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Rat Race Adventures in Edinburgh

Rob / 20.07.2004

It was an early start for the Rat Racers, with the route book not given out until 6.00am, but there wasn’t much map marking to be done, as few grid references were used. Instead it was a case of tracing the route as far as possible on the Explorer 350 map from instructions like ‘Paddle westward to Lins’ Mill aqueduct’ and ‘Head for the blue multistory car park’.

There was a lot of information to take in, and not all was revealed even now as the words ‘Follow Marshals instructions on arrival’ were used regularly- there were more surprised in store (literally). Even so, teams could sketch out the route which was a large cycling loop, starting with a visit to Arthur’s Seat and Holyrood Park, then heading to the coast for some paddling before moving along the coast to the new Ocean Terminal development at Leith and into the wilder landscape of the Dalmeny Estate.

The second half of the day then turned away from the coast to get teams to the Ratho climbing centre and through to the Bonaly Country Park on the Pentland Hills, before riding into town for the finish.

As Saturday’s stage was all on foot there was little running, apart from orienteering sections, but the special stages reached by bike came thick and fast. As they tried to get their heads around the route the Danish team, Tscherning realised they’d gone off the edge of their street map …. They hadn’t got the required Explorer map, but fortunately there was a spare available.

Steps to Start

It was a steep walk to the start, up onto the Castle Esplanade, though the scaffolds and seating for the summer concerts and Military Tattoo spoiled the grandeur of the start location.

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