The Old Stage Road runs parallel to the A7 between Heriot and Stow, and some way along that little road there’s a turnoff for Pirntaton. This runs as a paved road for a couple of miles or so, rising steeply into remote countryside. We have ventured there together in the past, but Colette particularly likes to cycle in that area, and often heads there by herself.
On one such trip recently, she got talking to a farmer about where the roads go, and he mentioned that he occasionally sees people cycling along one of the tracks that I had previously thought to be a dead end. When Colette told me about that, I got quite excited, because I have wondered for many years whether it would be possible to go that way. So we decided to do it one nice Saturday morning, with a sunny forecast and little or no wind.
We headed off over the Granites to Heriot and then onto the Stage Road. I was riding my gravel bike and Colette on her “CGR” e-bike, which is fitted out with gravel tyres the same as mine. She set her assistance level to the lowest setting, so that she wouldn’t have to wait quite as long at the top of each hill for me to catch up. I was making sure not to try to keep up, as I wanted to save my energies in case the going got tough on the off-road section.
We arrived at the Pirntaton turn-off and set about the climbing. The last part has quite a severe gradient, but I coped fairly well, since I recently swapped the stock 40-tooth chainring for a 36-tooth one, thereby making my lowest gear 10% easier. I had been looking for one of those replacements for several years without success. An American firm manufactures them, but they are very expensive and always out of stock. Luckily you can get them on Aliexpress now, and for peanuts too!
Once we reached the top of the hill, the view into the valley beyond opened up and the tarmac gave way to gravel landrover tracks. We descended carefully past a farm to a lower level, near Lugate Water. The stream is too wide to be jumpable and a foot or two deep in the middle, but not quite a river. Luckily there were several footbridges over the water, so we didn’t need to use the fords.
As we rode further away from civilisation, we were filled with that peaceful feeling, which is what we love so much about these outings. All we could hear was the babbling of the burn and the calling of the curlews and lapwings. In such beautiful weather, it was perfection!
We had been going for a while by now, so we thought it was a good time to find somewhere to stop and have a snack. We ended up eating our packed lunch at 10.30am. And why not?
We had stopped just as the good quality track petered out into rutted grass, then forked into two separate paths. It looked on the map as if they joined up a short way further on, so we just took the one that looked the easier to start with.
That involved going through a gate and alongside the water. This was nice and dry at first, in contrast to the other option. However, it wasn’t long before those attributes were switched, and we found ourselves trudging through a soggy marsh with the other path looking drier on higher ground.
We just stuck to our guns, as the feet were wet already. We carried on till the paths ran alongside, but were left with the problem of getting the bikes and ourselves over a barbed wire fence to join up with our path. This involved a bit of heavy lifting and some inelegant wire straddling before we were back on track.
The path then ran for a while as a very narrow rut through the grass until we came to marsh once more. The bikes had to be man-handled through this, then along more tricky track laced with awkward rocks that we weren’t confident enough to ride through.
We hereby name this route the “Lug-it” trail
It took a while to get the next mile or so under our belts, but we cared not. This is what we expect on days like this, and it’s all part of the fun. Eventually, we arrived at another gate, where a more distinct landrover track appeared. This was pretty good going for the most part, but there were also a few difficult sections. On one, my front wheel got bogged down and I had to stop and put my left foot down. It disappeared into deep mud and I was very relieved that my shoe was still on my foot when I managed to drag it free!
We had to keep an eye out for toads. Colette always stops to help them cross a road.
We were getting closer to meeting up with the Stage Road again though, as we could see some houses on the other side of the water. Then finally, we caught sight of the old stone Lugate Bridge on the Stage Road. One final gate was negotiated, then I spend some time cleaning the worst of the mud off myself as we planned to visit a cafe in Stow soon.
In fact, it just a short mile or so riding further north till we reached Stow. We locked up our bikes and went into the Wild Hare cafe (previously the Cloudhouse). It was still a bit too early for (2nd) lunch, so we had a cheese scone and a slice of cheesecake between us, along with our cups of tea. The scone was not the greatest, but the Basque cheesecake was fantastic, and easily made up for the scone disappointment.
Next, we headed home along the Stage Road till it petered out, then joined the A7 to take us back the last 5 miles to home. Here, I emptied the tanks keeping up with Colette and we both arrived home feeling tired but extremely satisfied after a great day out.