Cairngorms: Inverness to Tomintoul

Day 33
Distance- 93km (1587)
Weather- sunshine, little rain, head wind
Highlights-the barren hills of the Cairngorms
Lowlights- the long day and a few very steep hills
Accommodation- Tomintoul Youth Hostel

All happy to be heading out of Inverness this morning. We head off along the number 7 which we take us to as far as Boat of Garten. Soon to become directional challenged as signs seem to be pointing the wrong way and we have no map. After going around in circles for about an hour and only having advanced 7km from the campsite in two hours we agree to wing it and just follow the way we saw a few other cyclists go. With in a few minutes we are rewarded with road signs, yeah on the right road. Pleasant riding through rolling hills and winding our way around paddock. We pass (in the opposite direction) a lot of road cyclist out for their Sunday rides. We make it to Tomatin for lunch and the ladies at the local store stay open so we can get some refreshments before they close. thanks.

After lunch we climb still further and then are reward with a sweeping descent of 6km. We then left the number 7 behind and head off to navigate a short cut. These last two words are usually taboo but this time it worked out and we soon popped out on the A road to Tomnitoul. We book the youth hostel along the way since we will be finishing late, the weather looks average and Peter is pretty sore. The scenery is amazing with great downs and ups. We pass some motor cyclists touring and they give us a honk and a salute. Finally we see a little town off in the distance, we hit 90km this is it. Nice, ready to get off the bike.

The youth hostel is a converted old school house. It’s run by a couple of young women who are up there for the summer. We enjoy the facilities, especially the hot showers and have fried rice for dinner. We pass the evening listening to music, playing cards and eating baked banana and chocolate toasties.