Got home at 6.20 after a very fast ride from Dumfries. Said goodbye to my kind host + hostess after sending off my bag by rail + my tan shoes by parcel post enabling me to right ride lighter. Couldn’t get by [sic] back tyre properly inflated + took it to the repair shop. There they found something wrong with the valve of the new tyre they fitted on Wednesday + before they got it right it was 10.30. What with splendid roads + a S.W. wind I did the 21 miles in 1h 46m or almost 12 m.p.h. I was only 5 minutes in Moffat I left at 12.24 + got the first walk at Hunterheck1. At Craigieburn2 I picked up a big nail in my back tyre + after spending more than [an] hour patching it had to turn back to Moffat + get it properly done. It was most provoking. Ate my lunch + got a glass of beer meantime + finally got away at 2.59, a loss of more than 2½ hours. However I did splendid time + did the journey home in 3½ hours. The roads were execrable from before the tail to Chapelhope3 but I came along with the wind for the first few miles at 15 m.p.h. But for the puncture I would have been home before 4 o’clock. I was pretty stiff. Had a hot bath + dinner + went to bed comfortably tired.
1 Hunterheck, where the road rises, grid reference NGR NT101,047.
2 Craigieburn, NT116,051.
3 Assume Gray Mare’s Tail, NT186145, to Chapelhope, NT231,190.
[Source: Scottish Borders Archives & Local History Service SBA/657/22, Dr J S Muir of Selkirk, medical practitioner, journal for 1919]
Rumbling Clint's Scottish Notes 