Back to shore – boat secure on the roof and it was off to Applecross up the dangerous twisty road in high winds to test its ability to stay on the roof with a possible paddle where Monty Hall had launched the Klepper.
We had arranged to meet in Applecross with Gordon and Jill and somehow managed to miss them before turning into the Flower Tunnel for lunch. Assuming Applecross wasn’t that large to get lost in – we lunched under vines with birds flying around then assuming Gordon and Jill were late headed around Applecross peninsula to where the BBC series Monty Hall’s Great Escape was filmed.
We missed hte bothy the first pass – and ended up overlooking Torridon from the north end of hte peninsula before returning to find a cave dwelling and the bothy near the beach. The road was a military road so we had no vehicle access and the portage of the kayak now firmly strapped to the roof was not looking like fun so we went for a wander down to look at the bothy.
The visitors book revealed that Monty hadn’t actually stayed in it (due to planning permission) and the enjoyable series was a bit of a sham. But it was nice to see the places from the show and with the fantastic filming of the area it was tremendous to see those same views in real life.
Cake in the walled garden and the long drive back in rain to find a grumpy Gordon and Jill wondering where the hell we had disappeared to – they had missed lunch trying to find us. More drink and a discussion on codpieces led to the shouting of ‘Scrotum’ over a now hushed dining room.
We breakfasted with a chirping speaker, chirping randomly like a demented woodcock. Then homeward bound in even lower cloud than we came up in – reaffirming that the decision not to fly was sound. The only thing flying was the Coastguard rescue helicopter who popped in to refuel at Plockton airfield with large rescuers who didn’t know the combination for the fuel store…
Another great trip but no flying and no real kayaking (kayak to Skye plan fell through thanks to a head wind and rough sea) – but at least we had tried out the roof and I got back to relearn all the building techniques and now have a properly constructed sea kayak with operational rudder pedals and deployable (pull the white string) rudder.
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