car, lowered suspension to accompany the IQ, Loud exhaust, to block out the abuse they get and finally darkened windows so you they can’t be identified as a wanke**.

Before I left I did take the following photos.

The photos do not do justice to the amount of sea mist that was coming in, in reality it was much thicker.

After leaving Rhosneigr and the Golf Club, which is a lovely Links Course by the way. I got over confident and decided to take a back lane with a sign saying unsuitable for caravans and long vehicles, for some reason I thought I recognised it as a back lane that would take me to Capel Gwyn and then into RAF Valley by a back route. Through Llanfairyneubwll. It didn’t take me long to discover I got that wrong, or the 30 years plus, since I last used it it had gone down hill a very long way. After a mile the track went from a tarmac track either side of a grass centre to serious gravel worse than the lane to my house, on that basis I decided to retrace my steps and use more major roads into the back of RAF Valley my 24th and 2nd ex-base I have passed.

No. 4 Flying Training School takes RAF and Royal Navy pilots from 1FTS at RAF Linton-on-Ouse and trains them to fly fast jets, prior to training on an Operational Conversion Unit. 4 FTS is divided into two squadrons; 208 Sqn provides the advanced flying training, students then moving onto 19 Sqn to receive tactics and weapons training. Valley is also home to C Flight of 22 Sqn with Sea King helicopters. These are busy in the Search and Rescue role, rescuing people from ships in the Irish Sea, from the mountains of nearby Snowdonia and elsewhere. The mountain rescue work in Snowdonia is coordinated with the Wales Mountain Rescue Association.

The base is also home to SARTU (Search and Rescue Training Unit), part of the Defence Helicopter Flying School, using Squirrel and Griffin helicopters, and newly home to the relocated headquarters elements of both 22 and 202 Squadrons.

RAF Mona, also on Anglesey, acts as a relief landing ground. Although I would go no where near this small airfield.

The National Assembly for Wales announced on 21 February 2007, that Public Service Obligation (PSO) services was launched, from RAF Valley, in April 2007, connecting north Wales with Cardiff International Airport. "North-south airlines is revealed". BBC News. February 21, 2007.

A terminal facility, costing £1,500,000, has been constructed at RAF Valley, which will be named Anglesey Airport (Maes Awyr Môn); the capacity of which is projected to handle up to ten such PSO flights, each day. Inverness based Highland Airways operates the Cardiff route, using BAe Jetstream 31 aircraft. The first public flight took place on 8 May 2007.

The Station opened on 13 February 1941, in No 9 Group, Fighter Command, and for the first few weeks of its existence was called Royal Air Force Rhosneigr after one of the nearby villages, but was re-named Royal Air Force Valley on 5 April 1941.

On 3 March 1941, No 312 (Czech) Squadron moved in from Speke with its Hurricanes and began flying convoy patrols over the Irish Sea, and by the time it departed for Jurby on 25 May 1941 it had claimed the destruction of a Ju 88 during one such sortie. It was replaced by No 615 Squadron from Kenley, also flying Hurricanes, and was joined on 10 May by 'A' Flight of No 219 Squadron who brought their Beaufighter IFs on one month's attachment from Tangmere and whose nocturnal activities claimed several enemy aircraft. In the June, 2 sections of Hurricane IIBs of No 302 (Polish) Squadron and one section on No 68 Squadron with Beaufighter IFs arrived at Valley for one month's fighter defence duties.

In October 1943 the Sector Operations Centre at Valley closed down leaving only No 125 Squadron’s Beaufighter VIs for air defence duties, and No 275 Squadron which continued its air/sea rescue duties until the following April when it departed south to Warmwell. The Station’s effort during the remainder of the war was devoted almost entirely to the task of receiving incoming aircraft from the United States of America and Canada and despatching them to their war stations in Britain. They came in ever-increasing numbers until it was quite a common occurrence for 60 to 70 aircraft to arrive in a single day. In the main, they were handled by the United States Army Force Movements Section, whilst the Royal Air Force element took care of the diverted British aircraft.

Control of Valley changed once more in April 1948 when it was passed to No 12 Group, Fighter Command, and the uncertainty of its future was resolved by the decision that it was to become a permanent Royal Air Force station. Although the Station had been officially designated a Master Diversion Airfield in 1947, it remained on a care and maintenance basis and provided only limited diversion facilities. The Mountain Rescue Team, which had been formed in 1943, continued to turn out for crashed aircraft and stranded climbers in the Welsh hills.

During the period of inactivity, a number of improvements were made to the Station; 4 barrack blocks were built to a new design which provided a single room for each airman; It sounds so grand, I can assure you when I was there in the 70’s they were the same and more like a cell than a bedroom, when I was moved to one of the modernised rooms in the mid 70s they were much better and at least twice if not 3 times the size.

A new dining hall was constructed originally called the Junior Ranks Mess it now goes by the grand title of Junior Ranks Restuarant and a considerable number of married quarters built, and since 1951 it has been one of Flying Training Command’s principal stations.

The is many rumours around this site, one of which relates to the American inhabitance. There is a lake next to the Officers Mess, that is not only quite deep it is also very murky. Both swimming and fishing is banned, the reason for this is ‘said’ to be due to the American’s driving all the vehicles and equipment they couldn’t take with them, in there. It may be heresay but when I was stationed there a member of the sub-aqua club said that there had been a dive in the lake a few years before and due to the depth of the mud and the fact that it was fresh water etc, the vehicles were remarkably well preserved.

I had many, many escapades, while stationed here, far more than I could list here but I do look back on my time with a smile.Once again the Gate Guard is wrong, this time there is something that is even more stand out. It has a rear arrester hook not something that was ever fitted to an RAF variant and none that I ever worked on at RAF Valley, okay this aircraft may have been re-numbered and posted there at some point, but certainly not during my time. I suspect this one spent it’s life between RNAS Yeovilton and Culdrose.

I took a back lane out of Valley and on towards Holy Island but came upon another dead end, well almost, if I didn’t have a fully loaded bike I would have gone around the track that went around the edge of the land and over the small causeway, however given my luck over the weekend I wasn’t going to push it. So it was back around again and on to the A55 at Caergeilliog and then turning left at the Valley crossroads and through Trearddur Bay, unfortunately the sea mist was getting thicker and I ended up riding through it on the way up to the South Stack lighthouse, very worthwhile seeing but I didn’t make it today as the mist was too much as well as wasting too much time with the detours in the last couple of hours, so I bypassed the dead end road to the lighthouse itself and went on to Holyhead.

I then took my next stop off the bike to take a photo, I had been riding for close to 6 hrs by now, so my backside was getting a bit on the numb side. So it was nice to stop for a short while over looking the harbour.

As it can be seen by the last photo the sea mist was getting stronger now on this side of the Island so I could imagine it was going to get worse as the day would go on.

Having missed my lunch earlier and I also needed to refuel, I stopped on the way back to Valley Crossroads to refuel both ‘My Baby’ and myself, then on to the Crossroads before turning left onto the A5025 towards Cemaes Bay and beyond. A quick stop on one of the back lanes to take a photo and eat the pasty I had bought at the garage. Whilst it may not be the most scenic view it is interesting in the distance is the Wylfa Power Station It is the largest and last reactor of its type to be built in the UK. It was the second British nuclear power station, following Oldbury, to have a pre-stressed concrete pressure vessel instead of steel for easier construction and enhanced safety.

A second plant (generally referred to as Wylfa B) has been proposed, in part to provide for the needs of the Anglesey Aluminium smelter located in Holyhead. This proposal has been the subject of some local opposition, led by the group People Against Wylfa B (PAWB). The subsidised electricity supply to the smelter company will end, even if the life of the nuclear station is extended by a year or two. Substantial works were needed to strengthen the reactors against deteriorating welds discovered in the safety review in April 2000. Amid public controversy, Greenpeace issued an independent safety appraisal by the nuclear engineering consultancy, Large Associates, but the permit to restart operation was given in August 2001. In addition to welding weaknesses, radiolytic depletion of the graphite moderator blocks was still of concern and PAWB continue to campaign for early shut-down of the plant as well as against any nuclear replacement. Nevertheless, in March 2006 the local council voted to extend the life of Wylfa A and to support the construction of Wylfa B, citing the potential loss of employment in the smelter works and nuclear station.

I stopped a bit further on for one of the last times before hitting Chester, after coming through traffic in Beaumaris and the Castle there (29) built as part of King Edward I’s campaign to conquer the north of Wales. It was designed by James of St. George and was begun in 1295, but never completed. Beaumaris has been designated as a World Heritage site.
Beaumaris castle was positioned to face Garth Celyn on the opposite shore of the Menai Strait and was intended, along with Conwy Castle and Caernarfon castle at either end of the Menai Strait, to overshadow the Welsh Royal home and centre of resistance to the English forces.

