The intrepid adventurers met up on Thursday 18 August at 7.45am outside Newton Abbot railway station - all except our fearless leader Mike who, having exhorted us to make sure we arrived on time, predictably failed to do so himself in spite of being the only member of the party to avail himself of the use of his parents' car to get him there! When he arrived at 7.55 he handed round the luggage labels that I remembered so well from last year, on which we were to write our name, address and destination and which were then to be attached to our bikes. This was to safeguard against British Rail being successful in their attempts to separate us from our machines during the journey, although as it happened they didn't really start trying until the return journey, of which more later. At this stage they confined themselves to omitting the carriage on which our seats were booked from the train, which meant that some of us had to stand during the latter part of the eight hour journey to Scotland.

Nonetheless we arrived safely at Glasgow Central station and rode through the centre of the city - which was a far less unpleasant experience than we had anticipated - to Glasgow Queen Street. From here we travelled on a Trans-Clyde train for three quarters of an hour. This resembled the London Underground in that it had automatic sliding doors and carriages isolated from one another, but differed from it in not being underground.

We arrived at our destination, Balloch Central, at about five o'clock and set off for Rowardennan youth hostel, eighteen miles away. For the last few miles of this we were cycling around the shores of Loch Lomond. This proved too much of a temptation for the more aquatically minded among us, namely Kevin, Matthew T and Matthew B, who had to have a dip while the rest of us sat around on the wall by the side of the road and tried to keep the vicious midges at bay.

We arrived at the hostel (which incidentally was an unusually beautiful and picturesque one) at about eight o'clock, unfortunately too late for the dinner provided but we set about feeding ourselves with enthusiasm. We set off for a stroll along the shores of the loch later on, but were soon put off by the increasing smell of sewage and went home to bed.

(Andrew Billington)

[These slides were cleaned, re-scanned using new scanning technology and re-uploaded in higher resolution on 9/12/18]

Next morning we had to wait until twelve o'clock for a passenger ferry which would take us up the loch to Inversnaid, so we amused ourselves by skimming stones and dropping rocks in the water to splash each other - rather infantile, but vastly amusing. After the half hour ferry journey we climbed a steep hill and were forced to take a slightly earlier lunch than planned by Richard developing a puncture. Still, he chose a fairly good place to have it, by the side of Loch Arklet.

After lunch we continued to Loch Katrine with the sun shining all the way. We cycled along a road that was closed to motor vehicles, which made for very pleasant cycling indeed. The loch formed part of Glasgow's water supply, so swimming was unfortunately out of the question.

At four o'clock, having cycled nearly all the way round the loch, we arrived in the Trossachs at a grockle - sorry, tourist - area consisting of a car park, tea rooms, souvenir shop etc. After cycling in the heat a cup of tea and ice-cream were very welcome, though not both at the same time. Duncan bought himself a rather smart tartan hat, all the better to attract the local girls we assumed!

At the Trossachs youth hostel we were surprised, not to say disconcerted, to find that our dormitory had a sloping floor, as was evident by the fact that when Andrew W sent Michael's recently-acquired indoor bowls all over the floor they immediately headed for the far side of the room! The manner in which Andrew achieved this must not be revealed for fear that others might be tempted to imitate his bad behaviour, but I can reveal that it had something to do with giving Mike's bunk a hefty kick from underneath in an attempt to send Mike all over the floor.

We were also amazed to find that although the hostel was only a simple grade it boasted a table tennis table, a space invader machine, two pool tables and a television. Matthew Tewson and Andrew B went out for a quick exploration of the grounds in the dark and discovered the place to be crawling with frogs, one of which they took back to the games room: it didn't look too thrilled by this change of environment however so they took it back.

(Andrew Billington)

[These slides were cleaned, re-scanned using new scanning technology and re-uploaded in higher resolution on 9/12/18]