Woke up at around 5.00am felt pretty hungry so went and got my bacon sandwich that the hotel owner left in the fridge for me the previous night and helped myself to some cereal in the breakfast area and checked the route for the day. Set off at maybe 7.15 after another painful toilet episode and headed towards Greenock for the Ferry across the estuary to Kilgreccan. The roads round Irvine are pretty bad - very busy and again some dodgy road surfaces. After about 10 miles the A78 I was on headed towards the coast which made for much nicer riding scenically as well as thankfully a better road surface and less busy roads. A few miles later I'd realised I'd left my water bottles back at the hotel but I had done 15 miles and it was definitely too late to turn back. So after maybe another 5 or 10 miles I stopped at a petrol station and got some bottles of water with the sports caps which would have to make do as my new cycling water bottles. The remainder of the first section of the day was nice as the A78 followed the coast with nice seas views. I made it to Greenock in good time where my Dad had earlier informed me of a cycle shop that would be open at 9am. I had found the bike shop by 9.45 and it still wasn't open. So I headed towards Gourock a few miles along the coast where the ferry was departing where apparently there was another cycle shop somewhere. I then asked a cyclist and he said that the only cycle shop was the one that I'd been to in Grenock that was shut. So I headed back to Grenock again and thankfuklly the shop had finally open. The shop was a mess crammed with bikes and rubbish but they did have what I needed (a pump to borrow and a spare inner tube (although this did cost an extortionate £5.95)). The guy in the shop was very helpful however and he talked me through the day's ride. With this delay I had to make do with getting te 11.18 rather than the 10.18 ferry crossing. The ferry ride was nice - a small boat with a maximun capacity of about 30 people. So I used the 15 or 20 minute crossing as an opportunity to eat my brunch of donut, pastries and shortbread. After the ferry crossing I had a top up of the sun cream as it was yet again a very hot day before setting off up the Gare Loch coast towards my next pit stop at Crianlarich 40 or 50 miles away. The Gare Loch coast was gorgeous with nice roads and villages along the way. Then when I got to the next town of Garelochhead I took a wrong turn which resulted in some harsh hills/mountains but was rewarded with some truly stunning views and nice roads so not all bad. After a while I reached the A82 which would take me all the way to Fort Augustus. This runs along the Loch Lomond and is in the national park so more amazing scenery for most of the way. Crianlarich seemed to be taking forever to reach (perhaps because of the wrong turn earlier, or the heat was getting to me). I stopped at the sign for the Distrist of Stirling for a photo (I had taken photos of every county/district border that I'd crossed) and went over to a pub opposite to ask how far I was from Crianlarich. The pub was filled with stuffed animals and the men working there were in traditional kilts which made me fear that I could be miles and miles from anywhere. Thankfully however they informed me that I was only 9 miles away from Criarlarich and kindly filled my water bottles whilst I was there which was a relief as I'd run dry. So I finally reached Criarlarich and thankfully managed to find a Londis where I devoured a breakfast sandwich (egg, bacon and sausage all in 1 sandwich - oh yes), 2 more pastries, a callipo, a bottle of lucozade) as well as a few mars bars and more water. So after another sun cream top-up I set off at around 3.30 still with 60-odd miles to go. The next section of road between Criarlarich and Loch Lynne offered amazing mountain views (some mountains still had snow at the very top and saw a sign for the Glencoe Ski lift) as the road primarily stuck to the valleys at the bottom. After Loch Lynne I was getting tired and very achy and so just ground out the final miles to Fort William. I stopped at Fort William to get some food and called the B&B I would be staying in that night to ask about whether I should buy breakfast for the morning or if they would make me something for the morning as I knew tomorrow would be the last big day and I wanted an early start. The lady at the B&B agreed to make me something then informed me that I was over 30 miles from Fort Augustus (I'd thought it was around 15 from what someone had said at Criarlarich earlier) and that nowhere would be open serving food by the time I would be arriving. Crap. I quickly bought something to eat there and then as well as a couple of pasta salad's that I would have for dinner later. I quickly ate my food and slaggily tied the pasta salad packets onto the outside of my bag with cable ties before rushing off as fast as I could as it was about 8.20 and I still had over 30 miles to go. These last 30 miles were a real test and the fear of not reaching my B&B by nightfall carried me through the exhaustion and kept me focused reaching my destination. At around 9pm all the cars started putting their headlights on which worried me. Thankfully though by the time I'd reached Fort Augustus at just after 10pm it was still light. The B&B was a pretty long way down a little country road and it was getting hard to see under the cover of the trees. Eventually I was mightily relieved to find my B&B down this little road at about 10.20pm (it was still not dark thankfully). I left the bike by the side of the isolated house and went in to an immaculate room, jumped straight in the shower and went into the dining area for my pasta salad. Then found the food the lady had made for my breakfast in the morning, took it up to my room and went to bed.
Reviews
B&B (Mavisburn B&B, Fort Augustus) 9/10 - nice service and food, great value, great shower. however room too clean/nice (not suited for a smelly dirty cyclist like myself) and I was afraid of making a mess/ staining the immaculate carpet/bedding and bike was left outside.
Lessons Learned
Make sure you know how far you have to go until you reach your destination and again try to leave earlier.
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