The plan was nearly perfect, but the castle was never completed. The Welsh conquest was practically complete at the time of construction, and the immense cost of completing such a massive fortress would have drained funds needed for the Scottish campaigns. Neither the towers of the inner ward nor the great gatehouses were built to full height and many buildings of the inner ward were left unfinished when large scale work ceased in 1298. Small-scale work was carried out in the early 14th century. However, the outer walls were crenelated, and unlike many other castles Beaumaris did not suffer damage or demolition during the Civil War — the extant castle is very well-preserved.

The grey clouds were starting to build over the mainland as I took this photo of the Menai Strait.Into Menai Bridge and the bridge that carries the same name. Thomas Telford was assigned the task of improving the route from London to Holyhead, and one of the key improvements was his design of the suspension bridge over the Menai Strait between a point near Bangor on the mainland and what was then the village of Porthaethwy which is now also known as Menai Bridge. The design of the bridge had to allow for Royal Navy sailing ships 100 ft tall to pass under the deck at high water slack tide, and no scaffolding was allowed during construction which broke this rule.

Construction of the bridge began in 1819 with the towers on either side of the strait. These were constructed from Penmon limestone and were hollow with internal cross-walls. Then came the sixteen huge chain cables, each made of 935 iron bars that support the 176 metre span. To avoid rusting, each cable was first soaked in linseed oil. The bridge was opened to much fanfare on 30 January 1826 and succeeded in reducing the 36 hour journey time from London to Holyhead by 9 hours meaning it only took 27 hours. it is one of the first modern suspension bridges in the world.

Without stopping it was quickly on to the A55 and on towards Llanfairfechan and ultimately Conwy, this was achieved in rapid time as the main dual carriageway runs right along the coast. Then past Conwy Castle (30) and up the B5106 to Ty’n-y-groes before crossing the river an coming back down on the A470 Into Llandudno Junction then up and around the Great Orme.

Conwy Castle was completed in 1289. Six years later Edward I was besieged here during the rebellion of Madog ap Llywelyn. The siege lasted for several months and supplies ran low. However the castle and town were not captured. In the 14th century alterations were carried out under Edward, the Black Prince.

In 1403 Welsh forces led by Rhys and Gwilym, sons of Tudur ap Gronw, and the cousins of Owain Glyndwr, captured the castle and its English garrison. The fortress and the soldiers were later ransomed back to Henry IV. Tudur ap Gronw was the forefather of Henry Tudor. During the War of the Roses Conwy was taken by William Herbert, Earl of Pembroke under orders from Edward IV in 1461.

But by the early 17th century, the once great Royal Castle had become dilapidated and was largely unused. However at the outbreak of the English Civil War Conwy was again garrisoned for the King. It was captured after a three-month siege by the Parliamentary army in 1646. It was slighted and left as an empty shell.

Later the restored Charles II granted Conwy Castle to Edward Conway, 3rd Viscount Conway. In 1665 the remaining timber, iron and lead was removed from the castle by William Milward on behalf of the peer and sold.

Today the castle is a Scheduled Ancient Monument and managed by Cadw. It is also part of the World Heritage Site entitled "Castles and Town Walls of King Edward I in Gwynedd".

The trip around the Great Orme had to be taken in an anti-clockwise direction, which was a bit strange as everything I have done so far has been in clockwise direction. One piece of trivia for you . The Great Orme is the site of world’s first known Prehistoric Copper Mine.It was then quickly through Rhos-on-Sea into Colwyn Bay then back onto the A55 for the fast run to Pensarn before turning off to Towyn, Kinmel Bay and Rhyl. On the A548. I used to think about Rhyl as this exotic place to visit, full of excitement when I was 10 years of age, now it is sad, run-down and very, very tacky. From a recent program, I think it was Secret Millionaire they talked about the level of unemployment and desolation in the town.

I didn’t have time to stop it was now getting more and more overcast and the threat of rain was imminent, the problem being, even when I got to Chester today, I still had around a 4 hour ride back home and at this rate I was going to hit Chester at about 5.30 - 6pm so it was going to be a long, long day.

Going through Prestatyn then on to Talacre along this part of the coast you can see the huge Gwynt y Môr Offshore Wind Farm and further on when I reached Mostyn Dock I saw the massive drilling rig and main towers for more wind turbines that will be installed on West Hoyle Bank. After seeing this heartening sight of the future, I then came upon a very sad sight indeed at Llanerch-y-mor. The Duke of Lancaster Along with her sister ships the Duke of Rothesay and the Duke of Argyll, these vessels were amongst the last passenger-only steamers built for British Railways (at that time, also a ferry operator). Built at Harland & Wolff, Belfast and completed in 1956, she was designed to operate as both a passenger ferry (primarily on the Heysham-Belfast route) and as a cruise ship. In this capacity, the Lancaster travelled to the Scottish islands and further afield to Belgium, Denmark, Netherlands, Norway and Spain.

The Duke of Lancaster was sold to Liverpool based company Empirewise Ltd, who intended her to be used as a static leisure centre and market. She arrived at her new home at Llanerch-y-Mor, near Mostyn on 10 August 1979. The ship was beached and the hull was sealed in concrete. Known as "The Fun Ship", it was also possible to visit her bridge and engine room. Conversion for use as a 300-room hotel did not appear to go beyond the preliminary planning stage. Its use as "The Fun Ship" was relatively short-lived and was subsequently closed to the public. Over time, the vessel has become increasingly derelict.

The ship was later used as a warehouse by its owners Solitaire Liverpool Ltd, a clothing company registered to the same address as Empirewise Ltd. Despite rumours of the ship being scrapped, the company stated that they have no plans to sell it, or restore it and its current use is uncertain. Despite having large amounts of its exterior paintwork covered in red-leading, the interior of the ship is in very good condition.

I do think it is tragic to see a once great vessel in this state, either re-furbish her or scrap her, she doesn’t deserve this.

I was pushing on as best I could but the weather was getting more and more grey and dark, the last part may have been due to still having the tinted visor fitted to my helmet. Still on the A548 I came upon a new dual carriageway that would have taken me up and around over the estuary and but I pulled off to go through Flint and then on to Connah’s Quay and Queensferry, however before that I was to pass Flint Castle (31). It was the first of a series of castles built during King Edward I's campaign to conquer Wales.

Flint was the first castle of what would later become known as Edward I's 'Iron Ring'. A chain of fortresses designed to encircle North Wales and oppress the Welsh. Its construction began almost immediately after Edward I began the First Welsh War in 1277. Five years later Welsh forces under the command of Dafydd ap Gruffydd, brother of Llywelyn the Last besieged the castle in an attempted uprising against the English Crown. In 1294 Flint was attacked again during the revolt of Madog ap Llywelyn; this time the constable of the castle was forced to set fire to the fortress to prevent its capture by the Welsh. The castle was later repaired and partly rebuilt.

With the conclusion to the Welsh Wars, English settlers and merchants were given property titles in the new town that was laid out in front of the castle. The plantation borough was protected by a defensive ditch with a wooden palisade on earth banking. Its outline remains visible in streets patterns. In 1399 Richard II of England was held by Henry Bolingbroke at Flint before being returned to London.

During the English Civil War, Flint Castle was held by the Royalists. It was finally captured by the Parliamentarians in 1647 after a three-month siege. To prevent its reuse in the conflict, the castle was then slighted in accordance with Cromwell's destruction order. The ruins are what remain today. By the 19th century part of the site's outer bailey was used as Flintshire's County Jail. A quarry also operated nearby and in 1838 J.M.W. Turner did a painting of the Castle that is now part of the collection in the National Gallery.

The back roads along this section took me past one more airfield (25) it was never an recognised RAF base more of a factory. The aircraft factory at Broughton was established during the second world war as a Shadow Factory for Vickers-Armstrongs Limited. The factory produced 5,540 Vickers Wellingtons and 235 Avro Lancasters. Post-war the factory was used by Vickers to build 28,000 aluminium prefab bungalows.

The RAF's No.48 Maintenance Unit was formed at Hawarden on 1 September 1939 and until 1 July 1957 stored, maintained and scrapped many thousands of military aircraft, including Halifaxes, Wellingtons, Horsa gliders and DH Mosquitos. No.3 Ferry Pilots Pool/Ferry Pool, Air Transport Auxiliary, was based at Hawarden between 5.11.40 and 30.11.45. Its veteran pilots ferried thousands of military aircraft from the factories and maintenance facilities at Hawarden and elsewhere to and from RAF and Naval squadrons throughout the UK. On 1 July 1948 The de Havilland Aircraft Company took over the Vickers factory and over the years built the following aircraft types:
de Havilland Mosquito
de Havilland Hornet
de Havilland Sea Hornet
de Havilland Vampire
de Havilland Venom and Sea Venom
de Havilland Dove and Devon
de Havilland Comet (13 only, and two aircraft that became the prototypes for the Hawker Siddeley Nimrod
de Havilland Sea Vixen
The company became part of Hawker Siddeley Aviation in the 1960s and the production of the Hawker Siddeley HS125 business jet, designed by de Havilland, became the main aircraft type produced by the factory for nearly forty years. Production was moved to the United States when the 125 business was sold to the Raytheon Corporation. Raytheon still have a 125 and Beech 400 support centre on the airfield, renamed Hawker Beechcraft Ltd in early 2007.

