Auchencorth Moss.

The day started warm and overcast but quickly turned to cold and wet. Then it became wetter - and wetter - and wetter. Only an idiot would go cycling on a day like this. There were six of us out on the run today.

At the start, we debated what "Plan B" was to be; "Plan A" had involved 70 hilly miles to Innerleithen and back, we went for a relatively flat 35 mile round trip to West Linton for coffee, with an option for a second coffee stop on the way home. At Penicuik, my fingers were turning white (I suffer from Raynaud's phenomenon where various stimuli, not necessarily cold, cut off the blood supply) so I stopped to dry my hands and put on some thicker gloves. Since it was a procedure that would take a little while, I told the others to go on rather than wait in the rain for me; I knew where they were going so it was not a problem. Crossing Auchencorth Moss, an upland bog and Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI), a beautiful place in most weathers, I stopped for this blip through the mist and rain with the nearby Pentlands lost from sight.

On the way back, the others wimped out of the detour to that second coffee (I was really looking forward to the cheese scones they serve there) so we went straight back home.

Upland bogs are just what you would expect from their name, but the SSSI status comes from the peat based landscape and the incredible biodiversity that they support: plants, mammals, insects and birds are all well represented. The habitat is fragile: peat digging, draining for agriculture, and land stability are all major issues. It was horrific that, a few years ago, there were plans to build a wind farm based on very large turbines here; the vibration from the construction and then the operation of the plant would, almost certainly, caused the bog to slide downhill to lower ground and oblivion. Fortunately planning was eventually refused, but our council is remarkably persistent and keeps returning with proposals for similarly inappropriate locations.