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Journal: |
There were strong winds and some heavy rain squalls during the
night, but they didn't present any problems for my tent, which I am
very pleased with - lightweight, strong, spacious, airy and
waterproof. It wasn't raining when I woke soon after 6am and,
though tired, I forced myself to get up and pack up, taking
advantage of the brief dry spell. I was walking by 7am and my
path continued across the desolate and windswept moorland. I
was hoping to reach Inverlael, yesterday's "official" target, within
an hour, but the descent from the moorland to Strath More was steep
and winding and then I had to walk some distance along the valley
until I got to Inverlael (which was more a place on a map than a
place in reality), nearly doubled my estimate to two hours.
The valley was quite lush and I know I am quite close to the sea
(Atlantic Ocean) here, so the weather is probably more moderate
lower down. I saw some school kids walking to their bus from
some of the houses spread out in the valley.
After this usual brief taste of civilisation, I again headed for
the heights, initially through a pine plantation, then on a gravel
4WD track that climbed steeply to the moors again. It was
raining intermittently, so I was keeping my raincoat on, but it
wasn't too cold and I was sweating on the climbs. When the
track petered out in the boggy peaty moorland, I had a 5+kilometre
stretch of cross-country work to do, which I found very tedious.
The grass and tussocks were wet from the rain, meaning that my feet
were soon quite wet, and the boggy and eroded peat made
route-finding difficult and tiring. You are constantly
climbing down a metre or so to boggy peat washouts then climbing
back up again to grass tussocks to look for a way past the next
washout. The weather was still quite miserable but, as usual,
the scenery was spectacular and isolated. I had it all to
myself for as far as the eye could see, which was a long way.
Eventually I had a steep and difficult descent to Glen Douchary
and the Douchary River, which I had to ford. I found a place
where I reckoned I could get across by rock-hopping but, while
climbing down from the peat bank, my feet slipped and I ended up
standing in the water anyway! The guidebook now said to follow
the river downstream along the trackless bank, but I had noticed a
track, high on the other side of the Glen, that seemed to be going
in the right direction. I had a break and read the guidebook
and determined that there was nothing particularly special about the
next section, except that some of it was described as difficult, and
worked out on the map that if I climbed to the track it was no
further and probably faster going, along with better views.
I knew I still had a long way to go to get to the Oykel Bridge Hotel
and hoped that walking on the track would give me a chance of
getting there at a reasonable hour.
There was still plenty of ascent and descent and, despite the
firmer footing, I was tired and behind time. It's amazing how
much time gets soaked up in these cross-country bits. Anyway,
I kept plugging away, taking a break every two hours, and reached
the Oykel Bridge Hotel, all on its own on a minor road in a valley,
at about 6:15pm. I checked in, enjoyed my bath and went down
to the carvery dinner at the appointed time of 8pm. There were
about a dozen other people there and I was the only male who had not
dressed for dinner with a jacket and tie. I looked very
conspicuous in my shorts, T-shirt and running shoes.
Breakfast is not until 8:30am, so it will be a late start and
another long day tomorrow, with some more cross-country. At
least I will be well-rested and fed by the time I hit the trail.
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