Since the early 1970s the Broughton factory has been the centre of wing production for all the Airbus aircraft. Initially these were taken by road to Manchester Airport to be flown out by a Super Guppy, they are now taken by Barge down the Dee Estuary to Mostyn Docks to then be loaded on a cargo ship to France.

Raytheon System opened a new facility in 2003, to support the Bombardier Sentinel R1 entering service with the Royal Air Force. I worked at the factory making wings for a short time before it got SO! boring. Also whilst I was there and I believe still to this day one of the best preserved versions of the Mosquito is still based there. Along with a couple of very interesting wrecks, one of which looks like a MIG 21 that is sat around the back of one of the hangars as if it was one of the staff’s projects to rebuild it and get it going again.

Anyway enough of this it is actually taking longer to write about this last part than it did to ride it. It wasn’t long before I was in Chester itself closely followed by the rain. I pulled into the City and followed the roads past one of the first flats I ever owned, before the river Dee at Handbridge passing Chester Castle number 32 and last of the day before going up Watergate Street and then making my way to The Groves. Chester Castle It is sited at the southwest extremity of the area bounded by the city walls. The castle stands on an eminence overlooking the River Dee.

During the Civil War Chester was held by the Royalists. The castle was assaulted by Parliamentary forces in July 1643, and in January and April 1645. Together with the rest of the city, it was besieged between September 1645 and February 1646. Following the civil war the castle was used as a prison, a court and a tax office. In 1687 James II attended Mass in the chapel of St Mary de Castro. In 1696 Chester mint was established and was managed by Edmund Halley in a building adjacent to the Half Moon tower. During the 1745 Jacobite Rebellion a gun emplacement was built on the wall overlooking the river.

In the castle complex are the remaining parts of the medieval castle together with the neoclassical buildings designed by Thomas Harrison which were built between 1788 and 1813. Parts of the neoclassical buildings are used today as Crown Courts and as a military museum. The museum and the medieval remains are a tourist attraction.

Down at the Groves, I got off the bike after a very long day riding it was just before 6.00pm, thankfully I had kept a can of Red Bull I had kept over from earlier as all the kiosks were either closed or closing. All the pleasure boats were being tied up for the night. It was also starting to rain, so I took the opportunity of getting a few things sorted and put my waterproof over jacket on.

Just before the bridge is a weir which is the full extent of the tidal element of the River Dee, whilst it is largely silted up now, the Dee used to be a major navigational river in the past, and when I get further down the Wirral Peninsular to Parkgate next time around the road forms the old quayside where sailing ships used to tied up to and load coal from a small mine close by in the late 19th and early 20th century, it is now over a mile from the water and now a major marsh and Bird Sanctuary.

It is amazing how they get these Pleasure Boats on to the River, as they can’t be sailed up the river because of the weir and about 5 miles up river it gets to narrow and shallow for something of the size of these. Basically they were brought in by road overnight, to a point a couple of miles up river and then craned in. The Lady Diana has been plying her trade on the river for over 25 years now, I remember when she first came in as she was viewed as very large and vulgar in comparison to the traditional wood built boats that used to be there.

Anyway it was now 6.15pm and I had a long way to ride back home. The rain brought a stiffening breeze and a drop in temperature by at least 3 degrees so I was pleased to put another layer on. Now for the boring part M53 – M56 – M6 – M42 – M40 – A34 – M4 – A340 to home. With one stop for fuel and another Red Bull at Warwick Services I finally got home at bang on 10.00pm; 12 HOURS after I first got on the bike at that wonderful Campsite at Llanystumdwy.

I pulled up in front of the garage, put the side stand down went to get off but stumbled and fell off as my knees where locked into a position with stiffness from so much riding, when I picked myself up I took the main bits of kit off the bike and put her away, another largely successful ride which had lead me to covering the largest amount of coast to date. It did however leave me needing to do some significant work to My Baby before we got going again, the first priority being sourcing another Rear Shock Absorber.

Take care and as Mick says ‘You don’t stop riding when you get old; you stop when you fall off the bike!

24th of May – A great ride up the Welsh Coast

2009-06-02T12:45:00.000-07:00

I woke to another bright morning but I was slow to get sorted, despite being up and awake at 7.30. I just seemed to mess about and combined with the fact that my tent was soaking with condensation both inside and out meant I struggled to get it all the freshly cut grass off it, but I dragged it over to a concrete stand and lay it out to dry whilst I packed other gear up.

Looking as it I know I will have to do something to this when I get it home. It will have to open it all out and give it a proper wash and let it dry thoroughly before repacking it.

I finally got going by 9.45 and quickly went through Solva and then into St Davids, after a couple of false turns my Roadbook and OS Road Map proved to be slightly confusing and unfortunately my Sat Nav, went on to the very minimal settings, which just gave a few village names and the direction I was riding in. I had a similar problem when I reached the tip of Cornwall, hopefully it would get better the further I got up the coast. I finally got back on track by taking the A487 North out of the CITY, yes; St David’s is Britain’s smallest City not much bigger than a large village. It is a bit special, however even at this time of the morning the crowds were out and the only way to get close the Cathedral was to get off and walk, sorry I had a lot of mile to cover this day. I had a stupid aim of getting on to Anglesey which could probably get me back close to my initial plan for the weekend.

I turned off down the B4583, shortly after coming out of the City which would have taken me to Whitesands Bay and the views of Ramsey Island but I took the lanes to Tretio, Berea on the run up to Abercastle, I have to say these lanes were beautiful and far more wooded than I had expected, and reminded me of the section I did around Exmoor on the other side of the Bristol Channel.

After riding for a while I thought it time to take one photo of the beautiful views out toward the sea, when I also spotted another sight, both of these were taken on the road out of Abercastle towards Mathry before taking the back lanes again to St Nicholas and ultimately Strumble Head.

The cottage in particular was far more attractive than the dour pebbledash and slate roof you find further North. I was to pass a number of cottages in the subsequent miles with similar roof designs, it looked very resilient to water and ideal in the height of the summer at reflecting the heat of the sun.

As mentioned I had turned off through the back lanes and it was fairly quiet as it was still before 11.00 in the morning so the bulk of the tourists I would meet later were still getting their acts together.

I have to mention, coming into Goodwick on the back lanes, I came across a sight that made me stop, unfortunately, due to the road width I couldn’t stop to take a photo, although I would have loved to but it would have meant stopping traffic.

Just coming into the main part of Goodwick from a narrow lane there is what looks like either a or ex-council house, with 4 classic cars on the front area (what might have been garden) one Ford Prefect (1960s) A Cadillac (unknown model under refurb) a 1950’s US Ford pickup.(good but in need of work) and then finally what looked like the main run around a 1957 Chevy BelAir (in very good nick). Shame I didn’t have chance to stop and take a photo.

Just down the road I did get a photo on the descent towards the ferry terminal at Fishguard.
This had left me wondering as I had read about the ferry from Fishguard to Rosslare in Ireland I couldn’t see from this vantage point how that worked, as there was no ferry terminal in sight. Being this far West I also wondered what sort of traffic this would attract.

It was shortly answered when I pulled over in the car park close to the terminal to witness the SeaCat on it’s way out of the harbour.
I didn’t realise until I did some research that the bulk of these vessels including the one you can see are built in Tasmania, Australia and then shipped around the world. Just wait until I tell the history of one CAT I am hoping to travel on later in this trip, as it will amaze you.

I was then to come across a number of Irish number plates, including those on a few bikes that were obviously on a tour. Once into Fishguard I stopped for fuel and to grab some energy drinks as I was planning to go as far as I could on this day. As I was pulling away two more bikes from Ireland were pulling in for fuel.

Quickly around and into the old part of Fishguard I didn’t stop even for the young hippy chick who was hitching a ride, I have to say this is now a very rare sight, quite rightly, however this brave young lady was trying to get further up the coast somewhere. Now before anyone says anything sexist, she was quite attractive and in a car I would have stopped, this said, by her appearance she could probably look after herself, I hope so anyway.

I enjoyed a clear run for the next few miles on the A487, the bike performing beautifully so it was nice to cruise along at the legal limit on fairly empty roads in gorgeous sunshine. Before turning off to take the back lanes at Nevern and Moylgroveand then down into Poppit Sands, it was crazily busy, this is why all the roads where empty, all the cars were here, spilling out of car parks and taking up every verge and another place where I came across a with Spatial Deficiency Disorder, she was sat in the middle of the road weighing up whether she could get her RAV4 into a space big enough for a Transit van, ‘yes dear it will fit get on with it’ after the third miserable attempt her friend got out and started guiding her in, talk about the blind leading the stupid, she didn’t get within 3 ft at either end before finally giving up and driving off.

