Scottish Adventures: a photo blog

Excuse the briefness of my words! A week of burning the candle at both ends has depleted my energy stores. Alas, nothing exciting has been burning my candle, merely a week of a heavy workload and a coursework deadline = little sleep. I don't ever want to forget the beauty of my Scottish trip last week though! So I will communicate instead through pictures (which is probably better anyway - and if a picture speaks a thousand words - this just saved a lot of reading time).

Sunday, 9th August: climb Cairn Gorm, run around Loch Morlich, eat cake. The perfect day! And perfect weather (in Scotland and all!!)

Monday, 10th August: get up run 16 miles to Loch Eanaich, get eaten by midges.....

Enjoy the views....

Admire mushrooms...

And heather...

Realise there's still a long way to go, and it looks suspiciously uphill...

Laugh at Andrew (I mean, arrive at Loch)...

Turn around and run back along a river...

Await arrival of Alan, ready for big running adventures. Fuel (the Scottish way) for adventures....

Wednesday, 12th August: 26 miles, 5000 ft, Lairig Ghru & Ben Macdui circle

What a day! Wake up early. Set off through the Caledonian pines towards the Lairig Ghru

Quick navigation check (all OK)

The Ghru in the distance 

The Ghru! Quick stop to fill water bottles in a stream. Baking hot!

A short (actually, not that short), sharp climb (involving some heather bashing, and falling through holes) up Lerchers Crag. I felt a migraine coming on as the sun beat down on my head, and reflected off the stones and the temperature rose and my heart rate reached 96% of it's apparent maximum. Got to top and tried to look like I didn't feel sick. Found some tablets. Drank some water. Went in search of some "tops" and "deleted tops", which was a new discovery on this trip (who knew, that each mountain might not have just one top, and some might even have tops that people decided shouldn't be a top after all, and got deleted!!) 

View down to the Lairig Ghru

Along the ridge to Ben Macdui, keeping an eye out for Fear Liath Mor (the Great Grey Man). No sign today. But then, ghost stories never are set on bright sunny days. 

What goes up, comes down (eventually). A long descent (via another top) and more views of the Ghru

A "technical" descent (i.e. straight down). Found a comfy seat in the heather whilst filling water bottles again. 

Made it back down again. Chat with a man who is walking the exact same route in the opposite direction. This is the first time I have been here and actually fully seen the Lairig Ghru! The last two times it has been covered in cloud!

Have a break at the Pools of Dee, and Andrew goes swimming (AGAIN)

And almost gets eaten by a tiny brown trout

Back down out of the Lairig Ghru, it looks like it was worth getting up early and missing the thunder!

Extra incentive to run fast on the downhill home

For gourmet recovery!

Thursday, 13th August: 8 miles run to Loch an Eilein, with a picnic in the middle, and blaeberry picking.....

And on to Loch Gamhna (with waterlillies!)

Friday, 14th August: the Big One, 22 miles, 5700 ft from Loch Morlich, up Strath Nethy, to Loch A'an, around and up Beinn Mheadhoin, down to the shelter stone, up Cairn Gorm and down to Loch Morlich.

A gloomy start at Loch Morlich

And gloomy for the first few miles up to the Strath Nethy

There was a brief brightening at An Lochan Uaine (the Turquoise Loch)

Then it went back to being gloomy. And boggy. A 5 mile bog stomp ensued up the Strath Nethy. 

Until, near the top, it started to brighten 

In time for great views at the top!

Dropped down to Loch A'An

And then up the other side to the top of Beinn Mheahhoin and a bit of rock climbing right to the top 

Collected three more tops, and saw reindeer on the summit! I think this is the highlight of my year so far!!

Then it was down to the famous Shelter Stone (turned out not actually to be the one we thought it was, but the one to the left in the distance)

Back towards the Loch 

and then UP the most scariest climb of my life (sticking to running, not climbing)

And up Cairn Gorm (one of it's tops, first!)

