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[Trail blog is here]

We headed out from Kingussie after a late start at 10am. Taking advantage of the local shops to stock up on camping gas and blister supplies. Lynn’s blisters have been responding well to "Compeed".

We hit the road at 10am and headed back out of Kingussie passing by Ruthven barracks. Wonderful ruins that are still mostly intact. They were built in 1715 by the English to quell the Jacobite uprisings. After the battle of Culloden the Scots captured and burned them down. The site is still very well preserved.    We saw some very hairy cattle here and were told they were "highland cows" by the farmer – we’d seen patches of long fur on the trails yesterday and had wondered what kind of animal it came from.  Lots of sheep here – it’s very obviously lambing season in Scotland.

After hiking through several forests, we finally headed out into open country on our way to Glenfeshie. The hills here are beautiful with lots of streams and rivers.    We had a great lunch of "German flat rye/linseed bread". It’s very compact and tasty but has a tendency to fall apart if squished.

Lynn’s hands have been badly blistered from the sunshine the past few days. She’s in a much better mood tought with the blisters feeling much better compared to our yomps of the past three days. Today’s walk is much shorter so we’re feeling better physically and mentally. Apparently her new Bridgedale liner socks are working pretty well.

Note: hiking roads in walking boots is a bad idea. Lynn had brought Crocs along as a second pair of footware.  While these are great for camp at night, they aren’t much use for road walking. Next time she’ll bring a set of trainers and boots since the trainers can serve dual purpose.    I was doing fine with my Innov8 318GTX shoes.

The trails here are much nicer than the past few days; really makes you feel like you’re hiking again. The weather was mixed today with good cloud cover hiding the beating sun of the past few days.

On the trail today we bumped into Russ Manning, a jovial fellow wearing a black kilt. He says he likes the feel of the fresh air :-). Also bumped into Des and a new face – Adrian. Walked with them up to the Ruighaiteachain Bothy (NN847928) which was fantastic. The bothy has a nice water source and a flush toilet! There were a bunch of mountain bikers here with baby burly trailers. Hardcore group! Lynn walked to them for quite a while.  Someone said they’d seen Gordon here but I wasn’t so sure…

We stopped at the bothy for some Miso soup and oatcakes. Russ had this amazing wonder cream called Biofreeze which is a cold pain relieving gel. Worked wonders on my knotted left shoulder. Need to get some. The weather for tomorrow didn’t look very good.  Since we’d made the Bothy by 2pm, we decided to push on with a smaller group (Des, Russ, etc) and head up Glenfreshie to a better camping spot. The walk up the glen was nice with a bit of a "goat scramble" through one section where there’d been a landslide. From here the walking was superb following the river as it meandered up the valley floor.

Camping here with shelter is pretty sketchy but Russ has mentioned a great little camping spot in a depression further up the valley about another 8km on. We headed up and found three Akto’s already in place and a tarp. Wonderful little spot, felt like a little valley with a good stream and lots of places to "do the business" in privacy. We nick-named this spot "The Amphitheatre" – it’s located at NN887891.

Distance today was 21km making 150km to date

On to day 8

[Trail blog is here]

We got off to a reasonable start by 8:30am today. After leaving Garva Bridge we stopped in at Laggan "Wolftrax" mountain biking center for a huge slice (well two really) of Lemon Cake with a gallon of hot chocolate. After leaving Wolftrax, we took a wrong turn and headed in the wrong direction for about 2Km before bumping into two other challengers who set us straight 🙁

There was lots of road walking today and poor Lynn’s feet had major blister troubles needing lots of patching. We stayed off the major roads where possible keeping to military roads paralleling the A89. These routes above Newtonmore and Kingussie were beautiful.

On heading into Kingussie, we saw lots of rabbits (literally 10’s) who lived in a large rabbit warren on the side of a hill. We were traversing across the top and I had a vision of a collapsing hillside due to our weight!

By the time we reach Kingussie, we were both mentally and physically exhausted.    Lynn had been fighting wicked blister pain all day.  The first think we saw when entering the town was our friend Jackie with a glass of wine in her hand. Two minutes later and were in the bar sucking down a pint of ale. Champion!  We stayed at the Silverfjord Hotel which was superb. The bar food was great with a great breakfast menu. Rooms were big, nice and comfortable with a fantastic set of radiators for drying socks.

Our BPL blister kit was earning it’s keep today.  This is a combination of gauze, tincture of  benzoin, leukotape and hydropel gel.   Unfortunately we were out of leukotape but found a good alternative “zinc oxide tape” at the local pharmacy.

