Kingussie to Lairig Ghru
(14 miles/420 metres ascent)
Bob and Rose hadn't arrived the night before - they'd had a very hard, boggy day up on the Monadhliath, and were planning to head down to Kingussie later in the morning. I sent a text, and hoped to meet up with them again later on.
At some stage when eating my breakfast I remembered that I'd forgotten to collect my parcels at the bar the night before. I'd sent myself a delivery of maps and food and a new book, and a friend had sent me one of his Rab Survival Zone bivvys to use because I'd been cold in my sleeping bag earlier on in the trip, as well as some Mountain Suds to replace the bottle I'd left behind at the Tomdoun Hotel... I was a bit worried that I mightn't be able to find anyone up, and that my assault on the path to the Lairig Ghru might be delayed, but fortunately Caburn noticed the young woman who'd been serving in the bar at the Spar across the road, she texted the proprietors and my boxes were delivered to me before 9am :)
The parcel containing the bivvy turned out to contain some other lovely things too - 2 cans of G&T, 2 packets of my favourite crisps and a box of Green & Black's chocolate - mega yummy!...
...so I packed them all away, sorted out my food and maps, made up a parcel of things to send home and went down to the kitchen to meet Caburn, since we'd arranged to set off together that day.
A quick visit to the Post Office later and we were off! I was now able to take a proper look at Ruthven Barracks, and it turned out to be an impressive and imposing place. Caburn and I left our sacks at the bottom of the little hillock upon which it stands, and went up for a closer look. There was an interesting history to it...
...and I spent some time wandering into the little rooms and wondering what it must have been like to have been a soldier, living there. Pretty cold and damp, I should think!
Soon it was time to move on, though, and so we collected our packs and set off in the direction of Inverglass and Insh.
The weather had begun a little grey and windy, but it soon brightened up...
...and before long we reached a point where we were able to ditch the warmer layers and and walk happily on in lighter clothing and shorts. We met another couple of Challengers doing the same thing.
Caburn had noticed a better route than the one I'd been looking at, which would have taken us a longer way enclosed by the forest, and instead we were able to walk in the sunshine, along pretty little lanes that became lovely wild tracks.
I'd been surprised many times already by the absence of frog spawn and tadpoles in the pools I'd passed along the way, because the tarns in the Lake District had been filled with luscious clumps of frog spawn for quite some time, but we finally came to a rather muddy, shallow puddle where the tadpoles were out in force.
It didn't seem long before it was time to start looking for a nice spot for lunch, and we quickly found one. I dug around in my pack for what had seemed to me to be a pretty cushy backpacking lunch - tortilla wraps with Primula, and one of the packets of crisps that Matt had sent along - but I was amazed to find Caburn extracting a loaf of bread, a tub of Lurpak, a huge hunk of cheese and a large pot of Branston pickle from somewhere in the depths of his Tardis-like rucksack! He then got out his Trangia to make a brew, and followed all of that up with a packet of rum truffles! Being a kindly sort of bloke, and recognising a starving piglet when he saw one, he shared his goodies with me. Thanks, Caburn :-))
While we were working our way through the vast array of Caburn's delicious goodies we had time to play with the self-timers on our cameras, and mine came up with the following, which I rather like although it's a total focussing cock-up. The blurred quality of it conjures up for me a vivid memory of that balmy and relaxing lunch in the heather, which remains one of my happiest memories of the entire trip :)
Just for the record, though, Caburn's camera managed to record the moment in slightly more prosaic terms :) It's hard to believe they were both taken from almost the same place, at the same time!
Little Peewiglet was pretty hungry too, after a strenuous morning's ride in the back of my pack, and he ate a whole crisp and had a sip of my tea.
The Lairig Ghru was calling, though, and so eventually we had to move on. Not long afterwards we came across a pretty caterpillar on the road, and moved it to safety (via Caburn's map, so that we could get a piccy first)...
...and then we came to a little bit of road before we were able to turn up to our right, and into a wood.
The wood was absolutely brimming with delicious sorrel, which tastes uncannily like sour apples...
...and in bending down to pick some leaves I caught sight of a tiny little toad, which Caburn's camera managed to record quite brilliantly, sitting in my hands.
There was also more amazing lichen on trees...
...and then we passed a whole field full of pretty little brown sheep!
As we arrived at Feshiebridge we hoped for a tea shop, but had to make do with a bunch of lovely cowslips...
...and a seat on the rocks by the river.
We took a break to enjoy the river and the sunshine, and then we pressed on again. The Lairig Ghru was drawing ever closer, and eventually in a clearing we came across a little bothy, where Caburn made another brew and we celebrated our increasing proximity to the BGM with a wee restorative dram :) (Dutch courage, perhaps, in my case...)
After the bothy the path wound on between small pine trees, edged with heather and bilberries.
Caburn had read that there was juniper growing beneath the trees, and we found some, covered in hard, green berries, which were not yet ripe.
