Munros this section :
Slioch
A' Chailleach
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| A' Chailleach summit. I had already decided 'no more' by this point... |
My second day off in Kinlochewe, time for a rest, oh hang on, no, for some reason I decide to spend the day making my way up Slioch, the Munro I missed a few days ago - not like there is much else to do here it has to be said. Well, it's easy enough to retrace my route past Loch Maree, then a long climb, with path all the way, this is not so bad. It only rains some of the time, and I get one more selfie in cloud with a pile of rocks in the background, yay.
So, the last section, time to leave Kinlochewe with no hurry to come back, and it is raining of course, but slowly it stops, as I walk an easy ten km along a track. I've been a little worried about the next bit, 13km of planned route with no sign of a path, starting with climb of Fionn Bheinn. In fact the Munro is fine, a grassy hill, not too steep, even the weather holds off, though the summit is still in a cloud. Dropping my pack one km from the top helps too, and I get back down to collect it at 3.30, with only 7km of the day left this should be easy. I should be so lucky, rather I find my self struggling through truly awful, horrible bog, the rain returns, and my path is blocked by both deer fences and mountain streams swollen into substantial rivers I have no choice but to wade, one of them is waist deep...
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| Silver Bridge. |
I sleep poorly, it may be July but I am so cold. Next morning there is a Munro, A' Chailleach, nearby, I follow a stream uphill, there is too much rushing water to cross, but OK, it gets me onto a decent route to the summit. But, this weather really is just too much to bear, relentless, driving, heavy rain, flung at me by a freezing wind strong enough to make walking difficult. My hands and feet are numb, I can't do this any more. I do get to the top, and just about use my bloodless fingers to take that so important selfie, the plan was for four more Munros today, but that is not happening. One good thing, I meet an actual path here, I can follow it downhill, a long way down but in more good news, once I reach a loch I find a power company has built a little hut filled with humming machinery. Not sure I should be in it but there was one of those combination lock key boxes with the code handily written next to it! Anyway I grab the chance to sit somewhere dry, eat a big lunch, wring out my socks and generally shed water. Looks like I can walk a road all the way from here to Dingwall, it is over 60km but I have more than two days, no problem - so, I walk a few of those km over a couple of hours and then camp.
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| The welcoming Ben Wyvis Hotel. |
A genuinely easy last couple of days then. I am 32km to Contin, seems there is campsite there which sounds good, and dare I say it the weather is actually ok down here, I am starting to dry off. The road is actually a little busy for comfort, so it's good to find an alternative, the Two Bridges Trail along the Black Water River, then logging tracks to Contin - where obviously I get no response from the campsite. Never mind, only two km more to Strathpeffer, a nice Victorian spa town, there isn't a pub here as such but several hotels. One of then, the Ben Wyvis hotel looks super posh, but provides beer, soup and a hearty plate of chilli, and isn't even that expensive. The staff are lovely too, digging out a phone charger for me to use, my own being the latest casualty of the Scottish weather. And OK, after dinner I have to go and pitch my tent in a wood, I can cope with this... What is more I have practically made it to Dingwall, my last day of walking being an easy bit of footpath, finishing before midday. Not a great bit of planning this, I have walked past several train stations to get here - I think I simply defaulted to 'make a circular route'. Well, nice to be back in civilisation, I get lunch and a phone charger before taking the train to Beauly, a little nearer Inverness, where I have a campsite booked.
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| A somewhat more laid back walk in Beauly. I liked the warning sign... |
Beauly is nice, well, the name does come from the French for 'nice place'. There is a Co-op, I decide to celebrate the end of the walk with a barbecue, many burgers ensue, and a few cans, and indeed a couple of beers at the campsite bar - I did say it was nice here! And that is it, the next day various forms of transport take me away from Scotland. And what can I say about this trip? Ugh, well I guess doing this sort of thing you do run the risk of the weather not being great, and it was mostly pretty terrible. This would happen when I clearly hadn't put enough thought into keeping things dry... Never mind, I did have some fun, saw some remarkable countryside, and that is thirty more Munros in the bag at least. Well over half way through them now!
Photos to go with this post can be found here. 
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