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Home > Hiking, TGO Challenge, TGO Challenge, Trails, Trip Report > TGOC2009: Day 5 – Ft Augustus to Garva Bridge

TGOC2009: Day 5 – Ft Augustus to Garva Bridge

[Trail blog is here]

CIMG5328 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.

Trying to get power to my phone 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.

Jock, MBA worker-dog 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.

Blackburn BothyAfter 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

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