Chilly again this morning but miracle! Sun shining occasionally, wind down to 7 knots and less in amongst the trees. DAY warmed to nearly 15C by 2 pm.

Today was modern arts day; started with a 12 km ride to see the enormous steel ‘Kelpies’ at Grangemouth where the Forth and Clyde canal enters the estuary near Edinburgh. Kelpies were sea devils who took on horse form to entice men to to ride them and then take them out to sea to their deaths. When in Glasgow 40 years ago I heard about Selkies but they were seals which became lovely ladies to the same end.

“Ohhh, that’s a nice touring bike!” said an admiring local. I turned around to see YewLi and Patrick of the CTAWA standing there along with Patrick’s brother Damien (professor of Bayesian epidemic statistics at Heriot-Watt Watt Uni, smart family).

We had arranged to meet them at the Falkirk Wheel for morning tea but both groups went to see the Kelpies first.

Off to the Wheel to see the canal boats in the Union Canal drop 100 feet into the Forth and Clyde while F&C boats do the reverse. Cuts out 11 canal locks and a rotation takes enough power to boil 8 standard kettles. Smooth, quiet, no water dripping from the troughs as the rubber seals seat hydraulically. Nice.

Then it was a leisurely and picturesque 30 kms back along the F&C directly onto a by now minor headwind with occasional sunshine. The F&C has been returned to working order end to end so a small number of narrow boats were using it.

We got confused at the spaghetti Junction of canals and canal bikepaths on the Maryhill entry at Stockingfield Junction but eventually got sorted. Then I got lost looking for my old laboratory at Bearsden and the rhododendron bush that I did most of my PhD work on. Got to within 400 m but the other riders weren’t that keen on the rhododendron bush so we turned around and headed straight to the Glasgow Youth Hostel on Park Cresent above Kelvin Park. A couple of streets away from on of my student digs 40 years ago and in the dress circle of the now very desirable addresses in Glasgow (Masersti, Ferrari, Porch parked on street nect door).

Checked in, four of us in a six bunk room on first floor, £7 laundry machines and drying room on ground and kitchen in the basement of what must have been a grand business hotel or club rooms in the 1870’s). With much stronger legs from all the stairs we microwaved our meals-ready-to-eat and went to bed.