BRIAN ON LINE
 
 
With another week of sun and high temperatures behind us and a weekend of prolonged sunshine and highs in the mid 20’s the gruesome twosome decided to put on hold our attempted assault on the more demanding Gaick Pass and instead head out west to the more mundane and tranquil surroundings of Ardrishaig and the Crinan Canal.
Being on the potentially cooler coast and in flat terrain the relatively quiet tow paths would provide us with a gentle work out as we ambled along the 9.5 miles of the Crinan Canal that links Loch Gilp with the Sound of Jura. The Canal was designed by Civil Engineer, John Rennie to provide a link for commercial shipping between the city of Glasgow and the West Highland villages and islands. Work began on the canal in 1794 and was not completed until 1801,some two years behind schedule. Problems on a number of the canals 15 locks meant that in 1816 the services of the renowned Civil Engineer, Thomas Telford where called upon to re-design and improve parts of the canal. The canal remained pretty much unchanged until the 1930’s when further work was carried out to re-construct selected locks and deepen the canal. Nowadays the Canal is operated by British Waterways and is used primarily for pleasure craft seeking to travel from the Firth of Clyde to the west coast of Scotland. The canal is a wonderful resource and on the day we visited the traffic up and down was steady, I would certainly say that it is worth the effort to visit and cycling allows you to cover the distance at a steady pace that should not cause problems to anyone with a reasonable level of fitness.

For a more technical review of the trip, additional photographs  and detailed GPS route files visit...... www.davebanks.scot/route_5.htmhttp://www.davebanks.scot/route_5.htmshapeimage_2_link_0
MTB Trip to the crinan  canal 20TH July 2013
The Route - Total mileage 19 miles Temperature - Mid 80’s F
The Route  Profile