This bike ride made my eyes water, my sweat drip and my faith in fate stronger. Two weeks before the start we still had a lot of accommodation outstanding, so three of us got on the case and booked some up. I mistakenly thought I was booking for last Sat when on the phone to some hostel in Luss, and they told me they were fully booked. They put me onto the nest nearest one (the one we ended up staying at), in Rowardennan, on the East side of Loch Lomand. This was okay, but it was the wrong side for us as it put us 15 or 20 miles off our course. Having realised that I was actually meant to book for a Thursday (after I’d already booked it), I put this to the others, and they agreed that it would be okay.
This day’s route saw us tearing through Glasgow centre, then onto the canal path all the way to Loch Lomand. It rained, and we got stopped temporarily by a cow, but it was flat and the scenery was very interesting. In the photograph you’ll soon see for this ride I haven’t shrunk enormously from all this cycling. No, I have just tried without success to mount what must be the biggest bike in Scotland.
What I meant by my faith in fate at the start of this post was that booking the Rowardennan Lodge was a mistake, but it was the most beautiful place, overlooking the loch, surrounded by very special little coves with great boats and very nice houses poking out of the trees. The people were extremely friendly, and I met Bill, an elderly Geordie who was hiking through Scotland to raise funds for MacMillan, because his wife had died of breast cancer four years earlier. We had a chat – I told him about Meena – and it made me feel very sad but very glad for having met such a man on such a day in such a place on such an adventure. Bill, if by some coincidence you ever read this, it was an honour to meet you.
I thought about Meena a lot today. We decided to cut a fair few miles off our journey by not going back round the bottom of the loch and taking a ferry instead. This was possibly the best group decision we’d made the whole trip. It was raining fairly hard so 6 out of 7 of us opted for a whiskey to take the edge off. I declined, as I was deep in thought about life and death and things. The rain was heavier than it has been yet when we left Tarbot, and as Jack says, the views around the Glencoe region were as stunning as anything you’ll see the world over.
Dylan
