Not Glen Strathfarrar

Tuesday 27th May 2014

My plan for this day was to catch a train from Pitlochry, where I had been staying over the Bank Holiday weekend, and change at Inverness for Muir of Ord where I would catch a bus to the fabulous valley of Glen Strathfarrar for the start of an epic walk through this unspoilt part of Scotland. I managed to reach Muir of Ord with no problems despite a short time between trains at Inverness, but the instant I stepped onto the platform at Muir of Ord I realised that I didn’t have my walking poles in my hands. For a second I turned around to get back onto the train and retrieve them until I realised that they weren’t on that train, they were on the train that I had gotten off in Inverness. This was a disaster but I didn’t worry about it then as there was little I could do about it and I had a bus to catch, however that wasn’t for another hour and a half so I walked down the road to the Glen Ord Whisky Distillery.

I didn’t have time to take the full tour of the distillery so I just had a look around the visitor centre and had a taste of the Singleton of Glen Ord that is only sold in the Far East. With plenty of time to catch the bus I left the distillery and walked back into Muir of Ord while pondering my options for retrieving my walking poles. Do I travel to Inverness on Saturday, after walking through Glen Strathfarrar, to ask in lost property at the station about my poles, or do I abandon my walk through Glen Strathfarrar and go back to Inverness now as I’m a lot closer now than I will be on Saturday? The latter would totally ruin my plans for the week so I waited at the bus stop for the bus to Struy. A bus to Inverness arrived and left without me as I accepted that I wouldn’t have any walking poles for going through Glen Strathfarrar, and at just that moment the bus to Struy drove straight past me without stopping.

I was shocked. The bus driver had decided to ruin my plans for the week since I couldn’t decide. This bus is run by a small independent company using minibuses with the destination in small writing on a piece of paper in the window, and it wasn’t until the bus was alongside that I realised it was the bus I wanted. At the beginning of this day I had been looking forward to walking along Glen Strathfarrar, but now I had no idea what to do next. It wasn’t as if I could wait for the next bus to Struy as the buses were only once a week, the next bus was next Tuesday! My holiday was ruined. I had lost my poles and missed the only bus all week to where I wanted to go. Utterly gutted and dejected I headed back to the railway station and caught the next train to Inverness. At least, I thought, I could get my poles back, but lost property at Inverness didn’t have them.

By now I was so upset about everything that had happened I felt like crying, but I’m a man and we don’t do that kind of thing, so instead I formulated a new plan for the rest of the day and the rest of the week. I booked a bed for myself at the Inverness Youth Hostel and then did a walk around the lovely city of Inverness. If any city can lift depressed spirits then Inverness is surely the place to do it. I remember really enjoying being in Inverness ten years ago, but aside from passing through a couple of times I hadn’t spent much time there since, consequently this was going to be the first time I’d stayed in the city in the last nine years and I was keen on making the most of where fate had left me. My first destination was St Andrew’s Cathedral, a place that I’d seen across the river several times before but never actually gone in, however when I stepped inside it seemed so small I came straight back out again.

Near the Cathedral I saw a notice showing the walks around Inverness and one caught my eye as it passes through a nature reserve that I’d seen on the train. It lies between the River Ness and the Caledonian Canal at the northern end of the city overlooking the Moray Firth. To reach the nature reserve I walked beside the River Ness past works to build flood defences until I reached Carnarc Point, a narrow spit of land that juts out into the Moray Firth. The path was lined by broom and gorse (very similar in appearance from a distance, but very different close up), while at the end of the spit is a small lighthouse, while dominating the view is the Kessock Bridge sweeping across the Moray Firth from Inverness to the Black Isle.

Returning to the road I walked around the shore, past the old ferry port and into the Merkinch Local Nature Reserve, which was a fabulous place swarming with birds who all burst up into the air as soon as I approached. In the reserve, to my left were lagoons and to my right were mud flats on the edges of the Moray Firth. This path along the sea wall led me to the railway and the Caledonian Canal, which was as far as I was going to walk so I turned around and after crossing the nature reserve I passed through the Merkinch council estate following the railway line back into Inverness. This was a nice, little walk in warm sunshine, but it could only begin to compensate for what had been a bitterly disappointing day. I bought a cheap pair of walking poles to replace the ones I’d lost and continued to make plans for the rest of the week. I couldn’t help but be frustrated by what had happened on this day, but I was determined to make the most of what had happened and not let the rest of the week be marred by my regrets.