I stopped a bit further on the road to St Dogmaels to take a photo of the estuary, looking at the map I was expecting to see much more development being so close to Cardigan. I was surprised how under developed it was. Just back on to the A487 for the quick trip into Cardigan and going out towards Gwbert. I caught this sign which made me turn around and go and get a picture of it.
One of my distant relatives seems to be doing well for himself. I say distant relative as there is in fact a Cave Society that has been researching the family tree for years and according to them the family name dates back to one of the Knight Generals that came over with William the Conqueror in the 11th century.

In Gwbert I stopped near Cardigan Golf Club to take a couple of photos across the Teifi Estuary towards Poppit Sands, I also took the opportunity for a stretch and a quick drink.
The roads around here were very good and I was making good time so it didn’t take me long to pass by yet another airfield (21) and one that although I never visited it I had a loose involvement with, as we used to send aircraft off from RAF Valley for missile practice over the Irish sea, shooting at drones and this site was involved in part with some of these exercises.

RAF Aberporth is/was spilt into two parts, the formal RAF base at what is now West Wales airport situated a mile or so from the coast and the other part that was RAE Aberporth and manned by RAF And Royal Navy personnel the site and is still in use today is on the cliff top overlooking the town. But now it is a MOD research base for testing unmanned aerial vehicles as well as launching atmospheric research missiles.

From 1940 to 1984, this small R.A.F station was home to a hundred or so R.A.F and Royal Navy personnel on postings involved in weapons trials from war time heavy guns to modern sophisticated missiles.

RAF Aberporth, which, along with the nearby RAE Aberporth, were once the largest employer in West Wales. Between them in the 1950’s, 60’s and 70’s, the two sites employed up to 1,000 people . Much of the work was highly skilled, in what is primarily a rural economy. 75% of that employment has now gone. The RAF camp was built in 1940 during World War 2, when quite a number of Spitfires were based here. The camp was finally closed in 1984, and demolished in 2004 to make way for a UAV centre of excellence. In December 2007 the first five million pound contract was signed for the testing of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles at Aberporth. A new era has started.

Thales, the Watchkeeper prime contractor, is now clear to migrate the trials programme to the UK by October 2009. Initial live flying elements of the operator training are expected to commence in March 2010 contributing to systems acceptance and deployment in October 2010.

Other enhancements at the airport have included the runway being extended to over 1200 metres – a planned development that was accelerated to accommodate the Watchkeeper timetable. While undertaking this extension, extensive planning enabled [underground] infrastructure to be factored-in, giving the new Watchkeeper complex ‘plug and play’ capability with all airfield-deployed assets.

Watchkeeper UAVs will access the MOD Aberporth Range Complex in the first instance. Temporary segregated airspace will also be established to enable flying over mid-Wales and on to the Sennybridge Army Training Estate for integrated systems assessments comprising combined operations with deployed units on the ground. The air traffic control unit at MOD Aberporth Range will be tasked with managing all of the flying operations, with all scheduling being undertaken through QinetiQ’s ParcAberporth offices.

I also pass the sister airfield a bit later in the day at RAE Lanbedr. Before that I got one photo at Aberporth back towards the MOD site, however there are huge signs close to the base as I rode past that warn taking photographs of the gates themselves is illegal but at this range you can only see a the tops of a couple of aerial masts so should be okay.
Pushing on up the coast I made really good time through Tresaith, Llangranog and Llwyndafydd before getting into New Quay and wow, I thought Newquay in Cornwall was busy, this whilst being a lot smaller and far less tacky seemed to have the same amount of people crammed into it. It was also the destination for a lot of bikers and parking was at an absolute premium all the areas that were spare had a bike stuffed in it, I eventually found a small space in a car park overlooking the beach and a short walk into what appeared to be the hub of the town.

The second photo I took gave me a view of the coast that lay ahead of me right up to the Lleyn Peninsular a further 5 hours riding away.

I stopped off to go and get some supplies for tonight and some bacon and bread for breakfast in the morning as well as some lunch, given the heat of the day I also made sure I had plenty to drink. I was stood chatting with a fellow biker and about to take a photo of a particular bike , unfortunately the owner and his partner came back and I don’t think he would have liked me taking the mickey out of his bike. I have described it to a couple of friends who have laughed their heads off.

It is a classic case of Ewan Wannabees, he got himself and perfectly functional BMW R1200GS and then gave it the ‘Bling’ treatment he had painted the bike in the most horrendous colour of pearlescent Candy Apple Red, including the wheel rims and cylinder head covers, it had a custom seat and top box. It also had a set of road tyres on it, so obviously this guy hadn’t bought it as an Adventure Bike and what made me laugh the most was stickers on the bike for the Paris Dakar Rallye. I would be amazed looking at the bike and the riders whether this bike ever came out in the wet never mind anything like the roads and terrain this bike was designed for. I’ve seen some very customised and revamped bikes but the colour of this one was physically painful on the eyes, certainly something you wouldn’t look at the morning after a heavy session.

Enough of my rant, at little further up the A487 on the way to Aberaeron I pulled over on the side of the road again, however this time to take a photo of a classic and something I was going to pass on to a friend of mine, in fact if I had the money I would seriously be interested in this old BMW ‘Airhead’ a GS100PD, the PD standing for Paris Dakar and something that is totally at the other end of the scale to the ‘bling machine’ this looks as it should.

When coming out of New Quay I had actually spotted another one of these underneath the front porch of a house, so it is amazing to see two in such a short space of time, it turns out the one in town was the owner of this bikes old machine.

Spot the deliberate mistake, I had taken this photo with the idea of sending it on to a friend as it had the number to contact on the front screen, duhh!! I should have checked how it had come out before moving on. Apart from a couple of rub marks on the paintwork she was in great shape and if I had £2,500 spare I would have made an offer.

The ride from here was very straight forward as the A487 hugs the coast all the way into Aberystwyth, it was great relief to ride for the best part of 10 miles in as many minutes (well almost, honest, I didn’t push my luck officer!) Once again when I got on to the sea front I was faced with a huge gathering of bikes and struggled for a while to find somewhere to park in the end I decided to double park and block some people in but at the same time stay with my bike in case they came back and I needed to move.

Sorry the following image is slightly blurred, I’ve cleaned the lens since then. Once again other bikers came over to talk to me and find out what I was up to, there were a huge number of Sports bikes and quite a few Harley riders and it was a few of them that came over first to have a chat, now that is unusual, as most Harley riders for some reason I can never understand tend to keep themselves to themselves and they are the ones that usual do not return your greeting when riding, this is usually a nod or a wave or even putting your leg out off the footpeg.

The latter is a very French acknowledgement, where it is used more often than any other form, it is also a thankyou, you will get if you pull over to let a bike through. Anyway back to the point a couple of Harley riders came up, they were part of a group camping close by, he was from Yorkshire and she was from Oxford, they were genuinely interested in what I was doing and why.

After a quick check on where I was on the map and the best way to get on the road I wanted with one of the locals, I took another drink to keep the fluids up as it was getting seriously warm in my gear when I stopped.

Even with the directions I still got it wrong and ended up coming back to this point on the seafront 5 mins later, next time I went further along the A487 out of the City before turning off up the B4572, which in most places had ample two carriageways to keep up a decent speed into Upper Borth which would allow me to take the following photo of Borth and the major beach there.

It was then down a very steep hill into Borth then carrying on along the B4353 through Llancynfelyn and back up the A487 to Machynlleth, following the Dovey Estuary, once into the town it was very straightforward to take the A493 back towards Aberdovey and Tywyn, the nature of the road meant it was good riding at a good pace, to get into Tywyn and I had been wanting a good cup of tea for hours, I don’t know about anyone else, I am not obsessive about tea, however when I get a thought in my mind about enjoying a good cup of tea I can’t get it out of my mind. So it was with relief on the way out of town I spotted a small coffee shop that was still open, although they were in the process of cleaning up.

I had looked top stay as close as possible to the coast as possible and although they had maintained the railway bridge North of Town, the ‘Bailey Bridge’ that had formed the road crossing had long since gone so it meant a detour inland before coming back onto the coast and having the following scenes on the road into Fairbourne.

The first photo shows the Lleyn Peninsular and I was planning to stop half way along it and the second shows the tip and Bardsey Island in the far distance but I had some riding to do before I got there.

I carried on up the A493 towards Dolgellau but turned off slightly before I got there at Penmaenpool and took the wooden Toll bridge across the top end of the estuary/river to join the A496 towards Barmouth, on the run in to which I pulled over to take some photos of the estuary and in the sun, it really was a beautiful view.

To take these I was really pushing my luck stopping on a clearway with lots of holiday traffic passing by and as it was now after 5.00pm a lot of people were packing up to go home, so the roads were getting busy. Barmouth is a lovely place, unfortunately there are some tacky elements, and riding along you can hear the distinctive clatter of coins in an amusement arcade.

I had made my mind up that I was going to stop somewhere around the Criccieth area so I didn’t have that much further to go today, I had covered a lot of ground and pushing on any further would be a case of diminishing returns, i.e. according to the map I was going to come across fewer camp sites the further I went and it may will be of benefit to get my heads down early and get going sharpish in the morning, I had ridden a l to of these roads in the past when I initial had the idea of doing this ride. It all came about, as I have mentioned following a trip to take my Son up to his Grandparents near Chester and with a few days on my hands I decided to ride down the North Wales Coast staying as close to the coastline as I could, before heading back home. So I knew I could ride from the Lleyn Peninsular, around Anglesey and up the North Wales Coast road to Chester in one day.

