the Highlands, 6

The population of all of Scotland is not quite 5.5 million. (By comparison, the population of Wisconsin, which no one considers to be very crowded, is nearly 6 million.) Polish nationals are the largest group of foreigners here: 92 000 Poles live in Scotland. (The next largest group of non-Scots are Irish men and women -- a mere 21 000.) In the Torridon, I hear the Polish accent among the staff not infrequently. Young, friendly, helpful. I've stopped asking "are you Polish" because I know they are and I don't want to remind them that their accent says it all. 

Good morning! 

Breakfast downstairs. A Polish woman is taking the orders. (I choose eggs benedict with salmon, spinach and a mushroom.)

As is the habit among staff here -- she engages me in some friendly chatter, focusing on my camera, which admittedly stands out in size.

Have you gotten some good pictures? -- she asks.

I nod enthusiastically, telling her about my evening scramble up the hill last night. The light was especially good then.

Oh, that must have been wonderful! I went up there as well, two days ago. Also in the evening. Did you see the lake from the top? (I did.) And the one on the other side?

Say what?

Perhaps you remember from yesterday's post that I kept going until I decided that the path is a never-ending thing, possibly leading all the way to the Isle of Skye (some 40 miles from here). Okay, maybe not that far, but still. I turned back after I thought I had reached the top. Apparently, had I gone just a bit further, I would have seen another view. On the other side of the mountain.

Damn.

Well, that pretty much sets the agenda for this day! Back up I go. In better shoes, with walking stick and with water!

It's my last full day in the Highland hills of Scotland and I want very much to use it in a productive way. I dont necessarily mean that I want to eek out every last mile on the hills. I want to think about how to cope with the drama of life back home. 

It all surrounds my mother's increasing distress and dissatisfaction, which she channels right at me. Constantly. (She calls me here as well, but I have allowed myself a shut-down of my phone for the duration of my Scottish trip.) It is useless to try to "solve" her problems because nearly all of them are of her own creation and she is no longer capable of absorbing information, advice, suggestions that would change the course of her days. She has degenerated into sitting in her chair all day and using the call button (for the staff) and the phone (to me) to express her displeasure. All... day... long.

At first, when this began several months ago, I was overcome with anxiety. Whereas before I could listen each day to her grumbles and then shut it off, now, the sheer constancy of her calls at all hours dragged me down. I had ideas about what might help her, but it's one of those things -- horse to trough, but what's the point if said horse absolutely will not drink? She just wants to vent, expressively, dramatically -- this is her sole activity. Nothing else interests her. (She does not want to vent to any of the other family member. My daughter tried in my absence. But my mother just wants it go to me.)

So my goal for my final walk up that hill is to devise strategies for coping, because I tell you, that stream of voicemail messages (I have so many here!) is bad enough, but the calls, once I return, will be worse.

Ed says -- shut it off in your head. Well, I'm pretty good at blocking life's dramas. Of channeling my energies toward a happy platform where peace prevails. But I need to get even better, because frankly, my mother may go on like this for a long time. And it does pull you down. Or at least it pulls me down.

[Post walk thoughts: strategy number one: talk to the staff about upping her mood medications. Strategy number two: allow more calls to go to voicemail. Strategy number three: shut off the phone for the night. Strategy number four: turn on the affirmation! -- yes mom, the nurses, social workers and aides are awful, they all neglect you, yes CNN is terrible in repeating stories, yes, it's horrible in your room, with a view to the woods and not to the courtyard, and yes, the arrangement stinks, yes, it's a miserable existence, yes, yes, yes, I hear you! What does it matter if none of it is true. Well, maybe CNN does repeat stories, what do I know...]

Okay, time to start my climb.

 

As yesterday, the beginning is beautiful. Forested. Pure heaven.

I find the berries again. My plant identifier assures me that they're European Bilberries (or European Blueberries -- take your pick). I ate one yesterday, I survived. I pick a couple dozen today!