Then it's real top

Before heading back down the mountain

Towards Loch Morlich

Along magical forest trails

And back for fish and chips (using the Andrew two-seater shuttle service) which didn't last long enough to get a picture. Best holiday ever! Thanks Andrew and Alan for the adventures! And the mountain legends story telling of an evening.....here's to more!

Lockdown Frolic, and other frolics......

20.07.2020 - The Lockdown Frolic

My first virtual event! Thanks to Sarah and Jon for a day of adventures! The event was - start running at 08:00, and run for as much as you wanted to until 20:00. You could run on your own or as a team, and there was a Scavenger List published at 07:00 of all the things that you must collect along the way....

So we all set off at 08:00 from our respective houses, to meet about half way between us, at Putney Bridge. I ran down to St Paul's, and all along the river, about 11 miles on an old, and somewhat forgotten of late, favourite route. 

How good it was to see Sarah and Jon again! Oh, the event also had a woodland theme, Jon was a wicked weasel, Sarah a sultry (or princess) squirrel, and I was a feisty fox (my fancy dress didn't make it much further than a manicure).

From Putney, we set off on a route that we made up as we went along, thinking of where we could scavenge our treasures. The route remains a mystery, until Garmin is back up and running and can show us the map, but included, not necessarily in any order either here, or even when doing it: the Beverly Brook, Richmond Park (a few times), The River Thames (more than a few times), Hampton Court, Bushy Park..... lots of other places, I'm not quite sure, I can't wait to see the map when it uploads! 

Our scavenger hunt finds included....

A "nice" hill

A unicorn (at Hampton Court)

A cow

A fox

A beverage of choice

A (real life) dinosaur

Although not on the list Bushy Park had deer AND ice creams, so I felt should get bonus points of it's own.

We made our own Love Station

And our finishing photo

By the end of the 12 hours, I did just over 50 miles. By that point, I was still only in Battersea Park, which isn't where I live. Inspired not to get on a bus because of 1) Covid, but mostly 2) because of spending the day with Sarah and Jon who always inspire me to do very long runs (because of all their extreme and successful events and adventures they do), I decided on running home, which was another 6 miles. Which I'm really glad I did, as it was starting to get dark, and I ran along the river with all the lights twinkling, past Parliament and Whitehall, back to the river, by St Paul's and London Wall. Three miles of it was in an absolute downpour, with rain bouncing back up off the ground in my face and the roads all flooding. I loved it - cold, wet, dark, feeling tired at the end of a long run - I've missed this feeling. So I did 56 miles altogether, which I think is the 5th longest run that I've ever run. Thanks Sarah and Jon for such an awesome day!

And then, as I realise my Lockdown Diary has been lacking of late, photos the last three weekends running as well.....

18.07.2020 - Winter Tanners 30 miles
Back to Surrey for a run with Tara, on my favourite lockdown Surrey Hills route. For the first time, there was coffee on the way...

And grapes on the vines!

There has always been a Bus Stop Book Swap on the route - it used to be quite small, but over the weeks it's become more official and now has as almost as many books as a library, and it seems to have branched out into another bus stop a few miles further along as well...

It includes some quite obscure yet interesting titles, such as "The Dictionary of Dreams" which comes in useful for many a running conversation, and maybe also applies to ultra run induced hallucinations?

And, ominously for only 8 miles in, "If You're Reading This It's Too Late"...

 The rest of the route was beautiful as always, and it was a fantastic run.

12.07.2020: Olympic Park half marathon
Uni weekend, so shorter run. Didn't feel much like it at all after a weekend of virtual uni, but once I got going, it was great to be over in the Olympic Park and Hackney Marshes; much more spacious there than the other parks, and felt much less crowded.

04.07.2020 Milton Keynes 31.5 miles
A nice run around the countryside with Alan, Tom and Andrew. Today was the day that hairdressers opened - on the drive there, there were queues outside the barbers already, at 08:30! The weather wasn't so good, but on the plus side, that meant there was no queue at the cafe at 20 miles.....which meant coffee AND ice cream!