Day 108 Thurso to Tongue

 

 Date: Tuesday 24^th July 2012   Distance: 45.23 Miles

 

We had a later breakfast than usual as it all seemed slow and disorganised. It was freshly cooked though.  Unfortunately we were at the end of a block of motel rooms and our toilet blocked. Judging by the laid back attitude of the staff we thought it might be a regular occurrence.

 

Everyone we met in Thurso has been lovely. They were very philosophical about my comment on the fast driving. They said a lot of local young boys die driving too fast on the winding hilly roads. I do wonder why something isn’t done about it! Apparently Wick to Thurso is the worst road in this part of Scotland.

 

The sun shone and we were in shorts and amply sun tan- lotioned. It wasn’t as bad as yesterday but the wind was still against us. The views were lovely and there was another surfing beach .

 

We passed  Dounreay Power Station with its white dome gleaming in the sun. Several huge wind power sails lay on the ground in front of the station perimeter. Maybe this is the next phase!

 

We stopped at Reay shop and sat at a picnic table there sharing cake with a cyclist doing Lands end to John o groats.

 

Beautiful hills, up and down for a few miles brought us to Melvich where we stopped for lunch at Halladale Inn. Here the surf moves over orange sand towards grassy dunes. The next stop is Bettyhill which to us seemed very far away but was only actually 12 miles. It was many long ups and downs before we stopped at the little cafe by the small Strathnaver museum. It closed at 4.45 but we were glad of the little break.

 

It was up again into Bettyhill overlooking Torrisdale Bay, the river estuary and nature reserve dunes. At Farr bay to the north is a sandy beach where it is said semi precious jewels can be found. In 2005 we remembered transporting thousands of midges in our bike bags from Altnahara, midge capital of the world!!! We cycled down the river valley until the road divided for Altnahara and again we cycled more up on the fork for Tongue, 10 miles away.

 

There were lots of Lochs with grasses and not much else. We climbed a total of 3,600 metres in all today. On the tops of the mountain pass we could see the granite peaks of Ben Hope and Ben Loyal The road seemed endless then there were glimpses of the sea again and a village and then at last the outskirts of Tongue surrounded by lush green.

 

 The hotel (Ben Loyal hotel) room gave us a view of ruined Castle Varrich and the Kyle of Tongue. Other guests were here for the fishing but they bemoaned the wind and the sun which made it difficult to catch anything. It’s a good area for walking I would say and we enjoyed watching a beautiful sunset after a meal of scallops, Cullen skink and venison. It had been 45 hard miles today.