Well I needed the pasta in the Lasagna thats for sure. The hills out of Melvich towards BettyHill were phenomenal. Both James and I have aching knees to show for it. We could probably have managed a bit better if we hadn't had hurricane Betty trying to blow us back to John O'Groats.
We were however delighted to find that once we turned off the 'main' road at Bettyhill there was the most gorgeous 21 mile ride to our destination along the famous Strath Naver which is a lovely river running down to the sea from Loch Naver. The scenery was beautiful and the best bit was that although our map profile had shown some steep climbs on this run there was none. It would have been perfect except that the wind sussed out that we'd changed direction Southwards and swung around with us to try and push us back into the North Sea.
The last 10 miles were painful with our knees and general weariness but we made it to The Bed and Breakfast, Altnaharra. Theres about 5 houses here, a school and The Altnaharra Hotel to which we repaired after dinner to have a pint of Tennants and a dram of the local Balblair whisky.
Mandy and Lindsay Smith are the most fantastic hosts and I can't recommend this place enough. Lindsay put our bikes away for us and said if we just dumped our wet stuff down he'd get them dry for us. Mandy greeted us with biscuits and coffee and presented us with a lovely chicken dinner. A top place to stay. Except for the killer midges that is. It's a bit worrying when they say they've only 'lost' 12 days to midges, meaning that they basically can't even go outside!
Tomorrow should be an easier ride once we've conquered the 2 1/2 mile climb up towards The Crask Inn.
Fingers crossed the rain is absent, the wind is compliantly behind us and our bodies recover overnight to have some renewed energy.
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