Bught Park Campsite Inverness to Invernahavon Campsite south of Newtonmore

This was a satisfying day of cycling covering 66 miles with 3,740 feet of ascent and burning 1950 active calories for the day. I had not realised that the Newtonmore campsite had closed due to bereavement last year and was not yet operational again. A man there supplied perfect directions to this fine one which is new to me.

Today at a stop for soup and shopping at the Three Bridges Cafe at Tomatin (Strathdearn) I asked for a bicycle pump and an employee fetched their excellent pump and held the bike for me while I pumped both tyres to a pressure of 6 bar. The rear tyre had been down to 2 bar, making the pedalling more difficult. I had expected Highland Bikes, after keeping a bike for 12 days for a touring cyclist, to pump up the tyres. To give them the benefit of the doubt, perhaps they are so snowed under with backlog that their standards are slipping.

Look out for Strathspey gravel paths alongside the road and through woods to the north of Kingussie, with similarities to the most enjoyable path between Boat of Garten and Aviemore. These seemed not to be signposted as an alternative for Sustrans Route 7 but were fine for my hybrid bike.