Yes folks, after 8 days of pedalling our day 9 sees us step over the border in an odd ritual of stepping across the invisible line followed by a photo of the sign post at Gretna Green. This ritual must happen many times a day as most end to enders cycle through this way. So how exactly do you take a picture of yourselves when no one is around and there's no little post to put your camera on? The only way for us was the use of a small rock to try and level the camera on the nearby bank. Not bad for a crude setup.
Just as we finished along came a trio of cyclists who have passed us at some point way down the country. I guess we got in front! The lead cyclist came racing up to us in an overly keen manner. A bit like your over excited dog who's pleased to see you when you return from work. And he was excitedly saying "Are you going to do it? Are ya are ya. You know. Are you getting married?". Now firstly, just to clear things up, we were all dressed in cycling gear, and we had a bike each. I.e. we looked pretty much the same as the guy asking the questions. Imagine then the look on his face when I said "Err, Hi. No mate, this happens to be my daughter". His wife/girlfriend then turned up. Equally excited, "Can you take our picture, please, before you go, can ya". Wow, how similar can these guys get? So, who then was the third bloke who was tagging along? First bloke then pipes up after trying to get his foot out of his mouth. "Erm, well, actually that's a big compliment to you". Poor guy, inside I was laughing my head off.
We chatted for a while before setting off again on a road that just keeps going. We followed the old road that runs alongside the M74. It literally follows side by side and winds over and under all the way to Glasgow like a twisted vine. This makes for a rather loud experience for the day. We stopped at one of the M74 services on the way up for a break. You can reach it from the back road. It's quite funny to over hear peoples comments "How did they get here on bikes?". "Aha", Holly said, "It's a secret".
The road does start to climb after a while to reach 1000ft. It's a long climb on it's own but we were met with a headwind which made it tough going. And while I'm at it, what is it South Lanarkshire council? Why don't you look after this road? You boast about road safety yet you appear to neglect the road for cyclists. Have you actually tried to ride a bike on it? It's practically impossible on a road bike. It's certainly not safe. This was a road not to remember.
We finally rolled into Abington services at 5.30pm, earlier than we thought it was. Our 60 miles was better than we thought. Tomorrow things all change again for Glasgow and Loch Lomond. Although the view from our room window is not half bad.
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