Blonde Bird On A Bike

Result!   On Sunday 25th September Matt completed his first marathon and says he is never doing another one – we will wait and see though.   Emma completed her 3rd marathon and has signed up to The  Loch Ness Marathon next year – go girl go.   And I completed my 15th marathon  – not as fast as I hoped,  but nearly 2 minutes quicker than the last time I ran the Berlin Marathon and came in at 4hr, 42min and 52 sec – it was also the closest I’ve come to running the full marathon – only walked for a wee stretch and then realised that it hurt more to walk than it did to run!

Mostly great tunes being played along the route to keep us going but not sure Eric Clapton, Tears in Heaven  was the best choice from the band at 31k when my legs were seriously protesting.

Inline Skaters doing the same route the day before – what a speed they go at!

Chilled and blethered over a wee celebratory drink or 2 later that night and managed to catch up with my friend Kai as well.

Cheers   to Emma for booking us into “Three Little Pigs Hostel” – great choice,  lovely and clean,  good location and nice wee Italian just a couple of doors along for the carb loading.

Now been to Berlin twice now but still lots to see and do – another trip is called for at some point.

Pretty much back to normal yesterday,  and got my blog to look the way I wanted it to,  so headed out on the bike.   Was meant to be a quick 60-ish miles Round The Forth Loop – back in time to do the housework was the plan – but I got sidetracked and the housework got forgotten about – oops.

I’ve done this route a number of times but when I get to the grounds of Hopetoun House I normally make a detour inland and head towards Linlithgow – this time I decided I’d go have a wee nosy at the big hoose instead and stuck to the proper route.   The route then takes you to Blackness – how come I didn’t know that Blackness has a castle – will need to go back for a proper visit some time.   Then it was on to Boness – now I knew Boness had a Motor Museum and a Railway Museum but never been to either before so guess what I did next – both are well worth a visit but especially the Railway Museum and the tattie and leek soup at the station is good as well.

Stopped at the Spitfire Memorial in Grangemouth – the Spitfire is a replica built to remember 71 pilots who died in service – they were from all over the world but based at Grangemouth.

And finally before a quick sprint home,  a wee photo of The Kelpies on the way past.

To anyone looking at my blog just now – ignore all the new headings – I thought I was on a role – I had headings and then I even managed sub-headings – but then all the sub- headings turned into heading headings and there was way too many of them – there is even one titled “money” which isn’t meant to be there at all – it was done as a wee test and I used the first word that came into my head and now I can’t rid of the dam thing!   Time to switch computer off,  have a deep breath and go for a bike ride or something and hopefully I can figure it out later.

Jinxed – A condition or period of bad luck that appears to have been caused by a specific person or thing.

Tapering – refers to the reduction of exercise before a competition or race.

Well my last post regarding the Berlin Marathon jinxed my training and / or tapering big style!!   Went for a wee 8 mile bike ride on a Sunday and stopped to visit The Pineapple – had intended cycling (a lot) further but generally feeling unwell and all my bones were aching so I had a slow bike ride home.   It was worth seeing The Pineapple though.   So it is now Wednesday evening and I’m finally feeling a bit more like normal and I’ve had something for dinner that wasn’t toast.   My running tapering has turned into NO running at all – hopefully the enforced break will do me some good,  and I’ll go for a wee run at the end of the week.

The Pineapple –  “is an elaborate summerhouse of two storeys, built for the 4th Earl of Dunmore.” – stolen from the Landmark Trust Website – still my photos though.

Not much planning done of late – but now that it is getting darker in the evenings I’ll spend more time planning my route.   But some vitally important planning done this week! I have established the opening times of “Cheers” in Boston;  checked out the cocktails menu and “The Boston Breeze” has my name on it.  https://cheersboston.com/food/drinks