Day 98 Aberdeen to Cruden Bay

 

 Date: Tuesday 29^th May 2012   Distance: 29.4 Miles

 

Monday 28th May

 

We cycled to Manchester Airport at 4.45 for the 6 o’clock train to Edinburgh. We needn’t have rushed – it was delayed but miraculously recovered most of its 20 minutes between Carlisle and Edinburgh.

 

We seemed to attract chatty people and didn’t get much time to just chill (excitable lady from Germany going to Preston for a holiday? and then another lady who cycled and came from Dundee) We arrived at 10pm as it was getting dark and had the usual nightmare of negotiating the tramline road-works, now all over the city as we cycled to another Premier Inn in the east of the city near the football stadium. We went straight to bed with the bike in the same downstairs room.

 

Tuesday 29th May

 

It was a lovely breakfast then another cycle back through Scotch mist for the 9.30 train to Aberdeen. It was stressful waiting for the platform number to come up on the board but we got there in good time to dismantle the bike only to find the carriage doors all locked despite the staff being on the train. Then it was a mad panic and a lot of rudeness on the part of the guard who thought that tandems, even ones that come apart like ours, should not be allowed on the train. Good job we had booked the bike as 2 bikes!

 

It was a 2 hour journey and again we had a cyclist for company. I saw fins of, possibly, dolphins between Stonehaven and Aberdeen from the window. Aberdeen Station was quiet. There was Italian produce being sold in the attached shopping area and huge ships were in the harbour. As we rode along the quayside we could see a least another 15 waiting out at sea to come into harbour. We passed skyscrapers and a municipal golf course edged by hundreds of rowan saplings in protective coverings.

 

Four miles out of the city we stopped at the Brig o’don pub for lunch. I had been glad of my new ski jacket with thermal lining (we remembered how cold we had been in the damp of August last time we were in Scotland) Yesterday it had been 26 degrees at home but here it was barely 12 with overcast skies and a fresh wind. It is rare for Bob to find something on the menu for sweet but he had a pineapple kebab with yoghurt and I had 2 massive chocolate brownies with ice cream. It was to turn out to be a great holiday for food! We have never seen a pub with television screens at every set of tables. Bob was extolling the cleanliness of the toilets while I complained that the whole basin rocked and I nearly slid off-pointing out that I had only half a shandy! We left laughing and thought them nice friendly people.

 

It was busy on the road over the bridge and on through an industrial area. Then we took a higher route parallel to the A90 with some sea views. Soon the landscape became predominantly yellow from the gorse, broom and rape, cheering up the grey day. Bluebells were still out and wheat seemed stunted in growth. Helicopters continually passed overhead to and from the North Sea oil rigs.

 

We took our lives in our hands to cross the  A90 to go to Newburgh where we stopped at the Udny Arms hotel for refreshments. It was very quiet with heady scents from lilies and carnations left from a wedding. We sat in a comfy lounge and worked out we’d done over half today’s route but the cyclometer was playing up and did so all week.

 

We climbed out of Newburgh and were soon on very quiet roads. The prolific gorse seems a brilliant habitat for birds and since 3 o’clock the only sound is birdsong and the rolling sea. A large nature reserve in the sand dunes and estuary was alive with cormorants, oyster catchers, eider and shell ducks and herons.

 

We liked the varied colours, greys and pinks, of the granite pebbles on the beach. Yellow hammers often crossed our path and lapwings, swallows and larks (the latter singing its heart out all week) dipped and dived over the fields. Even the irrigation channels were full of yellow marsh marigolds. I always think of Scotland in purple from the heather but not anymore.

 

We arrived at Cruden Bay, Kilmarnock Arms where 2 fires were blazing away and we knew it would be cosy. I’d worn gloves for the last 13 miles. The author of Dracula, Bram Stoker was said to have stayed in the hotel in the 1800s. There is a massive whisky list but Bob had brought his own! Mixed grill and seafood thermidor were our chosen meals and we weren’t disappointed. The crème Brule and cheese board were huge and we wondered if appetites are larger in Scotland than anywhere else.

 

 Although it was deemed safe to leave the bike outside overnight they allowed us to put the bike inside by the back stairs. We walked between the houses and their gardens made separate by the road. There is a walk over a little wooden bridge to the beach and dunes. A cordoned off wooden Viking ship, made by a local awaited public burning at sea during a summer festival later in the year.

 

We arrived back to impromptu music in the bar. An American guest had asked if there were any locals who played instruments and a fair few turned up with guitars, bodhran and harmonica. The American mostly sang blue grass and yodelled Texan songs and he was given a lot of floor space. Though he was good we would have preferred to hear more traditional Scottish music. It seemed like they were just there for his benefit. We went to sleep but were woken later by loud music and after several attempts to sleep I thought that enough is enough and the music was directly beneath us so I went down to speak to them just before midnight. They apologised and left! Bars are quite often open till 1am.