Almost there!

Sunday 15 July  –  Dunbeath to Watten – Day 82

Well, as we mentioned yesterday, today was going to be a long day – 34km – so we set off just after 8.30am, with a delicious breakfast on board and having waved goodbye to our packs. As they were being transported for us today and tomorrow, we have officially finished carrying packs on this Adventure, which we both agree feels wonderful !

The first stage of our journey took us back on our old friend the A9 for another 8 or 9 km (5 miles). Being a Sunday morning we had expected it to be extremely quiet but there was similar volume of traffic to yesterday. As we had already experienced though, there was plenty of room to get well off the road when necessary. There were a few sizeable settlements along this section – Latheron, Latheronwheel, and Lybster – as well as more farms of course. Complete with some gorgeous Highland cattle calves, which saw Val and a car load of tourists stop and reach for their cameras!

Just after Lybster we had chosen to take a minor road and head directly north towards Watten. In hindsight we could probably have stayed with the main road and travelled via Wick but of course we had no idea how quiet this main road was going to be. So off we set on this very, very quiet and open side road, with 21km walking ahead of us. Fortunately today was another cloudy, if slightly humid, day – in fact we also had some showers during the afternoon. Had it been full sun we would have baked – there was no shelter.

The first 6km is incredibly straight and travels through farmland, with farmhouses and dwellings scattered along its length. The immediate countryside was now largely flat and the road could be seen stretching out ahead of us. The second section ran through Forestry Commission land for a further 8km (5 miles), with conifers set back on either or both sides of the road. At the far end of this we also had a wind farm to our right, its giant turbines gently turning in the light wind. Then finally another open section which seemed to alternate between moorland and farmland, eventually leading us up to the minor A road on which sits the village of Watten. And our venue for tonight – the Brown Trout Hotel – a country inn looking very welcoming after eight hours on our feet.

And tomorrow is our last day!  We are of course very excited about that – completing this Grand Adventure will be just huge for us. It is hard to believe that we have actually almost done this! We have been very fortunate that everything has gone very smoothly for us. To have walked for 12 weeks, about 1850km / 1150 miles, with our only health issues being a couple of minor and short-lived blisters is very lucky. And of course the weather has been outstanding! We have had to wear rain jackets on may be 5 or 6 days only – and even then generally only for half days – the rest of the time the sun has shone. We could not have imagined that in our wildest dreams! (We have sock / shorts / t-shirt tans to take back with us).

Distance today:  34km / 21 miles

Ewe never know…

We just had to have a cute animal photo