Thursday, September 25, 2008

West Highland Way - Loch Lomond



Balmaha to Tyndrum
I awoke the next morning to a rainbow over Loch Lomond. While I was sitting eating breakfast, Andrew and Scott from the day before passed me. Sitting there I had my first real experience with midgies, horrible little bugs that look like gnats, but swarm and bite. And while the bites don’t itch immediately like mosquito bites do, they do end up itching for days. But worse than the physical pain, is the mental pain of having swarms of insects in your face, flying up your nose and into your eyes.

I spent the entire day walking along the shores of Loch Lomond. Not that it’s right by the shore – there’s a lot of up and down and walking over rocks and such. I had decided that I wasn’t going to stop for lunch until I got to Rowerdennan. Not being the fastest walker, I was passed by many people on the trail. And I stopped a lot to for views of the lake and such.

I got to Rowerdennan after two, and sat down by the lake to eat my lunch. Today’s lunch was refried beans and cheese on pita bread with an apple. I then went into the inn, and had some tea and a scone and ran into Andrew. He had decided that he couldn’t manage to finish the trail because his feet were so bad, and so his girlfriend had come to pick him up. The first case of someone walking to fast and not being able to finish. Made me feel better about being slow.

I left Rowerdennan, and started out on the very wide, gravel road that lead to inversnaid. They never paved it though, and so it’s not possible to drive from Rowerdennan to Inversnaid. If you want to go by car you can drive up the other side, and then take a boat over. Apparently at this point the road splits into a high road and a low road, but I never saw signs for the more difficult and scenic low road, and so stayed on the high road

I saw very few people on the path. There was a family walking the dog, but after that it seemed that I was not on the same schedule as anyone else. One of the loveliest places I passed was a bench, overlooking the lake; with one of the most beautiful inscriptions I can remember seeing. There were also waterfalls along the side of the path every 10 meters or so, and I think that I stopped to look at every one of them.

It was beginning to get dark, and I hadn’t found a good place to camp, so with a burst of energy I continued on the smaller trail after the road bit ended, to find a lovely clearing down by the lake. The first thing I did was to take photos as the sun was setting. But as I started to set up my tent, I was besieged by midgies, and in complete madness I don’t think I’ve ever experienced before, I started pulling things frantically out of my pack, searching desperately for the midgie net I had been lent. I can’t describe the feeling of immense relief once I put the net over my head. Unfortunately I got a huge number of bites on my hands, and on the strip of my lower back between the bottom of my shirt and the top of my trousers.


I had a delicious supper of baked beans and rice, and then called Ian to wish him a happy birthday. My baby brother is now 21 and no longer needs me or anyone else to buy him alcohol. I spent a long time just looking into the darkness toward the lake as the light faded, and then went to sleep.

The next day it took me a couple hours to get to inversnaid, and it was getting to be a bit foggy and a little drizzly. Up until this point though, the weather had been fantastic, especially considering I was in the highlands of Scotland. Inversnaid is a posh hotel, with nothing around it except a nice waterfall. Not one of the more exciting places I’ve been, but I did have a cup of tea and a sandwich and charged my phone and camera battery once again before heading off to inverarnnan.


My guide book told me that the first half of the trail from inversnaid to inverarnnan was the hardest bit on the west highland way, because it involved lots of ups and downs over rocky trail. And just as I set off, it started to rain, making the trail very slippery. I guess I must have been on schedule with everyone else at this point, because I kept getting passed by people and then passing them again. One group in particular were all originally from South Africa, but now lived in many places in the world. They were a bit worried about me.

Halfway through the difficult stretch, which was also amazingly beautiful, I sat down to finally eat my lunch, and as I was sitting there, cursing the midgies, a guy came up to say hi and took off his pack to take a break. His name was Daniel, and he was from Tennessee, and hiking the way by himself as well. In fact, he was planning to walk all the way to Inverness. He waited for me to finish, and we started walking together. We finished the difficult bit, and got to the easy bit. We visited the bothy at Duane, a hut that had been renovated, that was a free place to stay for walkers. You were just supposed to make sure that there was wood there for the next visitors to use in making a fire in the fireplace. When we got there, two Scots were just leaving, having made a fire to cook their lunch on. The end of Loch Lomond is an amazing view. There’s a small island at the end called “Island I Vow” or something like that.


I walked with Daniel all the way to Inverarnan. He’s a very cool guy. Did a degree in sustainable development in Glasgow, and after graduating from a Scottish university, you can have a two year work permit, so he’d been working in Glasgow for a bit over a year. After having three and a half days mostly on my own, it was really nice to have someone to talk with.

He had also been lent equipment, but there was a small part missing from his stove, and so he hadn’t been able to use it. After passing stopping a bit in Inverarnan, visiting the shop to get food for dinner, and having some beer, or in Daniel’s case a half pint of Guinness and a banana, we left the campground. While there, I ran into Matt, a guy who had passed me while I was climbing Conic hill. Funny how half the people you see on the way, you see again.

We decided to camp somewhere further on and less than half an hour later it started to pour. After Daniel ran through a bog, we found a camping spot next to a bridge, by an old wall that was falling down. We had an amazing feast, which included quesadillas, scones, macaroni cheese, baked beans and tea. It was also my first experience with waterproof trousers – Daniel lent me some for sitting on the wet ground. And I have to say, waterproof trousers are an amazing thing! For the first time in a long time the clouds cleared, and with no light pollution, the stars were absolutely fantastic. I think I even saw the Milky Way.

The next day I was up and ready before Daniel, so I headed off, and he caught up with me about an hour later. As he caught up to me I ran into a couple of guys that I must have seen on the trail about five times before. They gave me some coffee and I stopped to chat with them. They had been walking together every year for ten years. Sometimes other people joined in, but they were always part of it. This year they were walking the whole way to celebrate 10 years of walking, and also the 50th birthday of one of the guys.

We walked to the turnoff to crianlarich, where we sat, had lunch, and exchanged contact details before Daniel sped off on his way to Inverness. As I watched him walk out of sight, it started to rain, and rained and rained. I was soaked by the time I got to Tyndrum. The walk wasn’t very exciting, but did go past the site of an old lead crushing plant, a site where to this day nothing grows from the poison that was leeched into the soil.


I was thinking to walk on past Tyndrum, but as I got to the campsite I was so cold and so wet that I stopped. I walked into the common cooking hut, to find lots of wet people trying to get warm, and we all instantly bonded. And, inside, I found Matt for the third time. Something about the way brings you back to the same people over and over.

I borrowed shampoo, had an amazing shower, and then discovered that I had been using my stove wrong for the past days. I played Uno with a group of Germans with one American woman, had some cider, and enjoyed being surrounded by a group of people all evening.

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