It's so gorgeous all around me. I climb not far from the mountain stream -- its sound is bouncy but at the same time soothing.

And then I come to the waterfall. I saw it yesterday, between the trees. It doesn't photograph well so I let it go. Today, I see that there is a short path jutting out on a cliff. From the tip of it, you should see the falls without tree obstruction.

Did you know that I have horrible acrophobia? Ed discovered this in our first year of hiking in the Canadian Rockies. The trail went across a very steep slope of scree (loose rocks). We had to cross it to continue. I felt completely unstable. The slope went down sharply and panic struck. I couldn't go forward. I couldn't return either. Ed had to come out on his butt and guide me back, also on my butt, holding onto me the whole time. 

And now, to get that shot of the falls, I get down on my butt as well and inch forward. I get halfway there. And that's it. I cannot do it. Well, I suppose I could, but panic would overwhelm me. The sheer drop on three sides is too much. No photo!

I continue on the trail, getting above the tree line once again...

 

 

 

 

Passing the point where I turned back yesterday...

 

(looking back)

Climbing, still climbing, trying to get to that crest that will give me the views to the other side of the mountain.

I hear nothing except for the chirp of a Meadow Pipit.

It's empty, it's desolate, it's windy and now I'm winded too. I realize my lungs haven't quite gotten up to speed after their dreadful spring of pneumonia. And maybe there always will be that hesitation in climbing great elevations going forward. At the very least, I do know that hiking alone on empty and wild trails feels safe only if I feel happy doing it. After an added half hour of climbing, I am no longer happy. 

 

(looking back again)

 

 

(looking ahead) 

And so again, you're not going to get that photo of what's on the other side of the mountain, because I see that the trail goes straight up to get there there and I am not up for it. My legs are strong. I have the energy. But I do not have the will to continue.

I turn back and start the descent home.

(such beautiful European larch trees... I grew up with these in the village in Poland)

At the point where the path detours for a view of the falls, I see two women hikers. One is gingerly coming up the detour path without hesitation, the other is moving slowly with the help of two hiking poles.

 

 

 

She has knee problems, the first one tells me.

I laugh -- at least she made it to the ledge! I couldn't do it. Haven't the head for it.

The women are from Belgium They're not from the Torridon - just hikers, here on a lark. They ask what's up ahead on the big trail. I explain that there is supposedly a good view, as reported by my sportif twenty-something morning wait person, but that even after a stiff climb up the mountain, I could not reach it. I wasn't up for it.

You have to listen to your body! -- the one with the poles says. She's serious and laughing at the same time. 

I suppose at my age I do...

At OUR age! -- she responds. We're all in the same boat, no? (Turns out she is 69 and her nimble friend is 72.) She says -- this is enough for my knees. They go down. I give them some space then follow.

And I think this is the main difference between so many solo hikes in years past and solo hikes now: in the past, I would reach the goal for the day, no matter what. In Gargnano, I was winded and panting, but I wanted that summit and I got it! I can report countless such climbs. Now, it's different. Sometimes, I just wont be able to reach the summit. Not alone, on a mountain. I just wont always have the head for it.

Down I come. Pausing to look, to identify...

(a carpet of mountain wood-sorrel)

(my plant app tells me this mossy looking plant is a cranberry... could that be right??)

Then, not feeling tired yet, I walk over to the meadows that extend from the hotel to the shores and I say hello to the Highland cattle...

... and hope that I wont be tempted to have a piece of that meat for dinner tonight!

At the Torridon again...

(the symbol of which is a deer...)

 

... I eat lunch in the living room. Isle of Mull cheddar and chutney, on grain bread from the Cromarty Bakery. Funny, I had wanted to stop at the bakery (it's by Inverness), but gave up on the additional drive the day I flew in. I feel now my eating load is complete.

Well...

The kind staff person asks me -- don't you want a freshly baked scone today?

