After our two nights at our respective homes, on Sunday Martin and I did the the return (and last of LEJOG) rail journey north to Edinburgh to recommence our ride. Prior to LEJOG I'd never taken a bike on a train, although Martin had, and each time it has gone very smoothly, with the rail staff very helpful on each occasion.
We arrived at Waverley Station around 2.30pm on a dry, mild afternoon and with 45 miles estimated for the last of our three "half day" rides on the trek to take us to our B&B in Perth. Despite the shoppers and tourists, the traffic in the centre of the city was a little lighter than it had been on Friday and we were soon heading out to the Forth Road Bridge crossing at Queensferry, where, as the discerning reader can no doubt see from the photo below, I made light of quite a strong headwind.
The ride over the road bridge gave us some superb views of the original Forth Bridge:
Once over the bridge we continued to make decent progress and as we cycled into Hill of Beath, we came across the statue of one of its famous sons, Jim Baxter, one of Scotland's football greats (apologies for the lighting - the sun was right behind it).
A relatively uneventful ride took us into Perth and our B&B for the night, from where we went into the city centre and found a really good restaurant, the Grand Italia. On leaving to make our way back to our berth for the night, we came across a new twist on (a) Scottish national dress:
For those struggling to see the detail, the sporran in the window might be clearer to read!
The final photo opportunity for the evening came as we were about to walk back over Perth Bridge, which spans the River Tay. In full daylight the bridge and the river views were superb, but in the fading light they were augmented by the bridge itself being illuminated, as well as the trees by the water's edge, as you can see from the picture below. It was really impressive and if you added a bit of snow it would look even better!
