GNT - Day 9 - Torgoyle to Garve - 20/08/21

When I planned this day of the route, my main concern was to make it longer. We had planned to stop in a B&B on the 9th night and had to book it well in advance before really understanding what each day held in store. In my head, this was an easy day: Short and limited climbing. So, when the sun nudged us awake past 7.00am, we were all looking forward to a less demanding day. Sure, there was a fat looking hill first thing, but nothing too scary thereafter. 

Hang on a minute, I hear you say, I haven't logged in to read this nonsense to hear about fun, easy days riding, I want pain and suffering. I want to know who wins the midge wars. You can relax - this was another trip to the pain cave, dropping in on despair on the way through. This bloody adventure has gone well past anything any of the 3 of us has done on the bonkersness scale.

It started beautifully with a giant 'full Scottish' at a cafe a mile down the road. Kate's front brake was a concern, well more than that actually. It didn't work at all. We tried changing the pad but that didn’t resolve the issue, so we set off anyway. After breakfast we know we had a big climb on gravel. Strava calls the bottom of it the Dundreggan climb and it starts at the Tomkrasy Road and goes up and up and then down until it eventually heads down to Redburn. I will see that hill again in many nightmares, of that I’m sure, because every time you thought you were done, you would see the next stretch of track snaking yet further up. It wasn’t like the previous day’s climb, where the ridiculous bit was relatively short. It was less technical and just about possible to keep riding, but painfully slow. This almost broke us. I know that sounds melodramatic, but we are all exhausted and such a monstrous climb so early in the day was a killer. The top was quite emotional and a bit dusty. 

Things did get better and, though technical, the descent was manageable. We pulled over in Redburn, just 12 miles into our allotted 54 for the day to take on some calories. It was almost lunchtime, so obviously scones with cream and jam. A short stretch of road followed, along the river Glass through Cannick and towards Struy. You many know of these places if you fish, as the rivers seemed to be full of people standing in the middle in waders. 

Past Struy with some morale-boosting miles ticked off, it was back up and over. On our last descent we had stopped to chat to a super-fit fellow gravelista, on a 100mile circuit and he had warned us about the puddles at the top. We didn’t quite laugh in his face. Puddles? After what we’ve been through. Up we went, plodding by now, but slowly eating up the miles. The countryside here was even more beautiful, complete wilderness but softened by the purple heather and more rolling green hills, plus quite a bit of water. 

That should have given us the clue, because as we reached the high point, the track levelled out and in every dip there was a large puddle. At first, they were easily dealt with - straight through. It’s been dry here, so it could have been worse. And soon, it was. These weren’t puddles, more like permanent water features, depth unknown, that had to be skirted, which meant dismounting every 50 meters to struggle through deep, boggy heather. It did get a bit tedious. 

The theme of the day was the never-ending road and it was an eternity before we finally reached the dam that marked the descent to Marybank, for a bit of road and then a scenic route around the Loch before reaching our luxurious and much needed B&B. Silverbridge Lodge. Willie, the owner, very kindly drove us to the nearby Aultguish Inn where we dined like royalty. 

Tomorrow - we are getting close, but we don’t think we’re going to make it all the way to Cape Wrath. Our sights are set on Durness now. We gave ourselves too much to do and we are just exhausted. Still, not ruling anything out at this point. One day at a time.