This was to be another long day as we were intending to finish at the foot of Daviot Wood in readiness for the short stroll into Inverness tomorrow.
We leave the bunkhouse and go via a short cut that was pointed out to ITN by the owner of the bunkhouse – he wasn’t too interested in a shorter cut for some reason! We cross the fields, much to the excitement of a couple of horses, and come out onto the wee road that leads past the railway station. We continue along here past a wood yard, where some of the workforce started shouting “Up the County” to which the reply of “where’s yer caravan” was duly retorted. Private Mrs PB has a tear in her eye when she came across some of her old childhood haunts – she’d spent a lot of her time around these parts – bless her! Private PB and Cadet ITN Jnr were romping away ahead of the rest but Sergeant Gringo raised concerns about their ‘route knowledge’ – would they know where to turn off the road and follow cycle route 7?
The answer was no – they’d marched past the turn off and, to much whistling and shouting, their error was pointed out and they back tracked.
This, 5 miles or so ‘off road’ cycle route seemed a bit rough for bikes but was ideal for walking. It uses General Wade’s Military Road around Inverlaidnan Hill and Insarn to Slochd, the highlight being the crossing of the River Dulnain at Sluggan Bridge. Wade originally crossed the Dalnain with a ford, which was later replaced in the 1760s with a low two-arch bridge. This was swept away during the great flood of the 3rd August 1829, to be replaced by the current large single span bridge in the 1830s. Major repairs (whoever he is??!) were carried out to the bridge in 2001/02 by Sustrans, as part of the National Cycle Network. Sluggan Bridge is category A listed and a scheduled monument.
The scenery is quite fantastic along this cycle route with goods views across to our left of the peaks of Carn Dubh (1880ft) , Carn an Ailean (1794ft) and Carn na Sguabaich (1889ft). Our approach to Slochd is greeted with a fleeting glimpse of the railway viaduct before the dull drone of the wretched A9 can be heard. We than follow the route of the old A9 once again, over Slochd summit, where the old A9 and new kin of come together. A few lorries and cars then start to beep their horns to our HM Flag….nice.
We turn off and head towards Tomatin crossing the ‘over constructed’ Findhorn Bridge, the stone turrets of which presented a prime location for an ambush - but none came. As we approach the village we pass by the Tomatin Inn (scene of many emotions later on!) and to the children from the Strathdearn Primary School who’d taken a break from lessons to come out and greet us once again, just like they did last year. Their cheering and clapping kind of makes it all worthwhile.
We pause briefly at the Little Chef – just for the ladies, before heading out again towards the A9. More noisy traffic ensuses. Again, there are prime locations for ambushes along the here and the stragglers were very wary of this as they stocked up with ‘grenade’s’. Again, nowt happened.
Walking alongside the A9 briefly, we come across and injured or stunned young seagull and Private Fro’ In shows his soft side by giving it a gentle stroke….ah!.
Col’ is waiting around the corner in the bus and we take the opportunity to take on water and food. There are still a few miles to go before we end the day but we were keen to get finished before the forecasted rain turned up – it was going quite cloudy by now. Captn ITN had consulted his OS map and discovered a track across the hills which would cut off a couple of miles of the boring and uninspiring B9154 (old A9) via Moy, surely this shortcut would be much better than the ‘yawn’ of this road. Then again, maybe not.
The general consensus was to go for it……..what-a-mistaka-to-make-a.
We leave to tar-mac and head up the track – which was signposted ‘Footpath to Inverness’ (it was the only sign, by the way), cross the A9 and head for the wilds. The track takes us through a wee place called Lynemore before it all started to go pear shaped. I’d spotted, to our right, a wee post with a circular ‘path’ sign on it but this was judged to have been the path that led back down towards the A9. We decided to carry on along the track until this, eventually, petered out. In true yomping style we were all subjected to a difficult climb up through the harsh heather and peat bogs, crossing streams and jumping puddles…and then all the way back down again to try to find the right ruddy path. The troops among the none yomping types were getting very mad and tempers were, to put it mildly, on edge. This shortcut was turning out to be nothing but a nightmare and, when the rain started, really tested the tempers and emotions of many in the struggling tail enders. This nightmare was ended when we eventually reached trera firma and the Team Gringo contingent voted unanimously to return to the A9 and suffer the traffic noise – it would be much better than this. This ‘short cut’ had cost us dear in terms of time and I was seething with myself for taking the shortcut in the first place and going back on my own personal views of ‘keeping to the route’. I must have kicked every can and plastic bottle that littered the grass verge of the A9 as I stormed off up the road….The totally uninspiring walk along the A9 was to be much worse than B9154 via Moy could ever be, it was never ending en route to Daviot and the long bends in the road never seemed to straighten out. Fekin yaaaaaaaaaawn.
Team Gringo reached the finishing point about 10 minutes ahead of the Yompers and we all had a team hug and patted each other on the back – still simmering underneath about what had happened earlier. But it’s all over now (we know a song about that too, don’t we?).
We guzzled down a can of booze and, after the Yompers had turned up, we were back on the bus and heading down the road to the Tomatin Inn for a rendezvous with Lyndsay from MFR, some beer and a pool table.
To my delight there was some real ale on tap in the form of Marstons Pedigree – which I thought was amazing – here I was, 400 miles or so away from home about to drink beer that’s brewed about 30 miles away from where I live. Uncanny. Copious amounts were drunk by all including Sergeant Doz who put the day’s experiences behind her and got absolutely smashed – bless her.
The pool championship was well underway and was very noisy with its loud cheers disturbing the locals who’d shut the door on the poolroom to keep the noise down. Some good, close games were played and, for someone who doesn’t play pool, I was getting all excited!!. Fro’ was the eventually winner and yet more beer flowed and noise prevailed.
Before leaving the locals in peace and quiet we managed to drag Sergeant Doz out of the bog and gave her a window seat on the bus back down the road to our digs in Aviemore.
Prisoner Cell Block Aviemore just has to be the worst of the bunkhouses we’d stayed in, its electronic locks are a pain in the erse and there aren’t enough keys to go around, and the breeze block walls give it that quintessential ‘prison’ feel.
My evening was spent looking after Doz whilst CS Grino Jnr went off in search of some much-needed food – ah, good ol’ fish and chips.
I’m not sure what time it was before I leapt on to the top bunk but – after a few exploding frogs – I was soon kicking out the zzzz’s to lay this day of mixed feelings to rest.
Team Gringo Ped’ Reading: 21.86 miles. 39834 steps