Mrs Fat Lad and I had managed to escape the clutches of West Yorkshire, it’s saddening claws of failed house moves and insurance industry fun and games left far behind. 496 miles up the lanes and hills of the NorthTM were swapped for glens, Munroes and snowcapped beauty of the north west Highlands. Thinking I had an easy tweetup ride scheduled in for April I pored over the lines and paths of digital cartography to see if I could find something suitable for Sarah’s still poorly knee.
Our Sandwood return was scheduled for another time when co-operating limbs and joints would play nicely. The answer seemed to shine from the LCD screen of my laptop me an obvious solution. A fish restaurant we have missed the last few times here due to the seasonal nature of tourism in the wilds would be open for us to enjoy aquatic culinary delights. Over the hill from the bay we were lounging around a footpath led straight into Tarbet Bay a mere few miles from Scourie. After Thursday’s jaunt round the tiny roads in Pugsley we managed to make it home in time for me to shoot off and do a recon of the ride to make sure things would be suitable. In Memory Map’s digital domain the route looked flat and tame but I wanted to make sure; “There might be a bit of hike-a-bike through the crags†I stated “ and just want to make sure it’s okay for us both.â€
I uploaded the intended track to the GPS and ran round like my usual disorganised self getting ready whilst Mrs Fat Lad looked on with wry amusement. Rather than just following the intended up and over the hill I planned to follow the road for a few miles down to the coastal hamlet and then come back across the tops. My long suffering wife sat at the kitchen table reading a photography magazine as her husband whizzed about. “Shouldn’t need these†I said as I stuffed a gel and a energy bar into my jersey pocket “but you never know. Also brought along for ‘Justin’ included my USE Joystick, my waterproof softshell and enough water for three people. I mounted up and pedalled away on the tarmac heading for Tarbet with a grin on my face.
Out on the road I pedalled away with the legs of a man whose had a week and bit since his last ride. Feeling fresh and not bad it’s funny because that’s exactly how long it had been since my last excursion with Stu. An evil headwind and a 12% climb couldn’t dampen my spirits and the good natured horn pipping of the local drivers was a welcome change to car owners back home. Turning off the main road (well as “main†as they get up here) I had just one last evil bit of headwind and another stinker of a climb before I had a rocket assisted eye watering descent into Tarbet itself.
The Garmin Edge 705 is a fantastic training GPS. It has some fantastic features and will mate up with some other nice toys too, heart rate monitors, cadence sensors, Power Taps those sort of things. It really is fantastic at seeing where you have been. Where you are going to… not so much. Garmin may have made the only GPS unit in the world that is useless for navigating. As I over shot the path to start my way home and it was trying to get me to go back up the road instead up the grass I remembered this with a sense of “oh yeah, it can be quite shit this thing…†It was at this point that I muttered the word “bollocks†repeatedly under my breath as I realised I’d left the ordnance survey map for this region back at the cottage. I was now reliant on American Satellites, Garmin’s rubbish off road knowledge and my legendary lack of direction. What could possibly go wrong?
By the sea front I pushed the bike up the muddy banking following the purple line of the topo map on the small screen in front of me. At the top the moorland glen stretched out in front of me the terrain euphemistically best described as undulating. The eventual destination was hidden by many climbs and I carried onwards. The ground was sodden, boggy and unrideable. Where the ground wasn’t soaking the path was either too narrow or rocky to remount. At the start of the path in Tarbet a sign warned the need for good walking boots and proper equipment. I wonder if summer stiff soled cycling shoes, sealskinz and ¾ Endura shorts fall into those categories. Very early on and my feet were already drenched. I ploughed on through bog after bog dragging the bike through heather up crags thinking that after the next summit it would become ridable. The path was always disappearing and I consistently mistook sheep tracks and streams for my route usually being guided back to the thin ribbon by the GPS. After a little while, making very poor progress I realised that some kindly soul or souls had piled small rocks to show the where the not very obvious path was going. These way markers didn’t always tally up with my digital compass but were always the best route available.
