Mallaig 2025 - Day 1

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 15th 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 hotel in time for dinner that evening.

Jo and I stopped off at Glenfinnan in perfect time to catch the Jacobite Steam train cross the viaduct made famous in the Harry Potter films:

A train going through a valley AI-generated content may be incorrect.

The weather we had driven through had been punctuated by frequent heavy showers and we feared for those out on the afternoon walk but it transpired that they had got round dry – at least for the first half of the walk, after which some stopped while others carried on, finally getting wet on the final stretch. The first part of the walk was:

A map of a trail AI-generated content may be incorrect.

Our hotel – the West Highland (https://westhighlandhotel.co.uk/) – had fine views over the harbour and beyond, and furthermore also had Orkney Raven and Red MacGregor on cask. Our meals in the restaurant that evening were enormous – we couldn’t believe the size of the portions.

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