I think about it. I do want a scone! Maybe just with jam? No, make that with clotted cream and jam! And with tea!

When in Scotland, I cannot say no to a cream tea.

 (while George, Duke of Gordon, looks on)

An ever so slight layer of guilt overcomes me: I love Scotland's countryside. When am I next going to be here? What am I doing inside, chomping away on cheese sandwiches and cream splattered scones?

It's just a little over an hour to dinner. I go out for a walk.

Where to? Well, there's one last trail suggested by the maps of Torridon. They call it the Torridon trail, I call it the "seniors' walk." I mean, it's a loop and it is only a mile long, give me a break. 

The thing is, it is stunningly lovely. And just perfect for an evening predinner saunter.

 

Through the forest, then down to the very edge of the shoreline. Accompanied by the singing of a Song Thrush. Heaven indeed.

So short and yet so beautiful!

And there's an added bonus: the trail ends in the hotel's kitchen garden.

I thought I had explored it the very first night I was here, but I'd missed about 95% of it, it's that well hidden!

Tonight I walked it in its full glory.

I met another two women there -- they were nibbling on the strawberries and encouraged me to do the same. Who am I to refuse two sweet old ladies?!

Later, as I settled into the living room for my predinner Negroni, tonight with a floral gin...

... the bartender, who has been at Torridon for six years now, explained to me that they are working hard to reimagine the garden space (aka the kitchen garden). Maybe add a rose garden? Something else? 

I don't know, I really like it in its hodgepodge form. Had I found it earlier, I'm sure I'd sneak in with my book and spend at least an hour there.

The bartender (and  gin connoisseur!) himself is from France. An absolutely delightful guy (photographed yesterday on Ocean). Since I'm nearly at the end of my stay here, I'm asking more about the staff backgrounds. For example, I found out that there are actually only two Polish people on the team: my meal server, whom I had guessed as such, and someone on the cleaning staff. I asked the restaurant person if she liked Scotland -- she'd only been here a few months -- and she said yes! She'd worked for six years in England and she waited forever to find something good in Scotland. She has high standards!

At dinnertime, the waitstaff at Bo & Muc told me what to order. The West Coast mackerel, okay, fine. I liked it before, I'll have it again for an appetizer. And then, they all urged me to get the Beinn Eighe venison. (Beinn Eighe is part of the mountain massif I see out my window.) It's a freshly added preparation, with very fresh venison!

Well fine, but I saw a deer here yesterday...  Still, they were so insistent that I caved. (Served with a potato cake, celeriac and cabbage, and red currant sauce.

I definitely wanted something local, something Scottish, and this was as local and Scottish as they get. And it was fantastic! Really delicious! Since I am normally not a red meat eater, I feel like the times I do have it (always in restaurants, never at home), I want it to be worth the sacrifice (of animal life, of my feelings about eating red meat, etc). This one was well worth it.

For dessert, I ordered something that was like a Pavlova except with a Scottish twist: strawberries (from their garden) with cream and chunks of meringue. I love that mix and I was thrilled to see it as an option tonight.

No post dinner walk. I think I pushed it with the hikes just a little. My cough is finally getting better. I dont want to return home feeling more tired than when I first set out.

Besides, I want to spend as much time as I can looking out my window. It's that pretty out there, over the waters and up those dang steep mountains.

 

Tomorrow, I return to Inverness.

with love...

the Highlands, 5

At the darkest point of the night (maybe around 1 or 2 a.m.), the light still comes through...

(out my window)

 

 

Weather in the Highlands doesn't really set the pace for most who come here. Expecting the worst, you dont recoil when it arrives -- you just pull out appropriate gear and keep going. They have lots of pairs of Wellies for your use at the Torridon. Mud wont slow you down.

