Day 9, January 19

Saturday morning, from 6 clock is here operation. All with their dogs. I admire this little bridge, which is completely useless for two hours at high tide – just a work of art in the landscape. It was a night of nightmares: The big dog, who could easily put his mouth around my knee and which I could hardly get rid of and finally locked up somewhere. The ride on the metro up the hill, although I had bought a ticket, had forgotten it in the machine and promptly had to pay a heavy penalty. On the return trip the same thing, but this time with no ticket and lots of other weird stuff about a stolen bike, which I first thought was mine, via a ladder to a platform that tilts the more it gets fuller and therefore sometime unattainable …

It was an uncomfortable morning, drizzle and a wind that goes through the bone and limb. I avoided any stopover and went straight north to the Highlands. Apart from a stopover at a smaller hole, which sought to hide its shores very discreetly in the fog. The afternoon showed that the decision to continue was correct. The Highlands welcomed me with sunlit peaks. I thought it was time to go back to a campsite and read about a place near Aviemore. A good day’s stage. Disappointing, although a relatively normal campsite – not a mobile home ghetto like some others – but I found a lot of 24 pounds for a pitch, a loo and a shower. The lady at the reception was probably the same and she recommended me to go to a pub nearby, the Old Bridge. If you eat or drink something, you can stand for nothing. I would not have expected such a beautiful place! A quiet residential street, the place right on the banks of a river, for the photographers very romantic with bridge and moonlight. In short, parking is ok, but there is no table left to eat. Okay, I still have duck from yesterday. I then rinsed it with one or two local beers.