The Cycle Path
Cycle Log
Day 17 - Monday 5th July 2004
Carbisdale to Durness
A feverish night of punctured sleep and sweaty dreams. Felt tired on waking but had 65 miles to cycle to reach Mackay Country. Crossed the Culrain footbridge hung off the Caledonian Railway bridge in bits...bike then bags due to an unfortunate step and walkway design. Got to Lairg both tired and cold and in need of nourishment and warmth. Sniffed out the single open shop and miraculously obtained both hot coffee and fresh warm pastries. Wolfed my breakfast by 7 as the flies began to bite and the Post Buses began to gather. Lairg seems to be one of the seats of the McPostbus clan. Sixteen miles of the shoreline of Loch Shin before the higher mountain passes of the Reay Forest and the portals of the land of Mackay. Reached the Overscaig Inn in two hours and chatted to the owners about fishing; salmon, trout, sea trout, char and the birdlife; sea eagles, ospreys, eagles, divers, owls and the more intimate bullfinches and siskins that were feeding in a kaleidoscope of colour on the back wall. Rain signalled the mountain gates but the road was quiet except for tourist RVs. Lochs became my markers towards Laxford Bridge and the sea...an hour for each with odd breaks for chanterelle and blaeberry picking. Great mountains looking mean and dirty with an ominous looking standing stone...but it was the markstone 'Mackay Country - failte' I had arrived...and the going was downhill..and suddenly warm air came up to meet me from the north...and pale blue sky from over the sea. Ben Stack now loomed massive then Arkle, followed by Foinavon still with a smoky cap of cloud on its quartzite lid. This is an impressive landscape but at the estate village of Achfarry nobody returned my greetings...coldly odd for Scotland. Lunch by the sea with an inquisitive stoat then on to Rhiconich at the end of which is the Kinlochbervie fishing port where most of the local haddock is landed.
Now feeling quite exhausted pushing up an endless hill but elated by the sunshine and landscape of giant glacial features. At the summit the single track road with passing places slipped down the U shaped valley like a scratch down a trowel. Having given way to the camper vans and RVs of Europe all the way north it was now my turn to plough the road. I let go of the brakes and went 5 miles freewheeling without deviation until I reached the Kyle of Durness and the startlingly green grass of the Durness Limestones. The shimmering azure blue sea spread thinly over warm sand met the incoming brown waters of the river and, in one of the rare places in Scotland not afffected by the pollution of fish farms, the game fishermen of Sussex and Surrey stalked their prey assisted by the incomprehensible paraphanalia of fly fishing and equally improbable language. Some would hire ghillies. At the Cape Wrath Hotel I ventured into conversation with one. A man who had as many flies stuck in his hat as I had stuck to my legs. "Have you been fishing today?" "No.... I've been watching other people fish" "Any luck?" "No" I sensed I was wasting my time seeking entrance to the mystic brotherhood of the fly by the front door and would possibly be more at home with the locals who probably just netted the fish by torchlight as they swam between their legs (a fact later confirmed by my taxi driver to Inverness Airport). The dinner gong went at 7.30 sharp and as we listened to the slap of the wild salmon in the Kyle through the windows we ate our roast farmed salmon with guilt-tarnished forks. I offered my chanterelles to be cooked for breakfast to recapture the essence of place but nobody knew what they were. I explained how to cook them and went off to pack for the final leg to the lighthouse.