Kingussie was the location of our number 2 food drop which made it safe and sound.  Opening the box was a but like a Christmas experience.

Distance today was 30km making 129km to date

On to day 7

[Trail blog is here]

We had a fantastic night of sleep in the B&B and woke up around 8am ready for a super cooked breakfast.  Showing again felt like a luxury but heck, get it while you can.

Our start today was delayed by our breakfast which started at 8:30am.   It was worth it though with a great helping of eggs, bacon and toast.   Nothing like a good old fryup to get you going in a morning.    We left the B&B at 9am passing by the campsite with was empty but for a single tent.    I think everyone else was up and off at the crack of dawn.

As we climbed up towards the Corrieyairk we looked back towards Ft Augustus and had great views of Loch Ness.    The past few days have had outstanding weather with full on sunshine and clear blue skies.    We’re both looking quite sun burned and are taking extra care to cover up from now on.

We reached the summit of Corrieyairk and were buffeted by 60 mph winds.    It was a wonderful walk up there with stunning views.   This has been my favorite day so far with epic views of the mountains.   As we walked up the pass we passed several groups of walkers and mountain bikers.   The path itself is very well maintained but hard on the feet with lots of packed rocks.  The shoulder was a little easier on our tired feet so we kept to one side and trudged on.

The highlight of today was our visit to the Blackburn bothy which was staffed by two fellows from an MBA work crew.   Iain and Neil were very friendly and greeted us with the offer of tea, coffee and biscuits.   They even provided seating outside the bothy.  They’d come up for the weekend to work on a planned extension to the bothy and had decided to stay on since the weather was so good.   Iain and Neil were being assisted by Jock, a very cute young Border Collie.

After a brief refueling we continued along towards Melgarve Bothy, a somewhat rustic (non MBA) bothy but in great condition. Here we bumped into Bill and Brian again who we’d met prior to the Blackburn bothy.

Lynn’s blisters were really bothering here at this point so we took the time to redress them before heading on the remaining 6km to Garva Bridge.   The campsite at Garva Bridge was very nice but there was no privacy for pee spots since we were surrounded by lots of green Aktos and Lasers!

Distance today was 25km making 99km to date

On to day 6

[Trail blog is here]

Today was a super long haul.   After leaving Cougie at 8am, we’d opted to take a easy but longer route up and over the ridge going by way of Hilton Lodge. This added 6km that was very easy going.   Today was one of the longer days taking 10 hours of hiking with short breaks.

Our feet really ached having banged out 31km to Ft Augustus.   It felt much longer too as the landscape was pretty boring compared to some of the great scenery of the past few days.  Interestingly we saw lots of Salamanders in mud pools at the summit above Ft Augustus.

As we got towards Fort Augustus, I started to dream about food.   I told Lynn I was thinking about Coconut buns and they looked so good I could almost smell them.   We later realized that Scotch Broom smells like coconut in full bloom.   Yum, it certainly made for an easier last few miles to Ft Augustus.

We were planning on camping tonight but were lured in by the delights of the local B&B.    We stayed at Caledonian Cottage B&B right above the locks which was a delightful little place serving a wonderful cooked breakfast the following morning.    We had a lovely pub dinner at the Loch Inn before jumping into bed for an early night.

Today’s distance was a whopping 31km making 74km total.

On to day 5.

[Trail blog is here]

We woke up to find two blokes has pitched their tents in the barn!   After a nice breakfast of oatmeal and dressing Lynn’s developing blisters, we pushed on for Cougie Lodge.   This was an easy day for us with only 12km planned.

The walk out from Athnamulloch to Cougie follows the banks of Loch Affric which is in a stunningly beautiful location.   Unlike our prior days, the weather had finally cleared and were were experiencing full on sunshine with clear blue skies.   That’s more like it!

The path up from the Loch to Cougie was very muddy with soaking wet trails.   Looking at the map, it appears we missed a turn which is very odd since we were following a very well worn footpath with lots of boot prints in front of us.

After climbing for a while, we hit a ridge and then traversed along travelling through commercial forest which had been felled a while back.   We later learned they were replanting the forest for the native species and removing (I think) non-native spruce trees.

We arrived at Cougie before we knew it and were greeted with steaming cups of tea, scones, stew and chocolate biscuits.   I was on my second brew and in pops Hamish and crew.   Made for a fun hour before they headed out again.   We spent the afternoon just chilling out and doing laundry.   I have to say that it felt very decadent just waiting around but it was a great deal of fun interacting with the Cougie Kids and talking with Val’s nieces and nephews.

