CWT – day 6

2.5.2023 Tuesday

Shenavall bothy – Schoolhouse bothy

46 km – 1215 m ↑ – 260 km total

I’m woken in the morning by a dog licking my face as it passes by. I have breakfast and set off around half past 7. Straight up steeply from the bothy toward the pass, then zigzagging through bogs, all the way to the village of Dundonnell. Beautiful weather all day today, so I really enjoy it.

Behind me are a couple of huge peaks, Sgurr Fiona and An Teallach, both over a thousand meters, looking really tempting. Next comes another climb heading east over rolling plateau. Then around Loch an Tiompain and very steeply down into Inverlael.

I’ve already covered half of today’s journey. I reach the main road into Ullapool, which is fairly busy, so I try hitchhiking. It takes another 2 km to stop a car. Sam picks me up, we chat a bit. He drops me right in front of a pub in Ullapool. I need to charge my phone and power bank, so I sit down for a beer and a cider, and have a mackerel pâté sandwich too. Then I wander around the town a bit and buy a few things for dinner at Tesco. Ullapool is the last decent-sized town on Scotland’s northwest coast, with a ferry departing from here to the Hebrides.

Around four I set off again alongside the Ullapool river, sun is warm, walking is well, so I push on. I start on asphalt through the valley by Loch Achall, later I climb around Loch an Daimh.

By the first loch I’m tempted to go for a swim, since it’s still fairly warm. After 18 km and 4 hours I reach Knock Dampf bothy on the shore of Loch an Daimh — looks nice, but it’s a lovely evening and the next bothy is only 6 km away, that’s doable. The sun’s setting, creating gorgeous golden light.

Starts blowing pretty hard though. The track’s a regular 4×4 the whole way, puddles everywhere. Just before nine I finally reach Schoolhouse bothy.

There are two guys from Edinburgh here, plus a Hungarian couple next door. Kai runs up and down hills collecting munros. Nigel’s an even bigger extremist, collecting every hill in Great Britain over 150 m — there are 1,600 of them and he’s only got 32 left. I didn’t even ask what they do for a living, that lets them spend weeks off in the middle of nowhere in northern Scotland. Guess I’m doing something wrong. I take a wash in the stream before dinner, something I try to do every day, and go to sleep.