The Hebridean Way - 2

The Lonely Planet guide to the Scottish Highlands describes the Isle of Harris as having a lunar landscape. The Hebridean Way cycling leaflet says the Harris section is “moderate/difficult” and talks about the hills of North Harris (but doesn’t mention the south!) So I did something bad. Unintentional but bad. During the first couple of days on the island when it was too windy to ride, I ended up driving some of the route. This was a mistake as I now knew what was about to come.

There were a couple of options for the ride to cover the South of Harris – the first would be to ride up and back. The second was to ride in a loop – covering about 50 really hilly miles, of which only about 20 were on the Way. Either of these options might have been ok if time was on my side but the wind has made cycling difficult and I needed to make progress up the island otherwise I’m going to run out of time. So I devised a third option – put my bike at the start, drive 25miles up the route (as it was a logical place to stop) and I catch the bus back to my bike to then do the ride. 

I locked my bike to a bench at the “Butty Bus” having done a deal with Mr Butty Bus to look after my bike in return for me buying a butty before I started my ride. It had taken a while to get out of him whether he’d be open or not when I got back, but luckily he was as I was counting on the bacon butty to get me up those hills.

That section wasn’t as bad as I thought it was going to be and I made it over the moon of Harris without any problems before deciding to carry on past my van to tackle the biggest hill on the whole of the Way. I’m glad I hadn’t driven that one first as I probably would have wondered if I’d get up without walking but I plodded up, and then came straight back down the same way to where I’d parked, another 30 miles completed. 270 miles ridden, and about 80 miles along the Way. It’s going to be tight to get it finished as there are gale force winds and snow forecast for this week, but as long as it doesn’t last all week I should just about get there.