Cougie was the location of our first food drop but alas the UK “guaranteed 48 hr” parcel force service wasn’t having a good day.  I did wonder about the small print “rural areas of Scotland are not guaranteed” when we’d posted it three days prior.   It wasn’t too much of an issue since we’d be in Fort Augustus tomorrow and would be able to hit the shops for supplies.

By dinner time, a bunch of other challengers had appeared including Des Horan and Gordon Green.   A delightful pair of characters with whom we’d spend a great deal of time with in the coming days.  Gordon had a nice bottle of Scotch with him which he generously shared after dinner!!

After a nice dinner and shower we were tucked up in bed by 8am ready for an early 7:30am breakfast and the long 30km slot on to Fort Augustus.

Distance today: 12km making 43km total

Go on to day 4

[Trail blog is here]

We woke up nice and early at 5am after a very cold night.   There was a lot of groundwater flowing underneath the tent so the floor acted like a fridge panel!

After a nice oatmeal breakfast, we packed up in the pouring rain and headed along the ridge following the river up to Loch Gaorsaic.   The going here was pretty hard with lots of peat hag jumping up and down.   We tried to find a better route by going high but it didn’t seem to make much difference.  We were headed for a set of stepping stones at the base of Loch Gaorsaic which would allow us to cross to the North side of the river.

When we got to the location of the stepping stones, there were only a few stones showing with the others a few inches below the surface of the river.    I’d had reports from a few weeks back telling me they were completely submerged so we were overjoyed to see the water levels had come down.   A quick change into our River Walkers and we were both across without any mishaps 🙂

From Loch Gaorsaic, we continued on towards the youth hostel at Allbeithe.   On the way we bumped into a group of four women (Fiona, Francis, Mary and Mari).   We’d actually met them the day previously and they’d taken a different route choosing to avoid the falls.    The youth hostel at Allbeithe was a welcome sight – by the time we arrived our feet were quite soaked and we welcomed steaming mugs of builder’s tea (tea, white with lots of sugar).

While in the youth hostel, we bumped into Hamish who asked us if we were the "Bloody Idiots" for camping on the ridge :-)    From the hostel, the walk to Athnamulloch was un-eventful, following a LRT all the way.    Athnamulloch is a random set of buildings which contain Strawberry Cottage, a very posh looking Scottish mountaineering house.

We met a guy staying in the cottage and he told us we were welcome to use the barn which was a wood store for the cottage.  We all pitched up tent in the shelter of the barn and then hopped inside to make dinner.    Mountain House spag bol for dinner which was great.    Francis gave us a packet of Apple and Custard dessert which tasted like heaven.

Distance today: 15km making 31km total

Go on to day 3

[Trail blog is here]

Day 1 of our 1st challenge was off to an interesting start.   The weather the prior day has been gale force winds (90 mph) with wicked rain.   We woke up early in the comfort of our hotel bed at the Lock Duich hotel.   The bedroom accommodation was good but the food and beverage service was poor.  Based on our stay there, I can’t recommend it.

Today the weather had cleared a little and the rain had died off.  The winds were still gusting though with forecasts still showing 70mph winds dying off over the next two days.    Given the conditions we decided we would take our FWA (foul weather alternate) avoiding the high hills.

We left the hotel at the prescribed 9am sign-out time and paid one last visit to 914 Outdoor, a wonderful outdoor gear shop.   I’d had my eye on a hip flask that would prove to come in useful over the next few night camp.   I also found a really great headband/spam band that doubles as both a head cover and heck warmer.

A quick stop at the local post office / grocery for a small bottle of scotch and we were off!  We met of first challengers leaving our hotel since it was the official sign-out point.   Following the river up we bumped into almost a dozen including three days hikers and two “north to south” hikers who looked haggard, wet and were ready for a hot shower.  They’d been caught in the horrible weather of the past two days.

The hike from Dornie to the base of the Falls of Glomach wasn’t too eventful.  The paths were pretty easy to follow with little to see as you walked up the valley floor.    As were were cresting Camas-luinie the rain started again and quickly turned to heavy hail that was so painful we had to put on full weather gear including gloves. 

The base of the falls were pretty spectacular with amazing flow and noise – pretty much a full on waterfall that looked very cold.   We met our first river crossing here and had to cross a burn in full-on-spate.   Another solo challenger had been there for a while trying to decide whether to cross or not.    I popped on over without getting too wet.   Lynn opted to pull out her “dry walkers” and came over with a hand from me. 