It did mean I had to call my father to say I was going to make it to see him on this leg of the trip, which was a shame.

Further up the A496 I came to the Sister Airfield of RAF Aberporth (22) RAF Llanbedr. It has probably the most interesting background of all those I have passed so far.

It opened in 1941 as part of RAF Fighter Command’s 12 Group. During its life, the base has been known as:
RAF Llanbedr until 1957
RAE Llanbedr until 1992
T&EE Llanbedr until 1995,(Test & Evaluation Establishment)
DERA Llanbedr until 2001, when most of DERA became QinetiQ.

The site was (from Spring 1942) an operational base for Towed Target (and in 1943, became the home of the RAF's No. 12 Fighter Gunnery School), and later, Target Drone services to the UK Armed Forces. Target provision services were typically to the Cardigan Bay Ranges (UK Danger Area EGD201, under the control of Aberporth) but Llanbedr targets also worked other UK ranges, including the Royal Artillery range off the Hebrides and occasionally overseas.

From 1957, civilianisation of the base services (typically airfield operation) began with Short Brothers holding a series of contracts until 1979, when Airwork Services took over and held them until 1991. In 1991, contracts and scope of work changed again and FR Serco took over its running.

Secondarily, it served as a Royal Air Force V-bomber dispersal airfield, more recently used for military weapons training.

In 2004, QinetQ gave up the contract and the Welsh Assembly Government began searching for a new tenant. The site has recently been used for agricultural purposes under the terms of an agreement with the site owners pending operation re-starting.

It was reported in February 2008 that the Welsh Assembly, the current site owner had awarded preferred bidder status for a 125 year lease to the operators of Kemble Airport near Cirencester. In May 2008, the Snowdonia Society, the Brecon Beacons Park Society and the Friends of Pembrokeshire National Park formed an alliance against the development of a new civilian airport at the site.

This campaign has been met by considerable opposition from people in the Llanbedr area who are delighted that their airfield, which has been an important part of the community for seventy years, is about to take on a new lease of life. A local petition in favour of Kemble's plans for the airfield attracted over a thousand signatures, while one organised by the Snowdonia Society received only 156, all but a few from people who live elsewhere..

In December 2008, the Welsh Assembly Government gave the final go-head for Kemble to take over the airfield, but there are some issues concerning planning consent still to be resolved, and the Snowdonia Society has vowed to continue its campaign. I just have to ask how many people in the aforementioned society are actually from the area. In so many cases, and a subject I have covered previously, ‘townies’ and second home owners come into an area and try and change what they say they have said they loved so much.

For those that may not realise, fast military jets have been flying in Snowdonia for over 50 years, so not one of the society can say a change is happening, in fact over the last 30 years the number of flights has probably decreased dramatically, so wind your necks in,it is part of the local landscape and it is what the locals want. I can’t understand why the group from the Brecons or Pembrokeshire got involved as it will have absolutely no impact on them. So as always, Locals Rule!.

A bit further up the Coast I passed by the next castle on my route Harlech one of only two I would pass during this day of riding and number (26) of my journey.

Built by King Edward I during his conquest of Wales, the castle was subject to several assaults and sieges during its period of active use as a fortification. The seven-year siege of the castle, during the Wars of the Roses, has been memorialised in the famous song "Men of Harlech”

Construction started in 1283 as part of Edward I's second Welsh campaign. The castle was part of Edward's iron ring of castles around Snowdonia, a string of new castles to hem the prince in. Construction began in 1283. Like many of the castles in the area, Harlech was designed by Master James of St. George. The castle took seven years to build, and cost an estimated £8,190 to build (£88 million in 2009). Following its completion, James was appointed Constable of Harlech Castle, a position he held for over three years.

All the royal castles of Edward's second Welsh campaign were sited so that they could be kept supplied at all times. Harlech was not always isolated; the sea used to come to the foot of the cliffs.

In the Wars of the Roses in the first part of Edward IV of England's reign (1461–1470), Harlech was held by its Welsh constable Dafydd ap Ieuan as a Lancastrian stronghold. Following the Battle of Northampton, Margaret of Anjou and the infant Henry VII of England fled to Scotland via Harlech. Following the defeat of the Lancastrians at the Battle of Towton, Edward controlled the country and Harlech eventually became last major stronghold under their control. Sir Richard Tunstall arrived as a reinforcement to the Lancastrians in the latter half of the siege in 1465. In 1468 it was the last Lancastrian fortress to surrender; it was able to withstand the seven-year siege through its being provisioned from the sea. It is the longest known siege in the history of the British Isles. This famous siege inspired the song "Men of Harlech" according to tradition. The castle was also briefly occupied during the insurrection of 1498.

During the English Civil War the castle was the last royalist fortress to hold out against the Parliamentary forces. The surrender, on 16 March 1647, over a year after King Charles had himself been captured, marked the end of the first phase of the war. The parliamentarians slighted the castle after its fall.

Harlech is part of the "Castles and Town Walls of King Edward in Harlech, Beaumaris, Caernarfon and Conwy (Gwynedd)" World Heritage site, reflecting its importance and remarkable state of preservation. The castle is now in the care of Cadw and is open to visitors.

Architectural historian Dan Cruickshank selected the Castle as one of his five choices for the 2006 BBC television documentary series Britain's Best Buildings.

Further up the road shortly after taking yet another toll bridge I was to pass the famous Portmeirion Village built by the vision of one man. Sir Clough Williams-Ellis designed and constructed the village between 1925 and 1975. He incorporated fragments of demolished buildings, including works by a number of other architects. Portmeirion's architectural bricolage and deliberately fanciful nostalgia have been noted as an influence on the development of postmodernism in architecture in the late twentieth century.

The village of Portmeirion has been a source of inspiration for writers and television producers. For example, Noel Coward wrote Blithe Spirit while staying in the Fountain 2 (Upper Fountain) suite at Portmeirion. In 1956 the village was visited by architect Frank Lloyd Wright, and other famous visitors have included Gregory Peck, Ingrid Bergman and Paul McCartney. Musician Jools Holland visited whilst filming for TV music show The Tube, and was so impressed that he has had his studio and other buildings at his home in Blackheath built to a design heavily inspired by Portmeirion.

Television series and films have filmed exterior shots at Portmeirion, often depicting the village as an exotic European location. Examples of this include the 1960 Danger Man episode "View from the Villa" starring Patrick McGoohan, the 1976 four-episode Doctor Who story entitled "The Masque of Mandragora" set in Renaissance Italy, and an episode of Citizen Smith in which the eponymous hero visits Rimini.

The best-known use of the location occurred in 1966-67 when McGoohan returned to Portmeirion to film exteriors for The Prisoner, a surreal spy drama in which Portmeirion itself played a starring role as "The Village". Whilst I didn’t have time to stop and spend time there on this trip, I have been there a few times in the past and all I can say is, It is mind blowing, it is so totally our of character with the area and in fact anything I have ever seen in this country, it is the ultimate theme village.

Quickly along the A497 I passed through Porthmadog and after a quick spin along the front it was on to Criccieth and the 2nd castle of the day and (27) overall, before finding a great campsite shortly afterwards. Situated on the headland between two beaches in Criccieth, on a rocky peninsula overlooking Tremadog Bay.

Construction on Criccieth began in the early 13th century at the behest of Llywelyn ap Iorwerth of Gwynedd, and was later continued by his grandson Llywelyn ap Gruffydd, Prince of Wales. Because of its strategic location, it was a focal point in the war between England and Wales — eventually it was captured by Edward I of England during his second campaign in North Wales (1282-1283).

Criccieth's most notable feature is its twin-towered gatehouse, rare among Welsh-built castles. It was built by Llywelyn, probably between 1230 and 1240, and was possibly copied from an English model.

In 1283 the castle was taken by Edward's army and rebuilt, including adding another tower to the wall of the inner ward and strengthening the "Engine Tower" (now in ruins), which served as a foundation for a siege engine.

In 1294, Madoc ap Llywelyn, cousin to Llywelyn ap Gruffydd, began an uprising against English rule that spread quickly through Wales. Several English-held towns were razed and Criccieth (along with Harlech Castle and Aberystwyth Castle) were besieged that winter. Its residents survived until spring when the castle was resupplied.

The castle seems to have been used as a prison until 1404, when Owain Glyndŵr captured the castle, tearing down its walls and setting the castle afire. Some walls still show these scorch marks.

Criccieth was also one of several locations Romantic artist Joseph Mallord William Turner used for his famous series of paintings depicting shipwrecked mariners.

