Castlelaw north climb....."the road to hell"

Baz and Clive contemplate the Castlelaw north climb, believe me it's much steeper than it looks here!

Off at 6am this morning and the weather for the time of year was its usual crap self, blowing a near gale and hovering around  40 degrees Fahrenheit. The plan was to do the much talked about (by us anyway) Castlelaw figure of eight, which involves cycling up Castlelaw from the south side swinging down round to the bottom of the north climb and cycling back up it to the top again. The north track has been recently resurfaced so on paper it seems possible but I'm beginning to have some doubts about it after today. The surface is still not compacted and on the really steep bits (there's quite a few) the loose stones cause all sorts of problems for both front and rear wheels. Add in today the fact that there was a gale force wind hitting us near face on and it became impossible to stay upright at times. Still good practise for hike a biking at events like the Tour de Ben Nevis though! At one stage on the final descent back down the south side Clive got blown off his bike, damn I never got a photo of that, I was too busy trying to stay upright myself. 25 miles this morning in weather more suitable for December.....but "we'll be back!"