We’d been told to be careful climbing up to the falls and were lucky that the weather cleared.  The trail near the top was very much a “goat scramble” that would have been very dangerous in driving wind and rain.   The view from the path to the actual falls was stunning and I’m ashamed to say we never got a picture.  In part this was due to the need to take an emergency bathroom visit 🙂

Our first night camping was pretty exciting – rather than camping on the valley floor which was extremely wet, we’d opted to take a little elevation and camped on what we though was a sheltered ridge (NH019245).   That was until the winds changed direction and gusted in a 2am causing the main guyline to let lose!

That wasn’t the only thing that went wrong; I’d neglected to remove my stove from the gas can and Lynn woke me up smelling gas.   After unscrewing it, gas was still flying out of the can causing it to go jetting around the tent!  Yikes – it appears the valve had failed so we had no option but to screw the stove back on and place it outside the tent.

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Overall an exciting 1st day to our challenge.   We felt good and tired.

Distance today: 16km

Go on to day 2

I finally completed the write-up of our 2009 TGO Challenge.    We blogged during the trip but missed out some of the more extensive notes.   I’ve collected them all here – the “Trail” links reference our on-the-trail blog entry while the “Diary” links to the more detailed report from memory and notebook.

My original post on our route with more details can be found here.  The actual route based on our SPOT navigator track is posted in a scrollable/zoomable map here.

All our photos are uploaded to SmugMug in the TGOC 2009 Album.   I’ve also posted “final thoughts” here.

Start reading here with Day 1: Dornie to Falls of Glomach.

Enjoy!

Lynn and I recently returned from our TGO challenge in Scotland.  One of the best pieces of kit we took was the new Thermarest Neoair mattress.    If you’re not familiar with it, Brett has a great “first impressions” review.

I took a Neoair “small” and Lynn took a Neoair “regular”.  They were very generously sized and extremely plush and comfortable.   The small comes in a 47” with the regular a whopping 72”!   I’ve included a comparison picture below.   

We really liked the Neo air for comfort during our trip.

Pros

• Treated with non-slip compound which helps ensure you stay on the pad – I never slipped off at all.
• Super light weight – 9oz for a 47” pad is amazing
• Easy to inflate (the small is super fast though Lynn complains it takes her a while to inflate the regular)

Cons

• Can be a little cold due to low “R” value (R2.5) – we found ourselves a little cold on some nights.   I would not recommend this mat alone for four season camping.    Thermarest recommends pairing it with the Z-lite pad which will add R2.2 making a very respectable R4.7 pad at only 19oz (size small).
• Does not ship with a puncture kit – this is absolutely essential

In short I would highly recommend the Neoair to ultralight backpackers. Like most ultralight gear, there’s a tradeoff – with the Neoair, it’s with the R value; the comfort is very plush and much nicer than other mats I’ve slept on.  There was a lot of Neoair’s on the TGO challenge and almost everyone was raving about the sleep experience.    On sizing I find the small to be fine and stuff extra clothes/backpack under my feet to ensure they stay warm and elevated off the tent floor.  

Unless you’re fanatical about weight, you might consider the size medium which weighs in at 13oz but gives you a very generous 66” of length.  An alternate (which I’m thinking of doing) is to buy the Thermarest Neoair seat which is 10” x 20” (2.5oz).   This could easily double as a foot rest giving you an extra 10” to your Neoair small.   Plus you get a plush seat mat out of the deal too.

One nit is that the mattress does not ship with a puncture repair kit.  For an inflatable mattress, this should really come as standard.

Rating: Highly Recommended

On our recent TGO Challenge trip, Lynn and I ate our fair share of dehydrated meals.   We picked up most of our dehydrated food in the US (Backpackers Pantry, Mountain House, etc) and took it over with us.    During our trip, I was lucky enough to try two meals that we hadn’t had before, supplied by fellow Challengers Richard and Fiona.  The Mountain House Apple and Custard was wonderful at the end of a long wet day.   But the winner by a long stretch was the Chicken Tikka from Expedition Foods  UK.  This was enjoyed in the Scottish equivalent of the Brigadoon Bothy (Sheilin of Mark).   I was in absolute heaven!  Talk about tasty – nice and spicy too!  I felt as if I’d just run around to the local Indian takeaway.

This got me thinking – why not take some of my own home Thai cooking with me on the trail?  I already have a great dehydrator plus there are lots of great resources out there on how to dehydrate for backpacking.   Andy Howell has a great set of postings on his blog to get me started.

I’ll report back with my findings…