We started the morning by waking up on a train somewhere in Scotland (you know a typical Friday). A little while after waking up we were brought our "delicious" "breakfast" in our train berth. It consisted of "eggs" and smoked salmon. The salmon was fine the eggs...not so much.
After rolling into Inverness and walking down the platform we saw our Scottish van driver waiting for us and he brought us to our bikes. So we mounted up again and made our way into the heart of Inverness. It was quaint, but personally I didn't think it was too breath taking of a city. Anyway we grabbed some real breakfast and coffee then did our shopping and went to a tourist information desk for directions to our bike path. The lady behind the desk was very helpful, but was mostly just really interested in our trip. It was slightly comical because at one point she asked how long do you think it will take to get to Ft William, to which I was thinking in my head well that depends on when we can actually leave from this information desk." Anyway we eventually made it out and found the start of our path in front of the Inverness castle (under construction, classic) and some statue.
The riding was excellent, the path we rode on was very well marked and either avoided roads entirely or only used small roads with hardly any traffic. We saw a lot of other touring cyclists too which was neat. The weather was overcast, a little misty, and cold... So we finally really got to use the cold weather gear we had been carrying since Rome. All in all the riding was uneventful aside from the absolutely jaw dropping views (Northern Scotland might be number 1 in my favorite places now). Just absolutely incredible views. We rode through mountain passes (yep some more epic hill climbing), around Lochs (we did ride by Loch Ness but no sign of Nessie), through glens, and around a bunch of canal locks. I can't really describe it so I am going to include a bunch of pictures (hopefully assuming this wifi holds out).
We eventually made it to Fort Augustus and grabbed some lunch. Lunch consisted of some hot sausage rolls (think hotdog on a bun) and a handful of Scott's pies (think lamb burger in a flaky pie crust). It was really good, but not quite filling enough in hindsight. After wolfing down some food it was back to canal riding, and a few miles later to some "tame" mountain biking. The trail was just a gravel road. Due to the speeds we were riding and the miles we were riding on the roads, it is likely this was some of the hardest riding for the bikes, but they held up (so far). We again had some outstanding views! I will let the pictures do the talking again, I hope they do it justice.
We eventually made it into Fort William no issues at around 7 pm, so not bad on time either considering we left Inverness around 10:45. We are staying in a hotel on the side of Loch Linnhe (I think). The hotel has a restaurant that made some pretty good dinner. I think that is about all I have for now though. Tomorrow we are heading out to Oban, so hopefully we get there early enough for a distillery tour. So for now I say best wishes and until next time.
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