Sunday, June 9, 1996
From Bridge of Cally to St. Andrews
43.1 miles
When I woke up 3 o' clock in the morning I realized for the first time that summer nights in Scotland aren't really dark, there's always enough light to see without lighting a light. At 7 am there were a few drops of rain, but when I packed my tent it already was dry again. I then started in the direction of Dundee, because I'd decided to ride to the Lowlands passing Edinburgh where I perhaps would stay for a whole day.
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When I started that day I first thought that my back tire was loosing air, but after refilling it, I had no more problems with it that day.
Not with the tire. But somewhere behind Blairgowrie I suddenly heard that some ticking in my back wheel I had heard the first time on that day when I rode from Loch Lochy to Kingussie. This time I stopped at once and checked the spokes. There was one I had to straighten out, but the rest seemed to be alright. But then, on the A923 near Pitcur another spoke broke. And of course it was Sunday. Well I was brought up to be polite, so I don't repeat what I said at that moment. And naturally, as the two times before the broken spoke was on the right hand side as usual.
Well, there's no point in crying about a broken spoke (it's like in a pub: you're broke? go away!) so I started to put in my replacement. I can't repeat how glad I was to have that thing. While I was working there on the side of the road a man stopped who came along on his bicycle. Obviously he was a local taking a short Sunday morning trip. He asked what my problem was and when I told him he offered me to take the bicycle to his home because he had some tools there. But as I got a Shimano system and he had a Campagniola that was of no use to me.
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I asked him if there's a bicycle shop in St. Andrews which he confirmed. He even described me how to find it. After talking for few more minutes he left because he still had work to do and I finished the bike and went on myself. A couple of miles later I was overtaken by a car which pulled at once to the left side of the road and stopped. And make a guess who got out? That very same man, asking me if it was all alright. He thought that just in case I'd need some help, he'd drive me to Dundee. Great folks! But my bike was going alright so he drove back home and I drove on into Dundee.
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Crossing the Tay Bridge with the bicycle wasn't a thing I'd like to do every day because it was really windy and there was a lot of traffic on that bridge. It must have been about one hour later when arrived in St. Andrews. After checking in at the camping site which is a little out of town I walked back into town to look for the bike shop which already was closed and have a look at St. Andrews which is a pretty little town with some interesting looking cathedral ruins. I decided to visit these the next day while I had to wait for my bicycle. I then walked back to the camping site and went to bed.