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Riding

Scottish Route: Bridge of Allan, Fort William, Aberfeldy Loop

There are many great roads up into the Scottish Highlands, but planning a manageable loop from the Central Belt that fits into a day is harder than you first think. The landscape and mountains force you to follow a limited set of main arterial roads that are full of slow tourists and camper vans. Many quiet side roads I’d normally try to opt for simply come to a dead end up long valleys. As such, you’re forced into either shorter loops through some of the low lands, or very long loops North around huge mountain ranges.

This route is a loop North from Bridge of Allan to Fort William and back via Aberfeldy and is on the longer side at ~220 miles but is a great loop you can fit into a day. Albeit a longish day with about 5-6 hours of saddle time, plus stops.

The first leg takes us up through Callandar and Cranlarich to a pitstop at The Green Welly Stop in Tyndrum. The section of the A84 & A85 from Callander to Mid Lix is a great set of twisty roads skirting the side of Loch Lubnaig and then climbing up to Glen Ogle Viaduct. It can get busy with tourists peek season and the A84 is often policed, so take it steady. The A85 from Mid Lix to Tyndrum is all average speed cams, not particularly exciting, so just sit back and enjoy the scenery of Ben More, they’ll be time for more progressive riding further on.

The Green Welly Stop, Tyndrum
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Riding Uncategorized Videos

Random Encounters Video – Scotland Style

Random encounters when out riding in Scotland are quite different to what I used to encounter in London. Check out this short video of some of my recent daily observations from riding around Scotland.

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Have you bumped into anything wild on your riding adventures, do comment below, I’d love to hear more.

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Featured Videos

Motovlog: Why Scotland?

A new YouTube video has just gone live for your viewing pleasure. Since making the decision to relocate to Scotland, everyone has wanted to know why. In this video, I run through some of our reasons and show some of the amazing scenery I’ve ridden through up here.

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Apologies if this comes across a little too much like a tourist promotional video for Scotland! Nonetheless, we’re all loving it up here.

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Riding Videos

Big Changes Ahead – Highlights from a Summer of Riding

There’s some big change ahead here at Beginner Biker Adventures as our plan to relocate to Scotland is rolling full speed ahead. All the moving stress and preparations may have reduced the amount of content we’ve been able to deliver, but we’ve still been out riding as much as we can. Here’s my latest YouTube video with highlights of our best riding moments from the summer – enjoy!

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What were your summer biking highlights? Have you undertaken a big relocation recently (or planning one)? I’d love to hear from you!

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Riding

Post Lockdown Ride Out

29th March: Stage 2 easing of lockdown restrictions – ride out time! Yeah, baby, we’re back in action.

We’ve spent days leading up giving the bikes a thorough clean and POWDERS check. Oil, lube, grease, cleaning fluids, sprays and air all slavishly applied. After so long parked up and with so much anticipation leading up to this first post-lockdown ride out, we didn’t want any niggles spoiling plans.

On the day, everything lined up with celestial gravitas; a workday clear of client meetings I could book off, an unusually warm spell of weather and Mary’s birthday. This was going to be a perfect ride out.

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Videos

Anniversary Ride

Time flies when you’re having fun.

My wife and I just hit our 15-year wedding anniversary, a bit crazy really. With all the current lockdown restrictions, it wasn’t really feasible to travel and stay away anywhere, so we kept it fairly low key. Taking advantage of the kids at school (remember those days?!) we took off on bikes for a quick ride into the Essex countryside for a decent pub lunch. Here’s a brief video of the mini-adventure – enjoy!

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I also managed to try out some new kit for this video: the new GoPro Hero 9 (all chin-mounted footage) and a DJI Osmo 3 for more stable phone camera footage off the bikes. The difference between the Hero 9 and my old Drift Ghost X is huge! Although I miss the long battery life of the Ghost X; 4+ hours versus just over 1 hour on the Hero 9.

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Videos

May 2020 Update and Post Lockdown Finchingfield Ride

Been a bit quiet on the biking front lately due to all the Covid shenanigans. So here’s a quick video update on what we’ve been up to and a cheeky post lockdown ride out to Finchingfield.

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Regarding the route I took, it’s the first chunk of this Essex Loop I have blogged about previously.

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Riding

Mid Wales Motorcycle Ride Out – The Abergwesyn Pass

Wales Motorcycle Ride, Powys
Welcome to Wales, Powys

This is a route I rode in May 2019, back then I could not have imagined what is happening now one year on. I find myself now looking back at the freedom we had to ride where ever we liked. Enjoy my reminiscing and stick this route on your to-do list for when lockdown restrictions are eased.

This route offers a short loop taking in some of the best roads Wales can offer, beginning and finishing in Newtown (because I was staying with family in Welshpool, the next town north, and using this as my base). All in its about 130 miles and about 3.5 – 4 hours of riding time, factor in a couple of coffee and food stops and you have a chilled out day on the bike.

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Riding

Scotland West Coast Motorcycle Road Trip with Mapped/FA

Scotland motorcycle tour with Blake, Mapped/FA
Blake, Mapped/FA

I think I’m almost as passionate about Scotland as I am about motorcycles, scotch and good coffee (which means it’s significant). My first Scotland motorcycle tour was back in 2017 for our NC500 Adventure. I fell in love with the scenery, the roads and the people. I knew I would be heading back.

In August 2019 I set off on tour to explore the West Coast of Scotland by motorcycle and, more importantly, the Isle of Mull and the Isle of Skye. I decided to call this adventure the “Western Isles Tour”. Now, I must put my hand up and admit that I have made a mistake. I have been advised by several followers that the Isle of Mull and Skye are not part of the Western Isles. Please accept my apologies for this error! (But to me, Mull and Skye were the Western Isles, for this adventure at least!)

The tour itself took place over five days and was designed to take in key parts of the Scottish Highlands, the West coast as well as the Isles of Mull and Skye. In total, the adventure covered over 1,300 miles, starting and ending in Manchester. AKA Team Mapped Base Camp. Although, the true start point is Loch Lomond.

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Videos

California Revisited – Exploring the Best San Francisco Motorcycle Roads on a Bonneville

Having rented big Hog’s on two prior work trips to San Jose, I opted for something a little different on my last visit. For this San Francisco motorcycle rental I went for a Triumph Bonneville T100 is perhaps an unlikely choice, but was surprisingly capable and comfortable to explore the Bay area from Santa Cruz up to to Petaluma in the North, whilst still being a lot of fun to fling round the bends. Check out the highlights from my weekend adventure to cruise the best San Francisco motorcycle roads.