I've not had to give any of this much thought, because the weather has been unusually agreeable in the days I've been in the Highlands. Mostly cloudy, but not only. One sprinkle, but otherwise dry. Temps hovering in the 60sF (so upper teens C). But for my remaining time here, we enter the iffy territory that is so much the hallmark of Scottish weather. It might rain. Sometime in the course of the day. How long, when and how much? A big shrug. 

I get up to clouds outside. They multiply.

I switch around clothes. Tomorrow will be colder, I think. I'll save the warm socks and long sleeves for then. But it's all rather a guessing game.

Breakfast at the Torridon is predictably traditional. Eggs with that British trim of mushrooms, trout, tomato. Porridge (meaning oatmeal) with drams of whiskey. Toast in racks. You choose!

(I pick eggs with wild mushrooms and trout)

They, like every good hotel, are mindful of guest comments and a recurring theme on sites is the complaint that you have to wait too long for breakfast. Most hotels get this grumble at some point. The Torridon preemptively tells guests that the busiest time is between 8:45 and 9:15 and so if you want to avoid a wait, you should avoid that time slot. I and everyone else, therefore, came earlier! There wasn't really a wait, but it was funny to see everyone pack in quickly before what turned out to be a very quiet half hour.

And now what? They have kayaking options, but not Mondays and tomorrow promises to be windy and wet. (Scottish weather promises mean nothing, but still...) So how about a hike?

After a rather sedentary Sunday, I opt for the long forested hike. It's misty and drizzly as I set out. Perfect for a Highland forest!

The trail is 10 or 11 kilometers long and it has two possible add-ons if you want, for a grand total of 18 kilometers (maybe 11-12 miles). That seems to be not a big deal. Right? Right??

It's not a big deal, but for the gross mistake on my part.

It strikes me that so much of our anxiety and misery is of our own making. Not all of it, to be sure, but so much! I would say that this held true for me today, especially in the second half of my adventure. 

The thing is, I didn't take water. I thought I'd be gone no more than a couple of hours (I wasn't thinking). I didn't have my day pack. I didn't want to carry water. A heavy camera and a tiny cross bag were enough.  And very quickly I realized that this was a terrible mistake. Especially after the salty breakfast. And especially since I opted to do the add-ons. I walked a total of 4.5 hours, not excessively hilly but not flat either. (22 000 steps for those who measure life that way.) 

Initially I was fine. And especially while the path meandered through the forest. 

 

 

 

It's as if those mighty trees were watching over me. Their canopy is awesome. Their limbs embracing. Shielding from all harm. Don't you feel that way when you walk through a forest? I do.

(dense cloud cover)

(misty and wet)

(lobster traps? fish nets?)

A forest shares its calm with you if you let it. But once the path veered upwards toward a treeless ridge, suddenly I felt vulnerable and thirsty.

(From here, you can take a detour to a waterfall gushing from somewhere in that mountain)

(here it is!)

It's not a totally isolated trek. In the forest itself, I encountered three sets of hikers -- one Polish, actually, though we didn't exchange nationality information. One of the Scottish couples I met, paused to encourage me to do the addition that juts out into the water. Great views! -- she tells me. I was here 8 years ago and they were even better, because some trees have filled in the empty spaces since then, but still, definitely worth it! How could I say "no, I am limp from thirst, tired from not taking a pause..."? And for all I know, the views will be gone soon as trees grow even taller! So I took the extra path. And I did not regret it, especially since I survived in the end and drank about ten glasses of water the minute I got home. 

(yes, the view was worth the second detour)

(three photos when the sun poked through, just a little: )

I encountered no wildlife except at the very end. This guy. We eyed each other and once again I conveyed greetings from Wisconsin. He seemed mildly interested.

At the hotel again I sat down in their living room and ordered a cream tea: a pot of their blend, along with a freshly baked scone with homemade jam and clotted cream. (And LOTS of water.)

