JOGLE Day 4, Inverness to Whitebridge Hotel, 31 miles

from my trip diary originally posted at Crazy Guy on a Bike

Day 4, Inverness to Whitebridge Hotel, 31 miles

Thursday September 8, 2016, 31 miles (50 km) - Total so far: 220 miles (354 km)

Today I was not a lion. After 3 days of crazy, hectic cycling to stay on schedule, I threw it out the window. 1) I stayed in Inverness until 10:30 because I wanted to buy a SIM card. Now I'm connected and can access mapsme better. But none of this helped the weather. It started rainy. I thought it might stay light, or stop after an hour. But by 12:30 I'd had enough of it. I was completely depleted by the time I got to Foyers for a cafe stop. 20 miles, what was the matter with me? I was walking the bike up every hill. And it was a climb up to Foyer. Every day there have been steady climbs, a point of neutral, before descending. Today even at what I thought was the top, there was a down and then a steep back up. I just couldn't stand the thought of one more hill. I only had about 10 miles to go to Fort Augustus and plenty of day, but the wind was brisk, I was wet and cold, and again just not mentally able to climb more. At a beautiful bend in the road came Whitebridge. An old stone bridge, Scotty dogs, a few hearty hiker people, and my body said here. Ask and see if you can camp. The bar proprietor showed me a back field, I wanted to kiss him. I can eat at the pub, have some ale if I want, plenty of water. And a fence to dry my togs--except it has started raining again. I'm dry, warm, and eating a candy bar. I need to rest up and get some wind in my sails for tomorrow.
Uh, right now it is storming. So glad I stopped and got set up here. 31 miles.
hotel at Whitebridge

view from hotel car park


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