It wasn’t much later when I saw a sign indicating a campsite in the village of Llanystumdwy, which has a claim to fame all of it’s own. It is the village where David Lloyd George the British Prime Minister lived until he was 16, and where he picked up his political nous and hatred for the land-owning aristocracy from his laypreacher uncle. His grave on the outskirts of the village was designed by Sir Clough Williams-Ellis and inscribed with a poem by Lloyd George's nephew Dr William George, a former Archdruid of Wales. There is also a museum of Lloyd George memorabilia in the village.

But for me it is also the site of a Camping and Caravan Club Site, run by a fabulous couple from Yorkshire, who not only welcomed me but also inducted me into the Camping and Caravan Club. A fellow bikers they understood what I was about and showed me to a pitch that had been occupied by a couple on their bike the previous few nights. After their hospitality I will be making a special effort to utilise my membership to the full.

It was a wonderful site and after getting pitched I had a great long shower and it was wonderful, then on to cook my evening meal and as this was cooking I took the opportunity to take a photo, given the direction I was pointing the mountains in the background are those on the way down towards Cadair Idris and mid Wales rather than Snowdonia.

And with that it wasn’t long before I had, had something to eat a few glasses of wine and then took the time to wash up before turning in to watch the last of my DVDs and then to sleep and a good night’s sleep at that.

Take care and as Mick says ‘You don’t stop riding when you get old; you stop when you join the Camping and Caravan Club!’

23rd of May – What a fabulous bunch Bikers are, no argument here!!

2009-06-01T03:45:00.000-07:00

I woke early on Saturday morning and thankfully it had dawned a little brighter with definite hope of getting better. The on site Burger Van in the bottom field was open just after 8.30 so I decided to get fully sorted and then have my breakfast there to get me on my way that much quicker. It is a bit of a strange one to find a roadside style Burger Van on a very organised and well run campsite. I wasn’t going to argue though as they did a wicked Bacon and Black Pudding breakfast roll and filled my mug with Tea and even topped it up whilst I was waiting. But first I had to get some stuff packed.

Despite how hard I worked it was still a tough ask as so much of my gear was still fairly wet from the night before, packing up the Basha was the first thing to get me soaked, followed by the outer of my tent, then it was the base of the inner. One of the jobs I will have to do when I get chance back home is to give it a good wash and dry it out properly, otherwise it is going to start to small and ultimately rot and a bit of care and maintenance will save me the cost, especially with what was to follow later in the day.

I finally got going just before 10am, which filled me with the false hope of getting right round the coast and even as far as Aberystwyth before pitching tent again.

Before that I had to get on my way, so I took the A478 into Tenby and immediately found out what all the fuss was about, I heard about Tenby for years and never visited. I have to make an admission here, whilst I have visited most parts of the UK, Pembrokeshire has been very lightly touched, a couple of times as a Salesman to Haverfordwest to try and interest one of the oil terminals with some networking equipment many years ago and also by Helicopter to visit a RAF base further around the coast when I was in the service which I will cover in more detail later on.

It is a wonderful little town. Now I am about to say something that may be taken wrong, please don’t. I have always related Wales to a certain architecture, scenery and people, this is based on my experience in both North and South Wales, now I had reached West Wales, I was actually comparing it more to Cornwall than Wales, I know there is a Celtic link but I could really see it even if it doesn’t seem that way to others. And the further I got towards the tip of Wales the more this became apparent in both the landscape and the people.

Not long after leaving Tenby I came to yet another castle, number (24) Manorbier castle was originally built on land granted to Odo de Barri, a Norman knight, at the end of the 11th century. Initially he constructed a Motte-and-bailey on the site which had a wooden keep defended by a palisade and earthworks embankments. But it was Odo's son, William de Barri, who began work on the stone fortification in the early part of the 12th century.

In 1146 Gerald of Wales, the great twelfth century scholar known as Geraldus Cambrensis was born at the castle. As the fourth son of William de Barri, he was related on his mother’s side, to the legendary Welsh princess Nest verch Rhys. Gerald wrote of his birthplace:

In all the broad lands of Wales, Manorbier is the most pleasant place by far.

In the castle's history, it was only attacked twice; both were minor skirmishes. In 1327, Richard de Barri assaulted Manorbier in a dispute over family succession. Then 300 years later during the English Civil War, the castle was seized in 1645 by Parliamentarian forces. It was then slighted to prevent further use by the Royalists.

Through the 17th and 18th centuries Manorbier was allowed to decay. However in 1880, the castle was partially restored by J.R.Cobb, a tenant who carried out repairs on the buildings and walls. Today the castle is open to the public. Along with the castle, there are also gardens, dovecote and mill.

After a quick run through the woods at Freshwater East and Stackpole, I started to realise something wasn’t quite right with the bike, I had got used to it feeling a bit squirmy but it was now much worse than ever but I pushed on but not for long, once I got to Bosherton on the way to St Govans Head, I knew I had a puncture. At this point I tried to pull over near to the St Govans Inn only to find the road and camber were not helping so I pushed on a little further finally coming to a halt a few hundred yards further on in a small parking area in front of a cottage, thankfully the owner turned out to be totally understanding and even offered me a cup of tea, whilst I waited for recovery.

Thereby hangs the bulk of the tale.

I tried to repair the tyre, but could find no real evidence of a puncture, when I pumped air in the tyre by way of a gas cylinder I carry with me, it was flat again within seconds, so I had a choice put the bike on it’s side and get the rear wheel off and fix it, however once I started playing with the real wheel it was obvious I had bigger problems as the rear wheel slapping around had finally finished off the rear wheel bearings, later evidence would show must have had this problem for much longer. And finally looking at this picture in comparison with one taken earlier in the trip out showed a problem with the rear end that would be even more apparent when we later got her on to a bike ramp.

Now I had checked all these things the weekend before I had set off unfortunately faults like these don’t have clock on them, they happen when they decide to.

After wasting 3 gas canisters I decided it wasn’t going to work so, I walked back down to Bosherton, initially to a phone box, where I wasted all the coins I had in my pocket to be told there wasn’t a bike dealership within 30 miles, Sorry all these 118 companies are just rip off merchants, ‘sorry we have nothing listed’ well I know they are there and this is their address, ‘sorry unless they register with us, we don’t have them listed’ What a bloody rip off. They also charge you at an exorbitant just to tell you that. Is that why 118 118 can afford all those stupid adverts on television. If you are from that company let me tell you something, because of you adverts, you are the LAST company I will ever call, that and you poor customer service. However BT get your bloody act together, before and after that, I didn’t see a phone box that didn’t state that coins were not acceptable.

Anyway here I was struggling at 12.30 on a Saturday Lunch Time on a Bank Holiday, my mobile was out of coverage (sorry as it is Orange it is a long shot when it does have coverage) The Phone box is one of the very few that doesn’t take credit cards. So in a very resigned mood I walk to the nearby St Govans Inn to ask for help.

The inn let me use their Yellow Pages, their phone for free, two local advised me on who to call, one thought the nearest was in Haverfordwest, the other said he knew of a company in Pembroke Dock that could help and we found the number.

I then made one of those fateful calls you end up making. Gone 12.30pm, Saturday on a Bank Holiday weekend, here I was not expecting the phone to be picked up.

‘Hello’

‘Is that West Wales Motorcycles?’
'Yes’
‘I have a problem and I’m stuck out at St Govan’s Head, can you help?’

‘We’ve got an open Day here today and we are very busy so I won’t be able to come but hold on’ ------- ‘John what are you doing for the next hour or so, I’ve got this guy stuck out at St Govan’s head that could do with some help’

‘I can’t come out to you but one of the guys here could use our trailer to come and get you but it will be at least half an hour’

Very feebly and very disbelieving in my luck ‘that’s fine I’m just past St Govans Inn on the road to the head, I’ll go and wait by the bike’

‘No worries I don’t think there are many broken down bikes on that road so he should find you’

‘I’ll be waiting’

What was to follow was an absolute surreal experience with some of the greatest and nicest people I have ever met, each an every one of them a fellow biker.

The guy that had been just visiting the workshop when I called was John Jenkins, an absolute saint as well as a bike nut when I witnessed the bike he turned up on later in the day, basically a road legal Suzuki track bike, that could be heard from at least half a mile away.

First of all this guy was visiting his friend when he got shanghaied into helping me out, this was done with very great grace, even though his truck started to splutter on the way back into Pembroke Dock which made me feel even more guilty. Thankfully all this turned to be was a dodgy fuel filter, soon as he changed it, it was back to normal.

We finally got back into Pembroke Dock after passing castle (25) on the way in. Pembroke Castle stands on a site that has been occupied since, at least, the Roman period. Yet its history is one of inheritance and acquisition not wars and sieges.

Norman Lord, Roger of Montgomery founded the first castle here in the 11th Century. Although only made from earth and wood, it resisted several Welsh attacks and sieges over the next 30 years. The castle establishing itself at the heart of the Norman controlled-lands of south-west Wales.

In the 1100s Roger de Montgomerie's eldest son was forced to forfeit all his British lands and titles after he rebelled against Henry I. By 1138 King Stephen had given Pembroke Castle to Gilbert de Clare who used it as an important base in the Norman conquest of Ireland.