This was the time to learn more about the hotel. Because it really is a very carefully restored, special place. Family owned and cared for since it first went up as a hunting lodge back in 1887 for the Earl of Lovelace. He was an English dude and he did one thing that put him in the history books for many: he married Ada. This woman:

Ada was Lord Byron's only legitimate daughter and she was one spunky woman. Her bio tells me that she wrote the first computer algorithm. She was heavily into mathematics. Read about her here.

The Torridon house remained the family's hunting lodge until the 1960s, when it first opened as a hotel. (A road was built this way and suddenly a hotel was possible. Though even the staff here complain that the road is too narrow! Unless you drive a narrow car, you are going to slip off the pavement. There seems to be little interest in widening it, which is a shame.) In the 1990s the Torridon (then under a different name) was bought by the Gregory family and eventually, their daughter Rohaise married, and along with her husband, took over the place. A dynamic, modern couple! They know good food, they're absolutely committed to good service. You will notice this at the Torridon: people smile at you and offer a hand at every turn.

 

Evening: I join the throngs in the "living room" for drinks -- a Negroni for me, with yet a different gin. Scotland has probably as many gin varieties as it has whiskeys; I know none of them except the Botannical gin from Islay, but the bartender is quite the powerhouse of info on this stuff. He asks if I want a spicy Negroni, I say sure!

 

 

Then I walk over to the building next door, to eat at the casual restaurant again -- the Bo & Muc. Today's choice? Shetland Mussels first, then my one nod to fish and peas and potatoes: Shieldaig pollock with mashed peas and spuds (Shieldaig is a coastal village just up the road from Torridon). 

Oh, and Scottish Cranachan for dessert. I'd never heard of it, but apparently it's quite common here: cream, berries, oats and either a dash of honey or whiskey -- I'm not sure!

I'm done shortly after 8. And here's where I really did something totally nutty: I decided to go for a walk again. The evening is absolutely lovely! No more drizzle. The sun hasn't set yet. And yesterday's evening walk in the forest was so pleasant!

 

 

All that makes sense, but here's the really stupid part: I opted for the one trail I haven't done yet. The one that goes straight up the mountain to the back of us. I thought it was only about a mile and a half each way, but in fact it's a never ending path and more importantly, it's quite the incline. I wasn't even wearing my hiking shoes! No hiking stick either. Just me and my camera and my purse. All the way up.

(I think I recognizes these low bushes from my childhood days in the Polish countryside. One solo blueberry remains. Will I eat it? Of course I will.)

I should have stopped climbing, once I learned that this was no small piece of cake, but you know how it is -- just a little more, just a little more...

An hour and fifteen minutes later I finally acknowledged that this was insane, that the trail just keeps going without an end, or at least not one reachable by a 71 year old woman who has already hiked a dozen miles today and who is longing for a comfy chair or better yet, a comfy bed with a big quilt on top of it.

(looking back and down...)

 

 

So I did an about face and turned back. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The descent for me is always easier, though the rocky path and the poor shoe selection (I wore my Allbirds, which are meant for Paris streets not for Highland trails) threatened to twist my ankles and send me tumbling. Luckily I did neither and by 10 p.m. I was back at the hotel, feeling much relieved that this day ended without some major calamity.

I did learn something about myself: first, that I really am nutty and there's no limit to the craziness of the ideas that will pop into my head, but secondly  -- that I am way stronger than I think I am, my enduring cough notwithstanding. My watch tells me I walked 30 000 mountain steps today. I know many who would beat that by a mile, or indeed many miles, but for me, that felt good. Well, once I drank water and sat down in a comfy chair to rest.

And now it's night, though never totally dark.

What I have loved about both Lundies and the Torridon is the absolute quiet of the room. I'm sensitive to evening noise. Other people's TVs, thumps, squawks and groans aren't my favorite. If hotel reviewers write "thin walls," you can be sure I will look elsewhere for overnights. These two Highland hotels have been absolute gems in that regard. Total silence. Thick walls. Peace prevails. And in the mornings? Only the song of the Song Thrush out my window. But now? Just restful quiet.

with love...