DAY 76: Kinloch Rannoch to Blair Atholl

Tuesday 15th May 2007
Today: 17.5 miles
Total so far: 1125.1miles
Percentage Completed: 67.4%

(Click map to enlarge)

CRIKEY!

Drama! On the Challenge! Dramatic Pause...........

My mate Lord Elpus (aka Phil, husband to Miss Whiplash) has been having adventures with Weird Darren! (see the 'places to visit' at the side of this blog, for Darren's Blog)

It appears that Darren's walking partner, a highly experienced chap, had to drop out of the Challenge the night before he was due to start, leaving poor Darren solo all of a sudden. Phil, being the sort of chap he is, and Darren, being an all round good guy, realised that they could make their second day the same, so they met up at Tarbet on North Morar.

Now, as I understand it, and I have only had this from Miss Whiplash over the electronic telephone apparatus in my hotel room late last night ("What was he doing talking to other chap's wives late at night", I here you ask!!!) Darren suffered a recurrent bout of the flu he has been suffering from over the last month or so, which totally incapacitated him. Phil stayed with him for a day or so until the food ran out and Darren was getting in a worse state, totally incapable of keeping either food or water down and getting weaker all the time.

The weather was getting shitty, so Phil took the grid reference and shot off to get help. As I understand it, this was no mean feat in itself as they were miles from anywhere and it took a while and quite a bit of drama, for Phil to flag a car down to organise Darren's safe removal from the hill. The Mountain Rescue team advised a helicopter, and so poor Darren was airlifted out to Ft William hospital, where, the last I have heard, he is on a drip recovering from his ordeal.

So - my heartfelt best wishes go out to Darren and a huge round of applause to Phil for being an all round Super Hero (the Capitals Are Very Important Here!)

My own day pales into insignificance in comparison, but in brief - I left the wonderful hotel at ten, promptly bumped into Jeff, Colin & Andrew, had a coffee over the road from my hotel, and left again at eleven and made wonderful speedy progress to be in Blair Atholl by 5:15pm - having walked with the wind beneath my feet and sunshine on my shoulders.

I am camped up at the very precious Campsite at the Castle (the best Wanda has been pitched in her life!) and am now in the pub posting all these blogs to you all. I am drinking a very palatable pint or so of Moulin (a pretty beer.)

As I am now a whole day ahead of my schedule, I am taking a rest day tomorrow, or I won't see any of the other Challengers! Also, the Magnificent Derek is bringing me a food parcel tomorrow, so I shall not starve. Speaking of starvation: I seem to be wasting away! I took a look at myself in the hotel bathroom mirror yesterday evening - I look sort of the same but thinner. I shall try to weigh myself for the all important statistics. Having said that, I think my feet are getting bigger...

Oh well....

Looking up Glen Tilt (tomorrow's walk)