Kilchoan to Broadford

An early start led to spending some time at Salen pier while waiting for The Tioram Cafe a couple of miles away at Acharacle to open. There is a toilet and shower open 24 h with the shower taking only 3 x £1 to operate. The shop next to the facilities opened early, served tasty coffee and sold healthy foods such as avocados, yoghurt without added sugar and mixed nuts free from additives.

A vegetarian breakfast at the Tioram Cafe was as enjoyable as ever and was good preparation for the hills ahead. You get used to the false summits and should always be prepared for a further rise round the corner. This lap there is the knowledge that it will be the last where the pedal speed is so slow towards the tops; replacing the 44 tooth chainring with a 40 tooth one should improve matters considerably.

There are three climbs in the final few miles before Lochailort Inn. At the inn, manager Barry was preparing a caravan to house new staff should they be tempted to sign up. The coffee there is reliably tasty and soup helps to replace fluid. A party of walkers was arriving at the inn; it is situated near the loch and close to scenic mountains.

The refreshing the break and sustenence helped to make the endurance cycling enjoyable, and the option of stopping at Kinloid Farm campsite was easily dismissed. At Mallaig there was time to eat some of the load and thus lighten it and also to have a rare glass of beer.

After the ferry to Armadale, it was clear this was to be my hardest day for many months so I planned a food stop after only five miles. This was sufficient to get me to Fiona’s at Skulamus, only a couple of miles from the usual campsite in Broadford.

Fiona’s old friends Jim and Sandie had stayed with her recently and had taken her twice to see her sister Sandra in the care home, walked with her and helped out in all sorts of ways as usual. (Last year they had been staying with Fiona when I first arrived and they allowed me to sleep in their campervan for a couple of nights when the wind and rain were dreadful).

The short final ride of the day to the campsite was into the low sun and it was a relief to stop. At the campsite the fish van was still serving and the hake and chips could not have been more welcome (despite all the food consumed already). The statistics for this big touring day for me day were 75 miles, 5353 feet of ascent and 2471 active calories.