No kippers 😱

Our hotel last night was quite basic, but the breakfast was one of the best. Only marred by the kippers Steve wanted being unavailable. Weather forecast to be nice for the day.

Rutherfords Law of Gravity states that water flows downhill, and when it finds a valley it forms a river. Rivers require bridges. By logical extension, any town in the Highlands that has the word ‘bridge’ in its name, such as Carrbridge, has only one way out - uphill! After a rather large breakfast our first task was a 500 foot climb!

Bit of a headwind as we set off north west for 40 miles, then behind us for the last 34 miles. Nice route up towards Inverness, and a nice route beyond it. Inverness itself was a pain to cycle through - many turns, rough cycle paths we could have done without and to cap it all the cycle path over the Kessock Bridge was properly closed and locked. We had to cross four lanes of busy A9 to get to the path on the other side, then re-cross the other side. Andrew did get his Boots points in town though.

As per the last few days, a lot of our route was on NCN 7 then NCN 1 that track the A9. Then just beyond Tain we had to cover 4 miles actually on the A9 to get over the Dornoch Firth Bridge. Fast traffic and not much fun, and this was a Sunday afternoon. Must be awful on a work day!

Made it to Dornoch early evening. Posh digs (not) in the University student accommodation. Towels supplied but some soap might have been nice too! It’s a lovely place. We were pondering whether it is a village or a town, but then we walked past the Cathedral. Smallest city I’ve ever seen.

Average dinner in an average pub, but nice beer. They also had Theakstons but that just seemed wrong. Visit to the co-op for breakfast supplies. No fry up tomorrow but masses of Alpen and Granola should be good for the internal constitution!

Apologies for a boring entry today, but it was generally a nice uneventful day. Hoping for two more of the same, and no closed roads!

stats 74 miles, 3061 feet

Comments

  1. Thorp Arch MOB9 July 2025 at 14:03

    Apologies. It seems that having a cathedral isn’t enough to be a city. That has to be granted by a monarch. So Dornoch is just a town. St David’s in Wales is Britain’s smallest city. I’m sure there are some Scots that may disagree!

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