In August 1189 Richard I arranged the marriage of Isabel, de Clare's granddaughter, to William Marshall who received the castle and became Earl of Pembroke. The castle was then fortified in stone and the great keep was built. Marshall was succeeded by each of his five sons. His third son, Gilbert Marshal, was responsible for enlarging and further strengthening the castle between 1234 and 1241.

However as all of Marshal's sons died childless. In 1247, the castle was inherited by William de Valence, a half-brother of Henry III who became Earl of Pembroke through his marriage to Joan, William Marshal's granddaughter. The Valence family held Pembroke for 70 years. During this time, the town was fortified with defensive walls, three main gates and a postern.

Pembroke Castle became de Valence's military base for fighting the Welsh princes, during the conquest of North Wales by Edward I between 1277 and 1295.

But on the death of William de Valence's son, the castle passed through marriage to the Hastings family. In 1389, 17-year-old John Hastings died in a jousting accident ending a line of inheritance stretching back 250 years.

Pembroke Castle then reverted to Richard II. Short tenancies were then granted by The Crown for its ownership. By 1400 Owain Glyndwr had began a rebellion in Wales. However Pembroke escaped attack because the castle's Constable, Francis а Court, paid off Glyndwr in gold.

Eventually the castle and the earldom were presented to Jasper Tudor by his half-brother Henry VI in 1452. Tudor brought his widowed sister-in-law, Margaret Beaufort, to Pembroke where she gave birth to her only child, the future King Henry VII of England (born 1457).

In the 15th and 16th centuries the castle was a place of peace. But at the outbreak of the English Civil War, although most of South Wales sided with the King, Pembroke declared for Parliament. It was besieged by Royalist troops but was saved after Parliamentary reinforcements arrived by sea from nearby Milford Haven.

Parliamentary forces then went on to capture the Royalist castles of Tenby, Haverfordwest and Carew. But in 1648, when the war was at its close, Pembroke's leaders changed sides and led a Royalist uprising. Oliver Cromwell came to Pembroke and took the castle after a seven-week siege. Its three leaders were found guilty of treason and Cromwell ordered the castle to be destroyed. Townspeople were even encouraged to disassemble the fortress and re-use its stone for their own purposes.

The castle was then abandoned and allowed to decay. Pembroke Castle remained in ruins until 1880 when a three-year restoration project was undertaken. Nothing further was done until WWI veteran Major-General Sir Ivor Philipps acquired the castle in 1928 and started an extensive restoration of the castle's walls, gatehouses and towers. After his death a trust was set up for the castle, jointly managed by the Philipps family and Pembroke Town council. The castle is open to the public. It remains the largest privately-owned castle in Wales.

As mentioned we finally spluttered up the last two hills before we turned into the small industrial estate occupied by West Wales Motorcycles, straight away I could see a number of bikes and riders around what was now he BBQ area, however at this stage it was only a few so I stupidly thought the so called ZX-9 group wasn’t that large, selfishly I was just thinking about getting on my way and further on my way and didn’t take any photos at the time, however I have stayed in touch with the group and I put them up. I finally left after 4.00pm.
Adam Stringer the owner of West Wales Motorcycles, relaxing after all his efforts on the day.

The crowd relaxing, it appears in relief to see the Africa Twin leave the midst of all these sports bikes.You can just see the forlorn pile of my luggage and helmet on the right hand side of the picture; she is obviously still on the ramp being worked on.
I would like to list some special thanks.

John Jenkins, who had just popped in to see Adam, who then came out of his way with his truck and trailer to collect me. A genuine one-off, who when I offered to pay him for his time, trouble and fuel politely but very firmly told me to sod off and give it to the charity. Which I will do in your name. Thank you very much.

Chris Williams ably supported by Brian who repaired the rear wheel and tyre and then went on to try and sort out my rear shock, their efforts ended up with my bike riding so much better over the following week than it has done in a long time, you would not believe. This may sound bizarre however, having ridden it for so long as it was obviously deteriorating I think has enhanced my riding style and ability, now I find I am going into corners on much cleaner, accurate and therefore quicker lines and feeling much more stable and balanced. Thanks guys you were stars to achieve what you did.

Tosh, who volunteered to ride over to Haverfordwest to go and get a bearing for me, when we discovered that Adam only had 2 of the required 3 bearings in stock, which is no surprise given the unusual nature of my bike compared to his usual fodder. It also saved me the embarrassment of showing myself up trying to ride Adam’s ZX-9. I’m not the smallest of blokes and I don’t fit very well on Sports Bikes, that and the fact that Adam’s mount has at least twice the horsepower of mine, so I had this vision of me popping involuntary wheelies all the way to Haverfordwest which scared the life out of me to be frank.

Finally Adam and Hooi for their hospitality and all the guys and gals of the ZX-9 owners club, you are a great bunch and thanks again for the invitation to stay over and join the party, but having seen some of the photos of bodies strewn on the workshop and showroom floor, I’m glad I pushed on, I can just imagine the snoring and other bodily noises in the middle of the night.

So from the depths of despair 4 hours earlier I rode out the industrial estate with the biggest smile on my face. The bike working again, the sun was shining and I had met some fabulous people.

However before I leave Pembroke Dock I must list another Airfield (17), well almost. As I listed RAF Calshot as a water aerodrome, I am going to do the same for RAF Pembroke Dock. With the closure of the naval dockyard in 1926, also the year of the 1926 United Kingdom general strike, unemployment was high through the Great Depression until 1931 when No. 210 Squadron RAF arrived equipped with Southampton II flying boats. For almost 30 years the Royal Air Force were based at Pembroke Dock. In 1943, at the height of the Battle of the Atlantic, 99 flying-boats - mostly Sunderlands - were located in and around Pembroke Dock. No-where else in the world had so many flying-boats at any one time.

Given its importance as an RAF base, it was no surprise that during World War II Pembroke Dock was targeted by the Luftwaffe. On Monday 19 August 1940 a Luftwaffe Junkers Ju 88 bomber flew up the Haven waterway and bombed a series of oil tanks sited at Pennar. The oil fuelled fire that followed raged for 18 days and was recorded as the largest UK conflagration since the Great Fire of London.

Following the war the town enjoyed a degree of prosperity; this, however, the Sunderlands entered RAF service at Pembroke Dock in 1938 and the last UK-based squadrons disbanded there in 1957, just two years before the aircraft was finally retired by the RAF.

Back on to the A477I had a decision to make, retrace my steps back to where I broke down or head off towards Milton and then taking the lanes around Carew Newton and Cresswell Quay. As I had traveled most of the route into Pembroke and all I would really be left to do was to take the road out and back to Angle, I decided to head off east as I wasn’t sure how well the bike would ride, as the shock absorber was knackered and the only reason I was able to go on was due to the spring being wound almost to it’s maximum. That and we had also compensated by pumping the rear tyre pressure to 4lbs over the normal top end.

Within minutes of turning off at Milton I stopped at Cresswell Quay outside the Pub there, what a beautiful setting.
On the way in I passed Carew Castle and Tidal Mill Castle number (26) the famous Carew family take their name from the place, and still own the castle, although it is leased to the Pembrokeshire Coast National Park, which administers the site. The castle stands on a limestone bluff overlooking the Carew inlet — a part of the tidal estuary that makes up Milford Haven. The site must have been recognised as strategically useful from the earliest times, and recent excavations in the outer ward have discovered multiple defensive walls of an Iron Age fort which means the site has had a military use for over 2,000 years. The Norman castle has its origins in a stone keep built by Gerald de Windsor around the year 1100. Gerald was made castellan of Pembroke Castle by Arnulf of Montgomery in the first Norman invasion of Pembrokeshire. He married Nest, princess of Deheubarth around 1095. Nest brought the manor of Carew as part of her dowry, and Gerald cleared the existing fort to build his own castle on Norman lines. The original outer walls were timber, and only the keep was of stone. This still exists in the later structure as the "Old Tower".

In the Civil War, the castle was lucklessly fortified by Royalists although south Pembrokeshire was strongly Parliamentarian. It changed hands three times, and with the Royalists defeated, the south wall was pulled down to render the castle indefensible. At the Restoration the castle was returned to the de Carews, who continued to occupy the east part until 1686, after which it was left to decay. Much of the structure was looted for building stone and for lime burning. Since 1984 Cadw has funded a substantial amount of restoration performed by the Park Authority.

Riding the back lanes up to Lanshipping and Minwear I noted a surprisingly improved handling of the bike and my confidence grew markedly the further I went. Back on to the A40 for a brief blast before turning off briefly this brought me close to the next Castle at The Rhos. Picton Castle (27) is a most unusual ancient building being in design half fortified manor house and half fully developed medieval castle. From the outside with its four symmetrically spaced half round towers and gatehouse entrance flanked by two narrower towers it looks like a miniature version of a great Edwardian Castle such as Conwy in North Wales. However as soon as one enters inside it is revealed not to have an inner courtyard and keep but rather a series of finely planned rooms typical of the grand country house that it is. There is no other building quite like it in Britain.

