We had had a really good stay at the Gordon Arms which we can thoroughly recommend - it ticked all the key boxes - the welcome, the value, the comfortable room, the food + the generosity of the people we met with all the cash donations we received there (including many thanks to Tom the owner - in the picture below):
It was a cool but fine morning and we set off at a good pace, with our first stop after a bit of climbing being Innerleithen, enabling a stock up on medical supplies (see blog for day 7 and the Morrison's "incident").
Heading for the coast from an elevated start meant (as we knew!) that overall we would be losing height over the day, so the cycling should be relatively gentle and so it proved. Also, for once, we were not under time pressures. We stopped for a non-alcoholic lunch in a pub in Pathhead and shortly after we left came across a magnificent poppy field:
The rest of the afternoon followed with easy cycling through lovely open rolling countryside, broken only by a stop for refreshments in Haddington, before arriving at my long standing friends Steve and Lisette's house in North Berwick shortly after 5pm - which was slightly disorientating - we're not used to reaching our destinations so early!
This left us in the unusual position of a having time for a long relaxing evening - sufficient time to talk about friends, times gone by, Steve & Lisette's home which is in a superb position (hopefully a photo of the view from their house will be in Friday's blog) and which they have transformed since moving in less than two years ago, plus Lisette's increasing insistence as the evening went on as to how much I look like my Mum - that'll do for me!
The mileage for the day was a modest 59, meaning that we're up to 779 in total - it looks like we will have cycled over 800 miles by the end of this week. Bring on Friday's even more modest distance into Edinburgh, but the significance of the day will be the expected meeting at the Royal Infirmary with my liver surgeon, Professor Garden.
Ian
