Suilven

[kiloran]

Yes, Sandwood Bay is stunning. Spent a week lugging materials (doors, floor joists, cement) in to a bothy, walking along Sandwood Bay on each trip.

Well Done!

Oh, and one of the lasses carried in a wicker chair!


High-class bothy, that

--kiloran

[Dod101]

Dod - some of the improvements are impressive, others less so. The Kylesku Bridge is impressive. The Ballachulish bridge is brutalist.

All we Scots can indulge in a bit of nostalgia now and again. My main regret about the Kylesku Bridge which I agree is elegant is that it has drawn so many to the Inn at Kylesku that it is almost impossible to get a room or even a table to eat nowadays without booking six months in advance and that I refuse to do. The NC500 has a lot to do with it as well of course.

BTW can somebody say how long it takes to walk in to Sandwood Bay from the nearest car park?

Dod

[kiloran]

BTW can somebody say how long it takes to walk in to Sandwood Bay from the nearest car park?
Dod

It's 4 miles or so along the track starting between Blairmore and Balchrick, so 60-90 minutes
https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@58.51333 ... authuser=0

--kiloran

[Dod101]

Thanks kiloran. Even this ancient could manage that (and back of course!) It is a place I have always wanted to get to but the opportunity has never presented itself. I love the west coast (well from say north of Oban!)

Dod

[panamagold]

Yes, Sandwood Bay is stunning. Spent a week lugging materials (doors, floor joists, cement) in to a bothy, walking along Sandwood Bay on each trip.

Well Done!

Oh, and one of the lasses carried in a wicker chair!

High-class bothy, that

--kiloran

As a foreigner I needed to google bothy.

[ten0rman]

Hi folks,

Thanks for all the suggestions. Unfortunately none of them fit my 45 year old or thereabouts memory. I had a look using Google StreetView & the associated aerial view all along the road from John 'O Groats to Durness and then down the west coast going round all the roads we might have been round but to no avail. All of which is now making me wonder if it might be somewhere else, such as Skye, especially as I have a photo which until Google Images corrected me, I thought was on the top road (it was actually Old Man of Storr). I've had a quick Google around Skye, but to no avail.

FWIW, I still think it's way up north.

There is another possibility, apart from the passage of time, in that perhaps due to (re-?) development, the relevant area has been altered: there is at least one possible place where the Google map shows the possibility of a main road realignment as there appears to be the remnants of the old road still existant. Another possibiity is that Google simply has not been down the original road, eg at Kylescu northern side where the original road, although still existant is not accessible.

So, thanks for the ideas - it looks like another distant memory doomed to remain just that.

Mention of the A6 brings back some memories: the Six O'Clock news in winter and "The A6 at Shap Fell is closed due to stuck lorries". Travelling up from West Riding of Yorkshire via the A65 to the Kendal one way system, then up Kendal Main Street - left hand lane for Windermere and the Lake District, right hand lane for A6 and Shap. And that was when it really struck home that we were off on a great adventure - which in some ways it was back then in the 1960's. A6 to Carlisle - a name on a map, then over the Southern Uplands to Glasgow and beyond - yet another name on a map. Little did I realise that my life would end up being involved with Cumbria and the Cumberland Hospital at Carlisle.

Must stop this reminiscing.

Regards,

ten0rman

[Clitheroekid]

Anyway, a query. In 1970 girlfriend & I did the grand tour - up the east coast, along the top, and down the West Coast. I have a memory of the road somewhere on the west coast dropping down a hill into a cove with a lovely sandy beach and then climbing up the other side to get out of it. Does that bring anything to mind? And yes, I know it's a long shot so I won't be too bothered if no-one can recognise it.

I wondered if you might be thinking of the B8008 that runs along a lovely series of beaches near the famous White Sands of Morar - https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@56.93939 ... 312!8i6656

[ten0rman]

Hi CK,

No it definitely wasn't that road. I do know that road, or rather I did when it was the A830 to Mallaig. We used to take our caravan to Arisaig in the 1980's and go into Mallaig. I remember going for a midday meal at the HeatherLea Hotel (appears to be a B&B place now - maybe it was then). We used to sit outside our caravan just after midday meal with the binoculars trained on the skyline towards Arisaig waiting for the puffs of smoke denoting the steam train leaving Arisaig station for Mallaig, then watch it as far as possible. On occasion we would go to cutting to see it.

Two bad memories though - left behind a pair of 10 x 50 House Of Holland binoculars - I know exactly where I left them - on a fence post near to where we had our caravan. The other was when my daughter fell on the rocks and cut her head open just above her eye. I've never gone across rocks as fast as I did then. We bathed it, and kept it clean with plasters and thankfully it healed up and left a faint scar.

Thanks anyway for the suggestion. I think it's going to one of those things which will never get sorted now.

Regards,

ten0rman

[nimnarb]

Thanks anyway for the suggestion. I think it's going to one of those things which will never get sorted now.

Regards,

ten0rman


Never say never.............go and find it, a bit like Masquerade and when you do, you will have your pot of gold, plus what an adventure.

[nimnarb]

Thanks anyway for the suggestion. I think it's going to one of those things which will never get sorted now.

Regards,

ten0rman


Never say never.............go and find it, a bit like Masquerade and when you do, you will have your pot of gold, plus what an adventure.