Since the 13th century Picton has been in the hands of the Wogans, Baron of Wiston and it was Sir John Wogan Justiciar of Ireland circa 1295 – 1313 who is believed to have built the present castle.

The Phillips's who are direct descendents of Sir John Wogan have held Picton since the days of Sir Thomas Phillips. In 1611 James I wanted to raise money to meet the cost of keeping his army in Ireland and he hit upon the idea of selling baronetcies. Sir John Philipps bought one at the cost of £1,095.

Throughout the 17th and 18th Century the Phlilips's of Picton Castle were the most powerful family in Pembrokeshire exercising both tremendous political, social and economic influence over all aspects of local life. They had vast estates were prominent philanthropists (being particularly supportive of the charity school movement). Patrons of the arts for generations supplied Pembrokeshire with Sherriffs, justices of the peace, Lord Lieutenants and MP's. Today the castle remains in the ownership of the Philips family and is open all year round for weddings and corporate events and during the summer there are guided tours of the Castle which still retains much of its original character.

Skirting Haverfordwest it was then down the back roads to Freystrop, Hook and Hill Mountain before getting to Burton which allowed me to take an interesting photo of the Toll Bridge.

From there it was a quick ride to Neyland which took me back up and across the A477 before coming down the other side of the small estuary which housed and amazingly large marina packed with expensive yachts for a couple of other photos from a seafront car park.
It was then through Llanstadwell and skirting around one of the many oil refineries situated around the estuary I entered Milford Haven and on the main road closest to the estuary, I stopped to go to an ATM machine and turning round to get back on the bike I spotted a number of tankers moored up at the oil terminal on the far side. There were 4 in various sizes in the process of unloading. Back out of town and around a small inlet on the way to Sandy Haven, I passed a couple of the new LNG Gas terminals that have been produced to accept the Gas Bulk carriers that are due to come into service shortly bringing in Liquid Gas from the Gulf.

After everything that had gone on during the day and some of the industrial areas I had ridden past, I through I had died and gone to heaven when I first of all came upon this small inlet on the way down to Dale and there were only two small houses that had the benefit of this view. As I have mentioned Pembrokeshire is not area I have visited too much in the past, in fact I have been to an Oil Terminal in Milford Haven twice on business about 15 years ago and I didn’t stay around on either occasion, both visits were in the late autumn early winter so it didn’t look as good as now.

I have spent quite a bit of time in Wales over the years and I have also mentioned how more like Devon and Cornwall Pembrokeshire was, the other thing of note is how this part of Wales seems to have far more English based village names than any other part of the Country.

Coming down into Dale the view really took my breath away. If you ever get chance it is very, very worth it okay the sun had a lot to do with it, but still just look. Back up the lane passing the turning for Marloes which have taken me right past the front entrance to the ex RAF airfield and then RNAS base at RAF Dale and the HMS Goldcrest. So Airfield 18 which may now start to catch back up with castles, as I found with the North Coast of Cornwall and Devon, there are fewer castles than the South Coast, looking at the map this seems to be the case with the Welsh coast as well.

Construction of the airfield began between the villages of Dale and Marloes in 1941. It became operational in June 1942. Initially it was to be named RAF Marloes. It was planned as a satellite to nearby RAF Talbenny.

Following the war, RAF Dale was decommissioned, and the site became occupied by the Fleet Air Arm as RNAS Dale (aka HMS Goldcrest). After a quick loop to St Brides and then it was into Talbenny and Rosepool which brought me past the aforementioned RAF Talbenny, airfield (19).

RAF Talbenny was a World War II Royal Air Force airfield in Pembrokeshire operational from 1942 to December 1946. There were 3 concrete runways encircled by a perimeter track and 36 dispersal points.

Brigadier Vivian Dykes, Director of Plans at the War Office between 1939 and 1941 and the Chief Combined Secretary British Joint Staff Mission Washington in 1942 died on 29 January 1943 on approach to RAF Talbenny on a flight from Casablanca along with 10 others.

I then stopped over in Broad Haven to go to a small shop there for a bottle of wine that night and as it was now close to 6pm I was about to start to look for sites to stay, however as I was coming out of the shop I was met by a couple that were looking over my bike, it turns out he was a fellow Africa Twin owner and he and his wife had done the run to Nordkap the previous year. For those that don’t know, Nordkap is the farthest point north of the European mainland being right at the top of Norway. It is also a ride I would like to do in the future. However next year is probably taken up by attending the Cagiva Elefant owners event in Italy, which will involve a stay in the Alps, close to the border between France and Italy and a number of great rides on the roads in that area.

Anyway I made my apologies but had to get on and find a campsite I said. They advised me that if I followed the coast road I would come out at Newgate where there was a couple of Campsites.

Now I am about to make my first plea of this nature over the next couple of postings. Blokes please, please do us all a favour and DON’T let your missus do the driver on these narrow country lanes on a Bank Holiday, spatial awareness is not their long suit. Why is it they drive down the middle of the road (no problem when no other traffic is around) but then go into an absolute panic that leaves them unable to pull over when something else is coming the other way.

The number of times when I came around or approached a corner only to find a woman driver in the middle of the road cannot be counted, fair enough you might say but when then couldn’t or wouldn’t pull over it gets very frustrating, no, down right annoying, even on one occasion I had to pretty much pull up on the edge of the road, because this one woman thought her car was 2ft wider than it was, even her husband was telling her to pull over. Is it related to the age old question ‘does my butt look big in this?’ do some women struggle with how wide some things really are?

I pulled into Newgate and tried the first campsite, which had the very unwelcoming sign saying they were full, which didn’t seem to be the case, but all the warning signs around the place did not make it look like somewhere I wanted to stay anyway. I then pushed on into the centre of Newgate and just before I got there, there was a huge campsite full of tents but it did look as if it was too big for the small facilities on the far side. So I pushed on a little further and came upon Airfield (20). RAF Brawdy, which is a base I once spent a short time at, we had an aircraft land there with an emergency when I was based at RAF Valley and myself and two others were sent down to fix her and get her back, which we did quite quickly so all I saw of the place was, a Station Flight hangar, the Mess, the Temporary Billet and the NAAFI for a quick pint, so fleeting and so long ago, it is now just a blur.

The Pembrokeshire base was officially opened on 2 February 1944 as a satellite station for the nearby RAF St. David's. On 1 January 1946 the station was handed over to the Fleet Air Arm of the Royal Navy and was initially used as a Relief Landing Ground for RNAS Dale. It was commissioned as HMS Goldcrest on 4 September 1952. In March 1953 the first Hawker Sea Hawk entered service with 806 NAS at RNAS Brawdy. The Royal Navy left in 1971 and the base was allocated to the Department of the Environment.

In February 1974 the Royal Air Force returned with D Flight of 22 Squadron taking up residence with their Whirlwind HAR.10 search and rescue helicopters. In September of the same year 229 Operational Conversion Unit (later the Tactical Weapons Unit) joined D Flight having been forced to relocate after the closure of RAF Chivenor.

The base was home to Hawker Hunter aircraft of the TWU, and the gate guardian at the base was initially a Supermarine Spitfire, this was replaced in the early 80's by Hawker Hunter FGA.9 (XE624). This airframe was subsequently sold to a private collector, Steve Petch, who is in the process of creating a website for the aircraft.

By the late 80's it operated BAe Hawk T.1A (234 and 79 Squadron) and Sea King (202 Squadron, B Flight) aircraft. The RAF withdrew in 1992 and the base, now known as Cawdor Barracks, is currently occupied by the Royal Signals, being the main electronic warfare base of the British Army.

The campsite I found was close to the village of Bryngwyn and the site itself Park Hall Farm, despite looking very nice it is somewhat dated from its layout and look of some of the buildings it was once part of the base. The couple that run it do come across a bit dotty and frail but I was assure later that he knew everything about and every inch of the site intimately.

Half of the site is for Permanent residents and the other half for tourers and tents, thankfully it wasn’t that late and I soon got pitched and set up despite a number of campers coming over to have a chat about what I was doing, believe me I have no problem what so ever, but I do need to start to arrive earlier so I can accommodate this; One invitation resulted in an invitation t watch the sunset from the verandah of a couple of residents, Alan and Kevin.

So after setting up camp and having my evening meal I did go over and watch the sunset with them and one of their neighbour’s, Steve, who had actually moved there when he divorced from his wife, spooky thing is, he got divorced around the same time I did and when that happened he lived a few roads away from me in Burghfield Common , he had researched on the internet the cheapest place to buy a property and moved there, I had stayed close to my children. Believe me it was a surreal conversation. The views on the other hand were stunning, watching the sunset over St David’s Head.

Good or what, the last two were taken after the sun had gone over the horizon. A glass or two of there wine later I made my excuses and headed off to my bed, without even doing my washing up, that would have to wait for the morning. Thanks very much for the hospitality. It really did bring a very amazing day to a very, very nice close.

Take care and as Mick says ‘You don’t stop riding when you get old; you stop when you have the best sunset ever to watch!’