Land’s End to John O’Groats

We have arrived in the Lochs! Hooray! And just in time for the midge season and everything…

On Sunday morning we went to Falkirk baptist church. It was really enjoyable though we were slightly surprised when one of the notices given at the start was , “now I understand there’s a couple from Bristol here, why don’t you come up and tell us what you’re up to”! So we got to talk briefly to a church which was really good as it meant people felt able to come up to us at the end and chat. It was funny, a few people seemed to be really taken with our “story” of our summer whereas we sort of feel that we’re now on a bit of a strange holiday. However, as we’ve been struggling a bit to see what the point of all this is now we’re not walking it was encouraging to hear people’s conviction that our prayers for the places we pass through are being heard.

After the church meeting we drove to Loch Long via a little peninsula that sticks out into the Firth of Clyde. Our accommodation here overlooks the loch and the mountains opposite and is absolutely beautiful. We had dinner of haggis, neeps and tatties and sat in the sun overlooking the water.

Yesterday however, we decided to stop slacking and climb some mountains. Ben Narnain is only a little mountain really, not quite a Munro at 926m, so why not take the quick route up the East face? This route was quick due to many sections being pretty much vertical and requiring you to free climb up wet rock faces with the added excitement of the occasional small rock you’re standing on crumbling as you lunge for the next handhold. But if you’re not muddy and scratched by the time you reach the top of the mountain you clearly haven’t been trying hard enough! After lunch at the top we took the “gentler” southern slope down a few hundred metres though that took an hour as “gentle” just means we occasionally had some flat things to stand on and really we were just falling down boulder fields. From there we climbed up to the top of Ben Arthur - aka “The Cobbler” - at 881m (the beautiful sunshine having given way to rain at this point) and then finally down the easier path back to the Loch. Best fun we’ve had in a long time!

Today my knees are very sore from the descent so I’m not sure what we’ll be doing in the next few days but all being well we might just give Ben Nevis a go. Only if the weather’s good though as every few months someone dies up there - we’ll get to Fort William and see I guess…