Up at 6 to eat cold venison sausages and coffee and finalise my complex packing and wrapping strategy. I have a 20kg allowance on BMI and the bike and tool kit will take up most of that. High value personal items and diary, wallet, camera, flashcards in hand baggage with the rest to post away in Inverness. Strap my Birdy bike bag to my back and just outside the gates of the castle hit the 800 mile mark on the odometer. That's 200 miles short of my estimate but with the breakdowns, en route realignments and possible calculation errors I'm still pleased to make the milestone. Not that this was intended to be a speed or distance freak festival...this was only ever going to be about SLOWness and taking the pulse of place using the medium of cycle travel. I'm still not a 'cyclist' (which implies athleticism) but my body has tuned in and got fitter as each passing pedal turned around the crank. Despite drinking 2 pints of water every day from my camel bak I have lost weight and body fat with two inches off my waist. Need to slim down? Take one bicycle; daily..for 800 miles. The station for Carbisdale Castle is Culrain and you have to stop the train on request. I arrived early but was then joined by two Austrian backpackers going to Skye and then 7 American backpackers...also going to Skye. They were packed like the SAS with tons of kit...then it started to rain and we all squeezed into the shelter. Then they all rushed on to the train; took up the luggage space on a train already overflowing with bikes and backpackers and I was forced down to the toilet area which fortunately had a 'dickie seat'. At Dingwall 5 of the Americans got off but left two of their colleagues struggling to lift their packs up...the doors closed and off we went to Inverness. Bagged a 5 kg parcel of clothes and bulky raingear at the PO and sent it home. With time too short now to cycle to the airport via Clava Cairns I folded the bike into a taxi and headed for the clean, bright and unpeopled terminal. Unfolded the Birdy bag; folded the bike into it; covered all the vulnerable points with other bags and empty panniers and took it to the weigh in: 20.7kg! Stuck fragile stickers all over it and requested special handling via a non-conveyor route...goodbye Birdy. Slightly later I watched in horror as the baggage handler launched the bike onto the plane conveyor from a great height...despite the fragile stickers etc. A cloudy flight back so no great views of places passed and two hours later I was checking my bike for damage at Heathrow. A bent stem bracket but probably fixable with my tools so that I can ride home. Put the bagged bike on the RailAir bus to Reading; took the ThamesLink train to Twyford; and cycled the last mile home to a warm welcome from wife and offspring with big swigs of our local Valley Vineyards 'Ascot' fizzy wine. Long, Slow & Wiggly indeed.