TGO Challenge 2018: DAY 10

Around twenty years ago after leaving Tarfside on the Challenge, Lord Elpus & I passed 'Cortina Cottage'. It was a small, unloved little house, with tired net curtains hanging in rotting softwood window frames. Over the intervening years the cottage slowly crumbled into disrepair at more or less the same rate as the blue Mark IV Cortina parked alongside. We were both quite fond of the place as it reminded us of our own mortality, as increasingly aches and pains replaced youthful vigour, and various surgical operations led to pieces of our own structures falling away.

Then one day, the Cortina disappeared and the cottage was transformed into a desirable well-loved little home. We were bereft! Was this an omen that we should hang up our hiking boots and let new, younger and fitter people take our slots walking down the North Esk to the coast? Around this time Phil had a few bouts of life-saving surgery that whipped out seemingly most of his internal organs.

New wind farms were springing up all over the Highlands of Scotland. They were now a massive barrier along the west-facing wall of the Monadh Liath. Our own creeping decrepitude and the increasing industrialisation of the wild land in Scotland gave us pause for thought. We talked at length on whether or not to continue applying for the TGO Challenge. Then, rather suddenly my own health took a dramatic turn for the worse and my brother David stepped in heroically, giving one of his own kidneys to me to save my life.

It was all traumatic stuff.

How does all this fit in with today's walk eastwards?

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Well, this morning we came across this year's Cortina Cottage: An abandoned home, slowly crumbling back into the landscape. Phil and I are now back to as healthy as we're ever likely to be and so we rather hope that someone will come along shortly to breathe new life into this beautiful house and make it their home. There are dozens of places just like this all over the Highlands of Scotland as the slow drain of the population to the cities continues. Rather than planting industrial structures in these remote communities, surely the way to renew the Highlands is to look at ways to reverse the population drift.

The present Scottish Government is overseeing a fall in their previously excellent record in education, health and the economy. The Financial Crash of 2008 and the sudden drop in the price of oil certainly did no favours to Scotland. However, the present administration seems to have as its raison d'etre the break up of the United Kingdom and independence for Scotland, despite the last referendum on the subject being a 'once in a lifetime' vote that it lost, admittedly by the narrowest of margins. It seems to those of us south of the border that the Scottish Parliament spends an inordinate amount of time on this single issue. Perhaps, now the chickens are coming home to roost, the Scottish voters will wake up and realise they are being served very badly by this single-issue party.

With the present status quo I can't see how these rural communities will survive.

*****

After leaving our wonderful overnight spot we splash across the burn and strike out, looking for the path Ordnance Survey has marked on the map. Of course, there is no discernable path that we can find and so we head off and make our own way up and around the shoulder, to harder ground where eventually a faint trace of the path appears. It must be years and years since the OS last made a ground survey of the paths in Scotland, because their most recent maps are woefully out of date with what is actually on the ground.

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We have just under four miles to walk along the A924 along Glen Brerechan, but apparently this is just too much tarmac for our backwoods compadre, Mad'n'Bad. Halfway along this delightfully empty-of-traffic road he decides to shoot off on a muddy track with the aim of meeting us when we get to the point where both routes rejoin.

That's all well and good. It is certainly quieter without his size fourteens flapping onto the tarmacadam but we missed the old boy. Even more so when we came across a new venture on the right hand side of the road - an art gallery and coffee shop!

After a few cups of coffee, I admit to Lord E that I am feeling slightly guilty as Andy will be at the confluence of the two routes waiting for us, and here we are tucking into excellent coffee and wonderful cake.

The ever resourceful Lord Elpus takes out his mobile telephone, and texts Andy to let him know our situation. I'll let you see the resulting exchange:

Andy is obviously another chap who wastes no time. Phil and I spend a happy time drinking more coffee and eating more cake that can possibly be healthy but we leave considerably happier and heavier. When we arrive at our designated rendezvous there is not a sign of the lightweight Andy. Indeed, we next bump into him at our evening's destination.

We're now following the rather anodyne Cateran Trail. It's one of those walks designed to suck reasonably active tourists into walking parts of Scotland that would otherwise be ignored by more adventurous walkers. It follows nice scenery, but on the whole leaves you feeling a little bit 'meh'.

The wooden signage is more interesting than the trail itself:

Towards the top of the pass - An Lairig - there's a lovey garden centre wooden shelter where you can get indoors (the outdoors is so over-rated)  for  time out of the wind to make a brew.

After a rather good late lunch / early afternoon tea we brave the outside world once more only to bump into a Challenger coming out of the wilds from Goodness-Knows-Where. And he is a damaged Challenger to boot. He had taken a purler somewhere along his route but has bravely carried on, with a Man-Plaster concealing his horrific injuries.

Descending to the Spittal of Glenshee, we take particular care not to cross Northing 70, which unfortunately means a stroll down the empty 'A' road to our turn off rather than following the more pleasant Cateran Trail through the fields.

The stroll down the road, if I'm brutally honest, is a little pedestrian; the Cateran Trail would have made for a better walk on the other side of the glen, but our predetermined 10km corridor precluded that choice. It was of little consequence, as it is just a short stroll to our turn-off to the Christian Centre where we are staying the night:

This particular branch of Christianity appears to be of the Hair Shirt and Cold Showers variety. Why they chose this particular spot in scotland for their country retreat I've no idea but it's in a fairly gloomy location. Perhaps some brighter render would have cheered the place up a little? They had very kindly welcomed these heathens to their bosom and so we are very grateful. After all, it's indoors, with a shower and beds.

Andy is already here of course. He's been here for hours, and has finished his ablutions, washed and ironed his shreddies, and is looking forward to Lord Elpus' pre-arranged delivery of food and drink from Ocado/M&S/Waitrose or whoever it is that Phil has conjured from the middle of sod-all. It should be noted that this was the first time we had witnessed Andy's Gorblimey Trousers. Apparently he had won them in a card game with Croydon. I think Croydon was the winner here.

 

Just as Phil and I arrived, the delivery arrived too. Many months ago, Phil had arranged for a supermarket delivery service to support our venture with a *very* decent bottle of red, and some steak and kidney pie with gravy, and some fillet steak for the red-in-tooth-and-claw Andrew. There were the supporting vegetables to bulk it out to something approximating healthy eating. It's fair to say that we had been looking forward to this repast all day.

There was a hand-written scribbled note to say that Andy's Aberdeen Angus fillet steak was still stomping around the Highlands somewhere and the the Deliveroo Driver had not had time to lasso the beast to the ground and cut off the required cut of meat. How Phil and I laughed!

ANDY: THE SLOUGH OF DESPOND, AND A DECENT BOTTLE

Despite being Complete and Utter Bastards, we took pity of the wretched Mad'n'Bad and shared out our pie with the poor unfortunate. I know. You would not have either, but Phil insisted.

I will point out here, that Phil's engineering expertise came up trumps this evening. Our lovely bottle of wine comes with a cork; None of this screwtop nonsense for Lord E. Our only problem is that none of the party has a corkscrew, and there is none provided in the kitchen equipment. A disaster was averted by the ever resourceful Phil. He very patiently unscrewed one screw from a very heavy door hinge, and screwed it firmly into the cork. He them used the closing door jamb to secure the screw-head as he pulled the bottle away from the jamb. Et, Voila! A perfectly opened bottle of very decent wine. He of course re-screwed the screw into the heavy hinge so all was well once again.

We slept jolly well. Nothing to do of course with the wine and beers...