Finally, and after a brief navigational blip, we arrived at the sign for the Lairig Ghru, and I realised that I was now entering Big Grey Man territory, and that there could be no turning back! I went on with mixed feelings of excitement and trepidation...
The path grew prettier the further we went, and we passed a small, crystal stream where we both saw a tiny fish dart beneath a rock.
The Cairngorm Footbridge, another long-imagined landmark, now appeared before us in a clearing, and as I crossed it I felt that I was entering onto hallowed ground!
We'd expected to find other campers not far from the bridge, and it was only a few minutes before we saw a couple camped to our right on the other side of the stream, one of them collecting water for a meal. We pressed on, though, as we expected to find more on the side of the stream to which we'd crossed, and it was less than a minute later that we spotted a congregation of green tents in a clearing. Some of the campers saw us, and waved, and in no time at all we arrived at the tents to find a very select bunch of Challengers indeed!
They were Tim and Kate, who were the very first Challengers I'd ever met (since we live in the same town and I'd first met them at the train station at the start of the journey up to Scotland the previous year), David and Tom, whom I'd met at Glasgow station a week earlier, Pete and Trish, whom I'd not previously met but had seen on the Challenge notice board, and Ann, Alvar and Simon Thorn, with whom Andy Howell and I had shared the little fish and chip restaurant in Mallaig the night before the Challenge began exactly a week before!
The clearing looked like an advert for Hilleberg tents, filled, as it was, with Aktos and Nallos! Caburn got out his Nallo to swell the numbers still further, and I put up my Terra Nova Competition to add a bit of variety :)
Once the tents were up the conversation turned naturally to feet, as it tends to do on walks like this, and we all swarmed over to Pete and Trish's tent to take a close look at Trish's right foot and to marvel at the amazing range of uses to which it's possible for a laterally-minded person to put a panty liner! :)
David then produced his big toes for inspection, and explained that he'd had the nails surgically removed especially to enable him to skip lightly from rock to rock in the boulder fields that we were expecting to encounter the following day. Talk about dedication to the cause! Eeek....
After that we all lurked about under the trees, enjoying the evening and chatting, while Caburn and I made something to eat. It was a lovely time, and everyone was looking forward to the adventures to come the following day.
I brewed up some wild mushroom soup (with the aid of a covenient packet), and cooked the home-dehydrated veggie chili that Rose and Bob had donated to the Piglet Survival Ration Fund. It was delicious! Caburn cooked a very sophisticated meal, involving pasta, herbs, a real red pepper, another real vegetable of some description, more bread and butter and half a shoulder of venison that he produced from somewhere in the bowels of his rucksack.
(Well actually he didn't produce half a shoulder of venison, because he's a vegetarian, but at several times when he was rumaging in his pack and producing goody after goody it looked as though he might be about to do so...)
After we'd eaten we decided to have a food inspection, and people in turn were required to turn out the contents of their ration packs so that the rest of us could ogle in covetous amazement :) It actually took a couple of people to carry Caburn's ration pack over to the general inspection site, but for my money Pete and Trish turned out to have by far the most interesting range of supplies: in fact, it looked much as though they'd bought out the entire contents of a sub-branch of Julian Graves before leaving for Glasgow! :) I sampled some dried seaweed and a sesame snap with quinoa, and made a mental note to revise my lunch supplies before embarking on my next Challenge.
After that, I stood around with David, Tom and Caburn in a small circular stand of tall trees behind the tents, staring at the sky, swapping Big Grey Man and other creepy stories and wondering what sort of day lay ahead of us. There had been a spattering of rain a little earlier in the evening, but it had blown off and now it was dry and pleasant. I remembered my choccy supply, and we munched a bit in contemplative fashion. That reminded David that he and Tom had a lovely chocolate pudding uneaten in one of their packs, and Tom kindly cooked it so that we could see what it was like. I've never tried one of the backpacking choccy puddings before, but it was very nice indeed: spongy, with lots of chocolate sauce. Yum! Thanks, Tom! :)
Eventually it was time to start thinking about bed, and I realised that I could do with replenishing my water supply so that I could make some coffee before getting up in the morning (now that I've been freed from the tyranny of the early-morning pee dash by purchase of my lovely Whizz and a dedicated 1L Platy, and can Pee Like A Man...) At that stage I realised the light was fading...
...and for the first time that evening I experienced a frisson of alarm at the idea that the BGM might be lurking in the tall grasses over by the water re-supply point... The water had to be got, though, and so I bravely collected my Platy and set off for the stream, keeping a careful watch for sudden movements in the grass in my peripheral vision. As I bent down to fill up the Platy I suddenly felt as though someone had rushed up behind me - really! - but there was nobody there... :) I made my way back to the tent with my water, settled down to write up my diary and then read a few pages of my new book: Cold Comfort Farm...
In the middle of the night I thought I heard a noise, but I turned over and went back to sleep...
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