Day 8 - Loch Lomond to Fort William

Loch Lomond to Fort William



Cycled the above, then climbed Ben Nevis.

Today began with the realisation that somehow we'd miscalculated this distance to Ben Nevis from our finish point yesterday. That meant that instead of the comfortable 50 miles to the start of the climb, we now had to do 70! It wasn't the actual act of cycling the extra distance that would matter much but the timing definately would. We didn't really want to be on the climb still when it got dark, especially a climb we are unfamiliar with.
We started early and got on with the first 20 miles of the day, I felt very tired until we rode into Marmite Dan again, I think I must have just been bored by Sonny. I perked right up after that, cheers Dan!

On the horizon were mountains. After Wales and the Lakes, this concerned me as we had seemed to climb right over the top of them.



However, in Scotland thankfully they seem to run around the base of the hills, awesome. After a few gradual climbs we were soon into Glencoe which was astounding. The views were epic!!





The descent into Glencoe gorge was probably the best I've ever done and was the highlight of the trip so far. Huge mountains either side of a winding valley road which went on for miles! The best thing was that I didn't have to pedal. If you ever get chance, go for a drive along that road, it is beautiful. I videoed it on my phone which was perhaps slightly dangerous with all the coaches flying passed us all the time, but i had to capture it.

We stopped for a quick refuel and powered through to Fort William, we even beat the losers in the Canyonero and more importantly because of the immense speed we were travelling at, caravans could not get passed us. Ace.
Ang cooked up some lunch in the Ben Nevis car park and for some reason made me cry hysterically with laughter. I had to leave the van or I wouldn't have got my food down. The hysteria, mainly flatulance related, conitunued up the mountain. I think the tiredness is affecting my mental health.
Suprisingly, the climb was hot, really hot. We were sweating heavily 10 minutes in!
3 hours later we reached the top. Nothing interesting happening on the way up, it was a long a boring climb. The scenery was beautiful though:





The top is one of the better summits I've seen. It was completely clouded over, but that added to its appeal. It was extremely quiet, no wind or noise. There were some buildings up there, an emergency shelter and an old observatory.





Very odd to see these things at the top. Some monster drop offs in the mist added to the eerie feeling of the summit, there were even a few birds.







Unfortunatley though, it was quite littered. Why people can't take their rubbish back down with them I do not know. It shows no respect and really annoyed us all.
The descent was another long, dull and uneventful affair. All that happened was that our knees hurt. Happily though that was the end of the day so we could go and grab a Guiness and a chinese takeaway.
2 days to go from here!!

Andy