November 2007
Amended the amount raised off-line to £0 (was £175 including donation of £25 received 14.11.08) and added a £175 donation via credit card to "balance the books".
October 2007
Thank you very much from all of us for your generous sponsorship. In total we raised £865 so far ( look above, it may have gone even higher) and money is still coming in; £70 since our finish just under a month ago. We’ve created the blog below. Happy reading.
Milngavie, pronounced Mull-guy, is the start of the 95 mile West Highland Way (WHW) walk and the place where Steve and Kevin were brought up. It was just how they remembered it…wet and miserable and a lemon shortage (!) for gin and tonics.
Day 1 – Milngavie to Drymen
We set off in good but damp spirits and although we had two Milngavie natives with us, they didn’t know where we were on the WHW until almost outside of the town. They said it had changed quite a bit in the intervening 30 years! That grass was longer than they remembered. Past Dumgoyne distillery and time for a photo but not a dram. Many groups must have started at a similar time to us as we started to see faces that were to become familiar over the coming days. Next Drymen, gateway to somewhere or other. Good food and drink and after a vigorous hour of table tennis in a squash court, to bed.
Day 2 – Drymen to Rowardennan …
… via the 380 meter Conic Hill, a name engraved on our feet forever. Slippery, muddy and steep going up; slippery, rocky and steep coming down. Great views of Loch Lomond though. Balmaha for lunch and a photo for a happy couple where he had just proposed marriage and she had just accepted! Someone said “Do you realise that this is the happiest they will be for the rest of your life?” Oh how we laughed, too soon as it turned out as Steve’s map reading skills came into question. Only two miles to Rowardennan past Anchorage cottage, known for the diver's helmet and rocking horse in the window. This two mile seems quite long doesn’t it? After another 4 miles to the real Anchorage Cottage, we still had two miles to go. Oh how we laughed! Rowardennan at last and a pint of Belhaven Best just as it said on our T-shirts, kindly supplied by the brewery via Kevin.
Day 3 - Rowardennan to Beinglas
We thought Day 2 was tough but... We started off at 9:15 in good spirits with 2 additional team members, George and John from Duncan’s Scottish roots joining in for the day. On the gentle climb out of Rowardennan we met a girl with horrendous blisters who immediately inherited 6 additional fathers/grandfathers. We patched her up with our supplies of Compeed plasters and moved on. The terrain deteriorated and the path worsened and eventually we arrived at Inversnaid for lunch. After our break we reluctantly set off into the unknown. Worn signs to Rob Roy's cave marked the way and before long we were battling through familiar tree roots, rocks and mud along the loch side. Our progress was halted temporarily as we came across “road works” on the way. Perhaps they were adding more boulders just to make the walk even more difficult! After what seemed an eternity we made it to the end of Loch Lomond and a sign indicating just 2 miles to go to our destination. What it failed to mention was that the 2 miles was over a hill, which by then, to us, had taken on the significance of Everest. Eventually we fell into the Beinglas Farm Camp site in Inverarnan for a very pleasant night’s sleep in luxury cabins.
Day 4 – Beinglas to Tyndrum
The team was back to 4 as we set off with aching legs from the day before. The walk was a relatively straight forward 12 miles but the previous day had caught up with us and nobody could quite get into their stride. But luck was with us and just as lunch time approached we found the only picnic bench on the WHW with fantastic views over Crianlarich and the surrounding area. In the afternoon we climbed through a forest and over a hillside where we met two guys on mountain bikes who had just walked the WHW and were now cycling back?? We didn't like to tell them the coach from Fort William to Glasgow was only £11 and took under 3 hours. We then found a camp site at Auchtertyre with a tea shop – far too tempting to pass. We watched other walkers struggling along the WHW seemingly oblivious to the oasis we had found. We pressed on and after another long day eventually made it to the Tyndrum Lodge. Luckily we were tired and so were relatively positive about the shabby shoe boxes we had to sleep in. During the day we met the “horrendous blisters” girl again who was still struggling; her heels must have been agony every step. She had completed the walk before and we told her it was no shame to call it a day. She must have listened; as we had dinner we saw her board the Fort William bus.
Day 5 – Tyndrum to Inveroran
After four longish days this was the first of three shorter ones. The original plan was to go from Tyndrum to Kings House, a distance of some 20 miles but a cock-up on the booking front (was Steve just chickening out on our behalf?) left us all much happier with the 20 miles split over two days. A gentle climb out of Tyndrum had us following the valley between Tyndrum and Bridge of Orchy with railway and road visible on occasion. Bridge of Orchy Hotel provided a lovely cup of tea late morning! Lunch was atop Mam Carriagh, a decent sized hill overlooking Inveroran and Loch Tulla. Beautiful. A short 30 minute walk down to the Inveroran Hotel followed where very friendly staff made us feel most welcome.
Day 6 – Inveroran to Kings House, Glen Coe
The short day 5 had given us a little more energy which was just as well as the steady climb out of Inveroran had us all puffing a bit. Passed the former family home of Ian Fleming (he of James Bond fame) on Loch Tulla and also a cairn further on dedicated to his brother Peter who died in the mountains. We imagined this walk over Rannoch Moor in bleak, remote conditions with no shelter or main road for miles. Not a pleasant thought. We reached Glen Coe ski resort in time for a late lunch with only a mile or so left to the Kings House Hotel which was reached mid-afternoon. With generally poor reviews being given of the Kings House by fellow walkers, we were unsure of what we’d find. However a clean hotel with good facilities / food was all we could ask for. Overall a good day with magnificent scenery.
Day 7 – Kings House to Kinglochleven
Back to 6 again with John and George back for more punishment. The last of our short days but a stiff one with the Devil’s Staircase at the beginning then a long decent back down to sea level at Kinglochleven. The top of the Devil’s Staircase, at nearly 550 meters, is the highest point of the WHW and the steep climb from the valley floor had us “admiring the scenery” from a standing position on a number of occasions. However, with many Munros (mountains over 1000 meters, well 3000 ft really) close by, standing still and admiring the view would have been mandatory in any case. Today’s walk, the shortest at only 9 miles, is again remote as it follows the old military road from Glen Coe to Kinglochleven. We arrived at the hotel early afternoon and proceeded to have the first real session of the walk with a few beers being put away!
Day 8 – Kinglochleven to Fort William
Last day. Only 14 miles to go! For two days Gordon had been suffering a “bit of a cold” and was hoping to shake it off overnight but Saturday morning found his chest rattling more than the change in the beer kitty. With much regret to all of us, Gordon rightly decided that the bus was the only sensible option. How we later wished we’d all joined him! With no time to warm up, it was out of the hotel, across the road then up a particularly long, steep climb to reach 270 meters. Knackering! Towards the top it started to rain and it was soon raining hard. The wind also joined in the fun to make it a fairly miserable day all round, by far the worst of a week where we had been blessed with good weather. The path through Nevis Forest was rough and the climb down into Glen Nevis, by now in the sunshine, at about the 10 or 11 mile mark was tough. Reaching the tarmac road, the last 3 or 4 miles on the pavement seemed interminable and particularly hard on the knees and the spirit. Surely, please, the 30 MPH road sign signaled civilization and the end of the West Highland Way? No, still a further mile or so to go, but we got there, tired but happy at having done the WHW.
