THE RIDE OF MY LIFE
Day 4: 3 June. Ulapool round Assynt to Kylesku
then on to Durness. 91 miles. 9,000 feet of ascent Our shortest day’s mileage, a mere statistic I knew to be irrelevant having tackled the brutal Ullapool Sportive last September round the Assynt Coast. Instead of going up a glen and over a pass into the next system, the road cuts across each system laterally, dropping steeply til we hit a bridge, which signalled the inevita- ble climb – some as much as 25 per cent – into the next watershed. We knew the climbs would come one after another, and it was as hard as we’d expected. Top day for tears, but top day for views too as we wove through the foothills of Coigach, Cul Mor, Stac Polly, Suilven, Canisp and the mighty buttresses of the Quinag. I’m not sure if the excellent pie shop in Lochinver was a help or a hindrance, but wholeheartedly recommend the venison and cranberry pie. After lunch in Kylesku, we encountered some
respite on roads laid by a qualified disciple of General Wade rather than the crazed psychopath in charge of tarmacadaming the north Assynt coast. Craig kept us entertained with a quiz, shuttling between the two groups, ending each section with his trademark ‘irritating and inane’ question. I’m not competitive, but we won! We ended with a fine descent to the Kyle of Durness and reached the bliss of Durness’s fine
campsite bathed in evening sunlight, where all had been laid out by the support team. Some of us had enough energy to swim at Balnakeil, while I shed a tear at a good friend’s grave. I got a puncture on the short cycle back – we only had four all trip, which all happened on day four.
Day 5: 4 June. Durness to John O’Groats to Wick.
112 miles. 7,000 feet of ascent The day started by circumnavigating Loch Eriboll and cutting over the Kyle of Tongue, with fine views up to Ben Hopes and Loyal before the landscape started to flatten out. Weary after four days on the saddle, I began to have doubts about our route. The hardest stretches were behind us, but so was the best of the scenery. Wonderful as I’m sure Caithness is, how could it compete with the world-class backdrop we’d experienced? But challenges come in many forms. Salva-
tion came in the guise of a message from Malcolm, the manager at Pulteney Distillery: we need to be in Wick by 6pm if we are to visit the distillery. Suddenly the day had urgency. A fast team of four of us blitzed Thurso to John O’Groats, then set off for Wick at speed. Brown- ing’s How They Brought The Good News from Ghent to Aix went through my head as I set off
WWW.SCOTTISHFIELD.CO.UK 93
FIELD
FACTS Support team members (not pictured on opening pages): Sam & Patrick Rutherford, Celine O’Neill, Romayne Wainwright, John & Alison Fraser.
Clockwise from top left: Lending a helping hand on the aptly-named Destitution Road; wearing six layers of clothes, the team fail to break to speed limit coming through Invergordon.
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