Monday 8 July: Glencoe to Dornoch
Pouring with rain that looks, for once, as though it is here for the day. I put on my waterproof trousers and overshoes for the first time. Despite the rain I feel a sense of lightness. I realise that this is the first time I haven’t started my day with a huge cooked breakfast, always included in the price of the room in a B&B. I vow to myself that from now on I will just start my day with a cup of tea and some cereal and avoid grease, especially the sausages, which contain only a small percentage of lean meat.
Across the bridge of Loch Linnhe, to Ballachulish. The last time I was here I used a ferry to cross the loch and somehow it gave much more of a feeling that I really was going into the Highlands.
I see from the map that rather than taking the route along the very busy A82 east of Onich, it is possible to get a ferry along the south of the loch and then cycle on a tiny road along the west side. Then I can get another ferry at the north end of the loch into Fort William. This seems infinitely preferable to the A road, so I check the ferry times. The one at the south end of the loch leaves every hour, so assuming that the northern one is the same, I board the ferry and go across. The time is 9.30 a.m. and I ask the boatmen about the northern ferry times to Fort William.
‘Well, there is one at 10.15, then the next one is at 2.30.’
‘How far is it to the northern ferry?’
‘Oh, about eleven or so miles.’
‘And how far is it to go around if I miss the ferry and have to go by road?’
‘Oh, about forty to fifty miles.’
I get the feeling that I have blown it, but nothing ventured… I leap off the ferry as it docks and cycle along a deserted road like a maniac. I really don’t think I am going to make it, but at about 10 a.m., I see a decrepit-looking boat, moored to an even more decrepit-looking jetty. I ask, more in hope than belief, ‘Is this the ferry?’
The man on the boat says, ‘Aye, if you want the trip, hand me your bike.’
I hand over the bike, then I jump on board and he casts off. I get off the boat on the other side and cycle into Fort William. On the way there I see a ‘bap stall’. I buy an enormous one filled with sausage and bacon and devour it. So much for missing cooked breakfasts! It tastes like heaven.
I walk along the pedestrianised area in Fort William, remembering that my wife and I spent a few days of our honeymoon here. We came with the intention of walking up Ben Nevis, but when we arrived, the cloud base was somewhere level with our knees and it was bucketing down with rain. We spent a very enjoyable afternoon waiting for the Indian restaurant to open, drinking Tesco Champagne. We had to buy tin mugs to drink from, and as they didn’t have cold Champagne, we had to wrap it in bags of frozen peas. We sat in the car listening to a tape of Andy Stewart. As the rain bounced higher than the roof of the car, we sang along to ‘Cambleton Loch’:
Cambleton Loch, I wish you were whisky,
Cambleton Loch, och aye.
Cambleton Loch, I wish you were whisky,
I would drink you dry.
The cloud base didn’t lift and we never did get to walk up Ben Nevis.
However, today is sunny at the moment and with a strong southerly wind, it is time to get some miles done. The route leaves the town by the main road, then follows the Caledonian Canal, with great views of Ben Nevis. I ride through Fort Augustus and along Loch Ness, but there is no sign of ‘Nessie’. I stop to have a look at Urquhart Castle on the side of Loch Ness. It must have been magnificent once, but it is hard to tell, as it is another ruin. More Scottish history! – it was blown up in 1692 to stop the Jacobites getting it.
I reach Drumnadrochit at about 6 p.m. I have done a good distance, but as I have had a strong following wind, this seems almost like cheating somehow. Drumnadrochit has lots of B&Bs and hotels and a ‘Monster Exhibition Centre’. It seems to be full of Japanese and Chinese tourists, no doubt carrying out their own personal search for Nessie. All the B&Bs want to charge me the full double room price for a single one. There seems to be a landladies’ Mafia, so, reluctant to pay double the usual price I have paid so far, I cycle back to a hostel that I passed earlier. A jolly Dutch girl is in charge and for a very small fee, she gives me a room to myself (with towel) – the room has eight empty bunks in it!
I wake up at 7 a.m. and as I am showering, I can hear the sound of trucks speeding along the A82, so I decide it is time for a detour. A very steep climb, then a good run down into Beauly, a lovely town which is full of flowers. I am not surprised to see that it has won lots of ‘Britain in Bloom’ awards. If they can grow all these exotic flowers, why not vegetables? (It is much improved now.)
Sadly, I seem to be leaving the mountains and the glens behind and the countryside is becoming rich farmland with lots of cattle. I ride through woodland then along the side of the Moray Firth, to Cromarty, where there is a ferry. Not wanting another ferry crisis, I have checked the ferry departure times: they run every thirty minutes until 6 p.m., so I have lots of time. There are six huge oil rigs in the Firth, a majestic sight viewed close to. I discover that it is a giant repair harbour for oil rigs and this is where they park them. Seen this closely, they aren’t half big. I cycle to a tiny village called Jemimaville. It has a post office, which is the size of a small garden shed. I stop to post something so that I can get a ‘Jemimaville’ post mark for Jemima, my daughter. Sadly, the post office is only open on Tuesday mornings and Friday afternoons.
I get to the Cromarty Ferry, to discover that it is ‘broken’ and won’t be repaired until at least the following day. The trip across the water is about a mile, but by road it is more than forty miles. The thought of doing an extra forty miles is a bit daunting and I mooch around the harbour rather disconsolately. I see some men doing work on a large dinghy. I ask, as politely as possible, if they know of anyone who could give me a lift across the river if money changed hands? Perhaps they could? One of the men laughs and says ‘How did I know you were going to say that? Jump in.’ He takes me across and adamantly refuses to accept any money. I have met one of Scotland’s living saints.
Along the A9 and across the bridge to Dornoch. Dornoch is another prosperous, neat-looking old town with a cathedral and a jail. I sit on a bench in the sun with a cup of tea and a cake and watch the world go by. I see there is a stone here that marks the ‘Last woman burned for witchcraft’, in 1792. It is early evening but I am a bit tired and decide to call it a day. I have got two days to do only about eighty miles in total, to reach ‘The End’. A lot of the books say that there is a forty-mile fiendish exhausting climb ahead. I, complacently as it turns out, think that with my present level of fitness, this will be easy.
© Jim Anderson, 2025
Jim Anderson 