I left the Spotty Dog campsite at 7 o’clock and headed back onto the canal towpath. It was overcast, but sun was promised later. After 4 miles or so I left the towpath and walked along an old railway line, now tarmac, and frequented by dog walkers and cyclists.
I stopped briefly to buy basic provisions for breakfast at a shop and continued on. I was making progress but feeling a little weary. I diagnosed too much sugar and two few good nutrients in my diet over the last couple of days. I also received a well done and keep going message from Andrew who had hurt his knee while sleeping. I remembered the riddle he had set me on the first day of my walk.
“As I was going to Saint Ives,
I met a man with seven wives,
Each wife had seven sacks,
Each sack had seven cats,
Each cat had seven kits,
Kits, cats, sacks, wives.
How many were going to Saint Ives?”
As I was struggling to calculate 343 times 7 I paused. This must be a trick, particularly as Andrew sent it me. I think the answer must be 1. The riddle doesn’t say where the man, his wives, sacks, cats and kits are going. Only the narrator is going to Saint Ives.
After these mental gymnastics, I was approaching Strathblane and passed an interesting looking hill which my book told me had been caused by a volcanic plug. I’m not sure what that is but perhaps my son Joe could leave a comment on this blog to explain. After all, he was once geographer of the month at school. I never received such an accolade.
Arriving at Strathblane at 12 o’clock I went to the local Inn to find they were serving exactly the kind of food I felt I needed. I ordered a big bowl of Cullen Skink, a traditional Scottish fish and potato soup. It was delicious.
Leaving the pub I walked from Strathblane through forestry before joining the West Highland Way, just after Carbeth, about 5 miles from Milngavie. Of all the places I was due to walk, I know the WHW the best having walked it three times. It felt like home turf.
Home turf didn’t help when I arrived at the Beech Tree Inn at 3:05, 5 minutes after it closed for the day. This was fortuitous though as I then stopped at the well named Turnip the Beet. I was drinking a chai latte when Alexa, my intrepid Cape Wrath friend greeted me with the words “I knew it had to be you in that hat”. She hasn’t seen the shorts yet.
We walked the remaining 5 miles or so until Alexa’s campsite and I continued on to Drymen (rhymes with woman). I arrived just before 6 o’clock and was relieved to get a table at the Clacchan, my favourite pub in the village. I drank a pint and ate an excellent lamb Bhuna. At seven I set off again and walked up into the forestry above the village. This would give me a 3 mile head start tomorrow morning and was also an excellent place to wild camp as long as the midges were kept at bay.
It was warm and there was no wind, so I applied Smidge liberally and prepared for an early night. Tomorrow I aimed to walk all the way to Inveranon.
Day Summary
Cutting out the sugar, dodging the midges. Back on the West Highland Way.
Discover more from Henry’s very long walk
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Well done Henry, been following your progress since we met between banavie and gairlochy on the Caledonian canal path, wishing you best of luck and good weather to get to the end.
Thank you both. Much appreciated. I remember you both. Meeting people like you make the miles go by faster.
Forestry. I shall use this formula for my lexicon from now on. Tomorrow I shall be heading into the officestry.
How do you avoid midges coming into the tent? Lathering on Smidge doesn’t feel like enough to me.
My tent is quick to pitch. That said, midges seem keener eating you alive when you are out in the open. A couple of mornings I awoke to find several hundred had impaled themselves on my tent canopy. But they can’t get in once you’ve closed the tent (mine has an inner as well as an outer skin)