We haven't had a phone signal for the last few days, hence the lack of blogs. Although, having said that, I didn't write one yesterday, as I was too grumpy.
Since my last blog, which was mainly slagging off midges, we have discovered that the midges I spent so long slagging off were only the tip of the midge iceberg.
Yesterday we woke up to the sound of rain on the tent. Now, I know that the slightest drizzle sounds torrential when you're under canvas, but this was bad. We waited an hour or two, and it didn't stop, so we got up anyway. Within seconds we were bombarded by the midges. Not like the previous night, which was bad but just about bearable, but so bad that we couldn't even have breakfast. As some of you will know, if I don't have breakfast then the world must have ended or something even worse.
We packed up and set out onto the water in foul moods. Within about 10 metres of the shore, all the midges were gone and everything was calm and tranquil if a bit rainy. So we had a bag of mini cheddars and a twix which made us feel a bit better. A cup of tea would have worked wonders though.
We tried to have several breaks during the day, and each time it was either throwing it down with rain, or we were bombarded by midges. Not very relaxing.
We made it to the other end of the loch. The weather was OK. Quite a lot of rain but no wind so the rain didn't really bother us. We felt quite privileged to spot not one but two ospreys and an osprey nest! I won't say where abouts in case any egg thieves are reading (before anyone gets offended, this is a public blog). The ospreys were very protective and spent a long time circling over the boat screeching at us and generally checking us out and being intimidating. No dive bombing fortunately.
We camped on the opposite shore near the other end of the loch. And this is where we truly learnt about the legend of the Scottish midges. I've been coming to Scotland for at least 15 years, and have never really had much trouble with the midges. I've always thought that people who whinged about them were just being drama queens. And maybe they were. Or, maybe they experienced a body covering cloud of them that they just couldn't escape.
I'll stop going on about it now, suffice to say that we had to eat our dinner walking briskly to out pace them, and I'll post photographic evidence when I get back home to broadband.
Today was far better. We had breakfast (a bit midgey but not too bad), and have had a great day on the loch. It was raining when we woke but it stopped at about 9am and the day has been lovely - dry and still.
We had somewhat ambitious plans today, which I am pleased to report that we achieved! We decided we wanted to make it right back to the end of the loch near where we left the car, and camp on the island we stayed at the first night for two nights. This is because there were hardly any midges there, and we like the idea of having a base camp for the last couple of days and not have to keep packing and unpacking.
We stopped for lunch about half way down the loch on an island with a ruined castle dating from 1286 or something like that. We would have loved to have camped there but it wasn't the right time of day. The island was unoccupied and we were free to explore the castle. Which meant doing all the things you're not normally allowed to do in ruined castles, like climbing crumbling staircases and walls. There was a perfect camping spot inside the castle on a bowling green flat piece of grass next to a huge fireplace which had obviously been used for a few campfires.
We had a nice relaxing lunch on the beach on the island with no rain or midges!
Then a long slog back up the loch. It was tough going and we had all sorts of aches and pains. By about 7pm the end was in sight and we were feeling pretty good about the day.
The loch was like a mirror. Now that's a comparison that I've heard used many times, but today it really was. The reflections were clearer in the water than the real view. It was incredibly surreal. It was like we were paddling on a pool of mercury. It made us feel dizzy at times because it was like being in a plane looking down, except everything was upside down.
To make it even more spooky, to our left was reflections of blue sky and fluffy white clouds, and to our right, angry grey clouds. I half expected the waters to open up and swallow us into hell (especially after the anti god blog!). They didn't, and we made it to our island to find it unoccupied and just as we left it.
We've set up camp and have spent the evening watching the sun set. There are no midges and it isn't raining. The only small problem is we've finished the wine.
Tomorrow we are having a chilled out day exploring the islands and castles this end of the loch. And probably going to the wine shop on the mainland.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Location:Loch Awe
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