thanks for the advice on Strath Rusdale

have just got back from an incredible week in Sutherland, we were rewarded for still going despite the forecast by a week of sunshine and tailwinds

pics here

Strath Rusdale:

Looks fantastic. Where did you sleep? I’m guessing you didn’t have full camping gear in there. Going to try and do something similar this summer.

hotels/b&bs and Carbisdale Castle SYHA

i can’t get enough of northern Scotland

so that’d be

Inverness
Tain
Bonar Bridge
Lochinver
Richonic
Carbisdale
Inverness

Some absolutely superb photos there. They remind me that, while some folk are still planning their foreign holidays, I’m still in love with, and desperate to see every inch of, my own.

Thanks for sharing

Aye, it’s hard living up here…

Good photographic essay, makes me want to jump on my bike and go for a wee ride.

The hills may be steep but it’s made up for by the nice cooling headwinds 🙂

thanks, no worries.

what I find so great about making the effort to go that far north is that so few other people do. it’s a toss up between something like a Scotland end to end with various add ons or France by ferry/bike for the summer trip and Scotland is looking good at the moment!

I found myself stomping up climbs with a sense of anticipation to what was around the next headland/over the next summit

Nice pics. Felt kinda smug the other day when some one had the chance to do Thetford on a work trip. I can do anything between Aviemore , Wick and Aberdeen if I put the bike in the van!

The weed in your garden need attended too 😆

Fantastic photos of one of my favourite parts of the country – inspirational stuff 🙂

Beautiful!

What roads did you take out of Inverness?

Oh, nice, very envious.

thanks for the comments

13thfloormonk – followed sustrans route 1 out of town then north east into and back out of the Black Isle to Dingwall. Then headed along the coast and over to Tain which was a real surprise, i think some of the forestry there is as close as I have seen to old growth natural Scottish forest

Absolutely stunning, doesn’t get better than that. Can hardly wait till June when we are packing up and making our annual road trip north. Totally agree, there’s so much in this country to see. 😀

Aye it’s a bonnie place all right

my spiritual home

Really nice photos and an excellent distraction – currently further north and stuck offshore!
Fantastic weather and the beaches look great. Takes me back to boyhood holidays up there… photo essay cheered me up no end. Ta!

here’s the route for those interested

[EDIT] changed to correct route

superb set of photos there Mike, looks like you had a great week 8)

thanks

we did 🙂

Michael, these are brilliant photos which really capture the emptiness of Sutherland. I love the one of the stove with Ardvreck Castle in the background.

Looks like you got pretty good weather as well – I spent the same week riding around Fort William area and it was… mixed, shall we say.

Glad you enjoyed it – looks like the effort paid off!

Looks great.

How many miles was it in total?

280 miles, 21000ft of climbing. I’d give you more stats but my gps is playing up and won’t give me the details.

we did between 43 and 53 a day, I’d love to have had the time to extend it up to the north coast. there’s always next time.

Michael – I’m planning a North West Coast tour later this year. Probably starting at Lochcarron, taking in all the squiggly bits to Lairg and then heading for either Thurso, JoG or Lairg. I only hope I get your weather 🙂

sounds great, I really want to investigate resources as to which of the marked passes on the OS maps are actually navigable without monster pushes and also which of the fire roads link up, they are all numbered so a map would be an awesome tool

Ah – I’ll be going on road all the way…

As for the off road “passes” it seems to be a bit of a lottery. Geograph is a good site, as is just asking on here.

there are a few places where being able to pop over one of the passes opens up a whole new area, but the roads are so quiet most of the time anyway.

that geograph site is amazing, but i just want to go back now 🙁