I was recently lucky enough to experience the famous Scottish walk, the West Highland Way.
From Milngavie to Fort William, a land of wild windy moors and some of the most beautiful scenery in the British Isles.
Lets go.
Heading out from Kingshouse under a threatening sky.
Welcome to the West Highland Way, the famous long distance Scottish walk, and day one starts with some interesting questions.
1. "What's the difference between heaths and heathers".
2. "What's the history of the kilt".
3. "Do they speak Gaelic our Celtic".
4. "What's a Cairn".
The answers to these and other questions reveal themselves to us over the next 8 days.
1: Heaths have needle-like leaves while heathers have flat, scalelike leaves
2: First there was a great kilt, (16th century), a long garment, the top could be worn as a cloak and hood, the short garment coming into fashion in the late 17th century, popular because it was easier to walk in.
3: Gaelic.
4: In Scottish folklore, Highland Clan members would each place a stone on a pile before battle. The surviving warriors would subsequently remove their stone, leaving the remaining ones to transform into a memorial cairn for the fallen.
So, we're just a few hours along the track out of the town of Milngavie and we run into our old nemesis.
Cows.
Or in the local dialect, a coo, or a bonny wee coo.
What is it with these guys.
Boony wee coos getting in the way.
It's the third time in as many walks that we've struck cows on the wrong side of the right side of the fence.
Somehow these guys have climbed over from their side of the fence and stand blocking the way we need to go.
Being experienced at staring down coos, this time it's pretty straightforward and we're on our way before too long.
Heading north towards Fort William, about 8 days away.
The weather is not great to start with, some fine misty drizzle falls into a steady dripping rain.
I find myself thinking that this would have been better done in summer.
Only to pull myself up quickly when I'm reminded that it is actually high summer.
Loch Lomond views.
On our last few walks we've been using a tracking app, it helps to have a friendly voice adding a few encouraging words as the day goes by.
This walk we have no friendly voices helping, our phones have stopped working, our latest, the third, it turns out, is locked.
Locked to an American provider that doesn't provide in Britain.
It worked for us in Europe but not here in Britain.
This latest new (second-hand) phone, bought to replace the last second-hand one that is locked, does now not work at all, refusing to even charge.
With no phone we have no friendly voice helping us along, it's not such a big deal but here all the distances are in miles, and we have no idea anymore how far a mile is compared to a kilometre.
We can judge a kilometre almost down to the minute on any given day.
Miles are a different matter.
"Take the right turn about 1 3/4 miles up the way" we're told one day.
"Ok thanks".
A little bit further we talk,
"How far is 1 and 3/4's of a mile do you think?"
"No idea".
One of the long days on this walk is an up and down day along loch Lomond.
It's terribly slow going, the steep and rocky terrain slowing our progress, the rains have been falling as well and the moss-covered rocks have an extra degree of slipperiness about them, there's a point in the trail where we have a decision to make, a high road or a low road.
The high road is easier while the lower choice is more spectacular.
After a short umm and ahh we go with the lower road and the ear-worm lyrics to the Scottish folk song stick with us for the remainder of the walk along Loch Lomond.
Which is kind of annoying as Loch Lomond is the largest of the Scottish loch's and the walk goes for nearly a full two days.
You can hum along now if you like.
O you'll take the high road and I'll take the low road
And I'll be in Scotland afore ye
But me and my true love will never meet again
On the bonnie, bonnie banks of Loch Lomond
Home for the night.
Our food along the way has been surprisingly good, there'd been some pretty dire warnings online about the quality before arrival.
And you can indeed feast on deep-fried mars bars if you wish, or gravy covered haggis if you dare, but you can also dine on the highest quality haddock fish and chips or wild caught salmon or a venison pie with baby potatoes, there are all kinds of tasty local traditional dishes to tempt the weary traveler.
Our haggis experience turns out to be good haggis experience.
Haggis balls in the pub.
Lunch in the gastro pub in a village called The Bridge of Orchy, an entrée plate of crunchy fried balls served alongside a whiskey cream sauce, very nice, although vegetables and salad don't appear to be a "thing".
The pub at The Bridge of Orchy turns out to be our only sit-down lunch meal of the walk, we'd planned to continue our crackers with tinned fish and a piece of fruit, it's a good plan, but it's a plan that doesn't include the introduction of the dreaded midges.
Tiny flying pests, too slow to follow along as you walk, but even think about stopping and you suddenly have a swarm of black dots crawling over you, in your ears, eyes, mouth, up your nose, everywhere.
They only come out in breeding season apparently, and apparently this is breeding season.
Midge protection.
The thought of stopping and trying to construct a cracker with tinned fish topping while these little pests swarm around is not a thought we entertain, and lunch is skipped for the walk.
Many people opt to wear a Midge Hat.
We have them ourselves.
If you see somebody wearing a Midge Hat, you'll understand why they are usually walking alone.
We should talk now a little about the scenery.
It is, of course, spectacular.
The walk is justifiably famous for it's views and environment, from the top of Conic Hill at the beginning of the walk, through the vivid green moss covered forests along Loch Lomond and out into the last great wilderness of Europe, the wild wind swept moors of North Scotland.
The description Jaw-dropping seems to have been coined just for this region.
Those views though come with a price.
It's a tough walk.
It's not that hilly or steep, it's more the surface conditions, it's hard to under-estimate how hard on the feet and legs walking for hours a day on sharp stones and uneven paths can be.
Eventually we make the decision to have Annie's bag shipped forward for the last couple of days, after some 1300klm's carrying it across Europe her shoes are shot and enough is enough.
Bag free at last.
We met a man in Switzerland recently, he was coming down from the Great St Bernard's Pass as we were heading up towards it.
After some pleasant chit chat and small talk we revealed we were planning on walking the West Highland Way after we'd finished the St Bernard's pass trip.
I can still picture him now, him sucking his breath in through clenched teeth as he strokes his chin, a small shake of his shaggy head.
"Now that's a tough walk" he tells us.
We dismissed him at the time, perhaps we should have listened.
But would it have changed our minds?
Not with these views on offer.
Really enjoyed this! Wonderful photos and engaging storytelling.
I love Scotland. I spent ten days or so in Tobermory on Mull Island last year and a few days some years before that. I hope to get back again this summer. That hike is intriguing. Thank you for sharing with pictures and the details you added. Now to decide if I have the stamina to do it. I have hiked a couple of the great walks in New Zealand, and have done the entire Camino de Santiago (800k), but that those were fourteen and ten years ago. What you describe seems very demanding.