Once again I feel a little explanation is necessary. It's be so long since I updated this blog and I've been giving some thought as to why.
This whole blogging thing started when I stuck a couple of post-riding stories in the Singletrackworld forum. Prior to that I'd simply been taking wee notes as a personal reminder of some of my trips. They are fun to look back on and help re-live the thoughts that were going through my head at the time. The feedback from my posts was encouraging and I decided I'd blog a bit more so that a wider audience might enjoy them. Primarily though, it was still for the benefit of my future self. Of course, it was flattering to get some nice reactions and to think I was inspiring other folk to get out there too.
However, as I've got more and more into reading other blogs and forums, I've come to realise that my wee adventures are actually quite pedestrian. There's no end of folk out there pushing boundaries and doing much more inventive and difficult trips. That got me to questioning not only the act of writing it down, but the "value" of doing the trips myself. It like; you might think it's an achievement climbing Ben Nevis but when someone is doing Everest, it causes you to have a bit of a re-think. Then, a couple of years ago, I decided I'd do the Highland Trail Race. It was working out OK for a while - the riding became all about "training" for the race and I was definitely at the level whereby the fitness was fine. Thing is, my head just wasn't in it - and so I pulled out. And we moved to Aviemore. Frankly, the riding around here is awesome and I've really struggled to find enough of an incentive to travel elsewhere to ride. Plus there's again that nagging self-doubt that simply being out and enjoying riding just isn't enough on its own.
All of the above have somehow discouraged me from exploring and, therefore, from blogging about it. That's not to say I haven't been riding at all. My mileage over the past couple of years has been pretty steady and more of it tends to be off-road these days. However, I've now been prodded by a couple of folk, I've been inspired by the recent Highland Trail Race and I've managed to put together a wee bucket list of trips I intend to do - just for myself. I'm hoping this rekindling of spirit helps encourage and inspire some more folk too.