I carried on stumbling and walking as best I could across the broken landscape wheeling the bike next to me hoping for some ground I could remount and pedal across. The reality of dry feet had long been abandoned and I crossed streams and squelched through bogs not caring how webbed my toes were becoming. Where I couldn’t wheel the bike it was lifted onto my shoulder, dragged unwillingly and on one occasion thrown over a crossing. All the while I was floundering over the moor the heartbreaking beauty of the inlets, bays and lochs stole the breath from my lungs and seared a true sense of scale into my soul. For an awful lot of expended energy I had barely covered a mile and a half and it had taken me about an hour…
As the constant pushing began to take it’s toll I was at once grateful for regular Pilates sessions for the increase in core strength and also the running I’d done recently. As I was mentally patting myself on the back I felt the awful hollow feeling in my stomach and I know all too well as the first signs of the bonk. I stopped inhaled a gel and started to chew my way through a bar now hoping that it would be enough to see me home. My calf muscles were getting stiffer and stiffer as I pushed onwards and for the first time in my life I gave thought to abandoning the bike. What I would have done to retrieve it hadn’t entered my mind I’d simply had enough off dragging it up rocky terrain and shoving it through bogs.
Cresting another climb I followed the path until it vanished like so many before. The lifesaver rock piles, or as I’d began calling them “My beautiful little cairnsâ€, were nowhere in sight I stopped to try and follow the ghost line from the small navigation computer resting on my stem. This couldn’t be right. I was stood on the banks of a large body of water and the line on the screen was directing me straight across it. My feet may have been soaked but I wasn’t willing to get the rest of me that way. I followed the very wet banks for a little while and the little black arrow of directional hope still made no sense. I switched screens on the device wondering what the hell I was going to do now. I’d organised with Sarah to be back by a certain time. Out here with no signal it’s the right thing to do and if I wasn’t home she could send the right people out to find me. The hollowing feeling of hunger was replaced by dread. What now Fat Lad? What the fuck are we going to do with no map and no shelter if I’m out here on the tops for the night. The panic set in and as I cycled through the GPS screens desperately searching for inspiration the map display suddenly shifted and there I was next to a large body of water with the guide line visible for me to follow again. I looked at the time once more, aware of when I needed to return and it gave me a fresh burst of go. Motivating me along the rugged ground was the ever present fear of embarrassment of mountain rescue being called out for me. I think shame would have swallowed me whole if the big yellow helicopter had needed to scour the land for my chunky backside.
At the top of my next scramble I could see Scourie Bay and I laughed out loud my constant worrying and fretting all or naught. Blissfully too it was all downhill from here. I might even get some pedalling in. Nope, not happening. The ever present energy sapping bogland and unrideable rock strewn paths were still in evidence. Perhaps better riders than I could have flown down these boulder chutes but it wasn’t happening for me that much was certain. Not too far down the hillside in a final act of “fuck you†from mother nature I had to fight my way through 500 yds of Gorse bush, using the bike like a rear wheeled upright battering ram I pushed and forced my through legs and arms shredding pieces of skin on each razor sharp thorn and barb.
Finally and truly remounted I pedalled through a farm yard the wide and muddy path blocked by cattle. As I approached closer and closer the dim witted beasts stood immobile watching me with big disinterested eyes, I was at least grateful that these were cattle and not the heavy horned shaggy Highland Cows (coo’s) I’d have to shuffle through. With a few feet left between me and and the collection of incredibly rare steak the collective will and wisdom of the herd moved into the field giving the stinking bleeding cyclist a wide berth.
I snuck through a kissing gate to the bay front and in the really truly final act of Fuck you from mother nature my front tyre rapidly deflated punctured no doubt by the uncountable number of sharps form the gorse. Lacking the necessary enthusiasm to change the tube I kept peddaling until it went absolutely flat then pushed the bike the remaining short distance back to the cottage. Back in the warmth I felt immensely relieved to be home and could laugh off the ill informed route over the tops with my always insightful wife.
There are some out there in the wilds and crazy corners of the wide world that will tell you that you need to be frightened every now and again to make you feel truly alive. That you need fear to feel what it is to be truly grateful for what you’ve got. To which I say; bollocks. I’m actually rather happy in my comfort zone ta very muchly. I would always prefer to be well prepared with the right gear and at least a bleeding map to fall back upon. When you break down this little jaunt to it’s essence I’ve made dragging a bike across 3 miles of boggy glen a touch over dramatic but when you’re in the moment not sure where you quite are and with weather that can get very nasty very quickly it would have only taken a misplaced step or slip to needing those very nice chaps in the big yellow helicopter after all…
Fat Lad
