I woke up like this

Day seven of an early-spring bikepack through the Scottish Highlands

We awoke in a bank of cold fog, our first gray morning of the trip. The group was incredulous — isn’t it always sunny in Scotland? Where did these clouds come from?

This day — Earth Day — would be our last of pedaling. We had one more day to spare, but the forecast for Sunday was downright harrowing — up to an inch of rain, 20-30 mph winds, and a high temperature of 38 degrees. In the past few days, nearly every local we met made a comment about the snow coming next week. Although we set our dates in December, we couldn’t have planned our schedule better if we’d had a crystal ball.

Even though we truncated our trip, the last day would still be short and cruisy. We had 42 miles with 2,280 feet of climbing to close our loop in Inverness, mostly on mellow paved back roads near the Moray Firth coast. Given our abundance of time, we took the opportunity to make all of the possible tourist stops. We ambled around the grounds of Brodie Castle, a 16th-century structure. Although I failed to take a photo, I enjoyed the abundance of daffodils, the only spot of color on this gray early-spring Saturday.

We stopped in Nairn for lunch and a visit to the beach, where I briefly rode along the sand and dipped my wheels in the North Sea. This bike has now tasted the Atlantic Ocean, the Pacific Ocean (in California), and the Indian Ocean (in South Africa) — a distinction I am proud of for my 11-year-old Moots Mooto-X YBB that is still up for touring the world.

The day wrapped up breezily with more touring of the Scottish countryside, enjoying the antics of spring lambs.

A dramatic railroad bridge of Colloden Road.

Amber made a point of stopping to take photos of funny road signs. Humps for yards! Humps for days!

An ongoing discussion during our trip was how we never saw any squirrels, or other mammals for that matter. Eventually, we caught glimpses of a few of the red deer that have apparently overrun old-growth forests amid of lack of natural predators. But, with the exception of an abundance of birds, it does seem the wildlife in Scotland is fairly sparse.

This map shows the route we took, more or less (we did end up cutting out a few of the “junket” tours when our days proved slower and tougher than they looked on paper. It ended up being 292 miles with 22,336 feet of climbing. The route is a scenic tour of the Highlands with a mixture of singletrack, doubletrack, bike path, gravel roads, “singletrack” paved roads, and a few (minimal) highway miles. It’s reasonably easygoing with enough challenging terrain thrown in to keep the adventure spicy. (I’d call it medium spice. It’s not a cruiser ride, but it’s not the Colorado Trail either.) If anyone is interested in giving it a go, e-mail me and I will send you the files.

We arrived back in Inverness on Saturday night. The city was bustling with bikers — as it turned out, there was a big road race the following morning. The Etape Loch Ness is a “must-do” 106-kilometer cycle sportive around Loch Ness. Apparently, 6,000 cyclists from 20 different countries compete in the event. We joked about signing up last minute to race the roadies on our mud-caked, bag-loaded mountain bikes, but we were pretty sure we wouldn’t have been able to make the cutoffs. Anyway, it was effort enough to hoist ourselves out of bed in the morning to watch the poor roadies in their thin tights and clipless shoe covers rolling into the finish after 65 miles of cold rain and wind.

Danni and Amber decided to relax in the afternoon, but I thought it wouldn’t be a proper Scottish tour unless I rode my bike in at least a little bit of cold rain. I headed out for a 17-mile spin along the River Ness. The storm was spotty with intense squalls. One minute, I’d be pedaling along the lovely canal without a care in the world. The next, I’d be hunched all the way over my handlebars with needles of hard rain tearing into my scalp as a relentless blast of wind threatened to push me backward. And I could not stay warm in my rain layers, even while pedaling. It made me think just how difficult and potentially unworkable this trip would have been if we’d actually gotten the weather we were expecting. We were unbelievably lucky.

I’m so grateful to Danni and Amber for making the commitment, doing most of the planning, and encouraging me through my winter of mental health struggles to make this adventure happen. How lucky am I to know two strong women who are not just willing but stoked to spend a week riding bikes over mountains and through bogs just to explore Scotland? Thank you, friends. I had a wonderful time.