Banchory Veterans' Hill-walkers

Only 10 of us today – Gordon left early this morning to drive over to Banchory to attend his daughter’s and grand-daughter’s birthday parties. Sunday’s plan was a train ride to Fort William. We all declined the chance of taking the Jacobite Steam Train – mostly due to the extortionate prices – and just made the 90 minute journey in 2 standard Scotrail carriages. There was a mild bit of panic at the start as we noticed that virtually all the seats had reserved tickets on them – and none of the passengers had been able to reserve seats. It transpired however that all the reservations started at Fort William so no sweat. Initial plans for coffee when we arrived at FW were again disrupted due to the designated café being exceptionally busy and short-staffed. Some stayed while others moved on. The walkers were doing a circuit of Cow Hill so, after coffee, Jo and I decided to go to the start of this walk, which involved a climb up through some fairly grubby housing estates. The others ...

Saturday morning and we were heading to the small ferry/former fishing boat that would take us to Inverie on the remote Knoydart peninsula – only accessible by sea unless you’re tough enough to hike over mountains and boggy ground, camping out for 2 or 3 nights – there are no roads. Here’s our transport for the day arriving at Mallaig harbour: This was our approach to Knoydart: You can see the small community around the pier. There are now reckoned to be approx. 120-140 permanent residents – a number that has increased substantially since the community buyout in 1999:   Our first call was intended to be for coffees but we discovered that the only café only opens Monday to Friday so we trudged on, passing the Old Forge, the most remote and inaccessible pub in the country. However we were amazed to discover that it was Pride weekend in Knoydart – everywhere was bedecked in rainbow colours. We discovered coffees were available in the Community Hall, however, so we grabbe...

Jeb’s plan for the first full day was a walk along the shores of Lake Morar to Tarbet (one of many places by that name – and not Tarbert), catching the ferry back. First of all, however, they jumped on the train for the short journey to Morar. Those participating lined up for a team photo at the start of the walk: It was a fairly long and tricky haul, I’m told, with several precarious crossings of fast-running burns etc., but eventually Tarbet bay came into view: Showery weather meant it was a day for rainbows: Nigel’s stats for the walk were: Meanwhile, Jo and I checked out the lovely Bakehouse then explored a bit more of Mallaig in the morning, followed by a drive out to Loch Morar shoreside, then the Silver Sands, Arisaig and back to Mallaig for the same circular walk that the others had done the previous day. We also had a lovely rainbow as we began the descent from our walk: Here’s our afternoon stats: We all gathered in the evening for pre-dinner drinks ...

Jeb was this year’s organiser for our annual walking weekend and, having been before, he was keen to show us the delights of Mallaig and Lochaber on what was our 15 th year. We started this with the latter half of the West Highland Way in 2010 and have kept it going every year since, with the exception of the Covid-affected 2021. 21 people have now played some part with Ken (naturally) the most prolific having attended all 15. Dave and I have done 12, Gordon 11 and Ian Sharp 10 with the rest in single figures. This year Andy formed the advance guard, arriving in Mallaig directly from a trip down south with Hazel. On Thursday morning Ken, Dave, Gordon, Stewart, Nigel, Jeb and Vicki all made their various ways west in time for a shortish afternoon walk round Mallaig. Post-op I was unable to join the walks this year but as I already had a double room booked and paid for, Jo and I decided we would use it as a weekend break. Steve couldn’t leave Banchory until later but got to our hote...

We had 5 willing and able participants for walk 4 of 2025. Researched by Dave, it entailed a 2 bus trip for Nigel, Jeb and me on what turned out to be the hottest day of the year. As usual, the 201 had heaters blasting away and we were stuck on the sun-facing right hand side of the bus for the trip to Aberdeen. We had the pleasure of Ian Sharp's company on this journey as he was meeting up with an old pal for lunch. We met up with Ken, Dave and Ruby at Aberdeen bus station and we all jumped on the no.3 bus for the short trip to Cove. Jeb was totally unburdened by any backpack containing fluids etc and was relying on a pit stop at the Cove Bay Hotel to stock up so the rest of us, ungrudgingly, joined him: The narrowish coastal path was just behind the hotel so off we set: It's basically a clifftop walk and the contours of the land meant we often zig-zagged our way north along the coast. These were some of the views we had: Ken and Jeb wanted to have a closer look and, like Yes, ...