Beautiful but Bleak

Another Saturday and another trip to Whitelee.
It was a lovely day so we decided to take a packed lunch and try to get further into the windfarm than we had managed before. Basically we wanted to try the longer path that we gave up on last time due to bad weather (see here) .
Since the weather was better we planned to start at the visitor centre and do our usual loop bringing us out onto the spine road at turbine 14. From there we would turn left and head into the park, turning left at turbine 33. From there we would see how we felt, but hoped to cross over at 75 and follow the spine road all the way back.
Once we arrived, it was fairly busy, but not packed. While I unloaded the bikes Ciaran went to get a new map. Over the winter Whitelee has produced new maps. This time they are on A4 card. One side is a detail of the area around the visitor centre while the other side has the entire wind farm. The turbines markers no longer obscure the paths, meaning a few dead ends are more easily identified, and the new maps have contour line. An official 8 mile circuit has also been marked out.
Armed with our new maps, and with packed lunch in my new pannier, we headed out.
It was a lovely day to be out in the open. Temperature wise it was quite good - warm enough not to be chilled and cool enough not to sweat too much. With bright sunlight the shadows of the blades passing over the path were somewhat off putting, catching the corner of your eye as they sped past.

Considering the number of people who have recently been hurt here, coming off bikes, we decided to rein our speed in on some of the steeper descents.
As we came along turbine 73 we met John and his wife out for a walk, so we walked with them for about a mile and then continued on with our cycle. When we reached the spine road we agreed that we would continue and headed left into the farm. When we got to 33 we headed left into "Drum Duff" which opens with a nasty little 15m climb (three contours), levels off and then has another climb of 25m before levelling off at turbine 48 (only about 1km from the junction) where we had lunch.
For some reason this area looks bleaker than the rest of the windfarm so far.Perhaps its because relatively few people come this way, or you can't see the Lochgoin reservoir. The recent logging hasn't helped, with the area looking blasted.

Before we turned up at 33, there was a sign on the spine road than indicated it was closed to allow for logging. With this in mind we decided to only go as far as 75 and then cut down to 79 and then back past 63 to 48 in a big loop. Once we got back to 48 is was a rapid descent back down to the spine road and then all the way back to the visitor centre.
All in all, 16 miles in just over 2 hours.