Skye

With 'the walk' cancelled we are off to the NW and Skye. I can, I think, carry a light sack and maybe even do a one night backpack - my torn back muscle is recovering at last.

We're in Glen Nevis at present and, with its fine summit snow field, Sgurr a' Mhaim is a grand sight this evening.

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Local

Having a local walk without a rucksack to see how my torn back muscle feels. Fine it seems, except for slight dull pain. Maybe it will, after all, be OK for our planned West to East in a week's time, but then again there's a big difference between a stroll across fields and carrying a pack across Scotland, crawling in and out a tent etc.

And maybe I risk losing the rest of the summer by worsening the injury.

It will be a mad rush to deliver parcels if we do decide to go.

Problems, problems

Last Wednesday we set off in the motorvan for a short break and to deliver food parcels for our forthcoming backpacking trip, but it wasn't long before it was obvious that there was a problem: the engine simply wasn't functioning as it should. It's a VW 5 cylinder 2.5TDI and the 'T' bit just wasn't working. We eventually got off the motorway and home to our local excellent garage who noted that there was very little exhaust gas coming from the tail pipe: it was being vented into the engine compartment. Maybe a collapsed catalytic converter they thought, but in any event they are fitting it in at lunch time today for a more thorough investigation. If it can't be fixed this afternoon there is a possibility that our backpacking trip will have to be cancelled, since I'll need to take any date they can give if we are to have the motorvan for the rest of the summer.

Yesterday as we wandered the hills we pondered what we could do instead of our planned walk. Perhaps various short backpacking trips could be fitted in before the van was due at the garage for repair? Knoydart or a trip to Rum, maybe. We could salvage something!

However, for no apparent reason, this morning I have pulled a muscle in my back. I say 'for no apparent reason' but in fact it's the reappearance of an old injury. So, I'm sitting here feeling rather pessimistic about things because, even if the motorvan were fixed today, I couldn't risk a long backpacking trip which is now less than two weeks away - at the moment I can hardly move without pain let alone carry a rucksack. It doesn't feel quite as bad as the initial injury did back in 2009 so maybe I'll recover more quickly, but with a B&B to cancel and no parcels delivered a decision will have to be made in the next few days.

Fortunately the Fuizion food has a 'use by' date of 2014 so that won't go to waste but that's about the only positive thing I can think of saying to finish this dreary posting.

Snow in the 'west'

After several days of buying bits and pieces of gear for our forthcoming coast-coast to walk, plus organising a week's holiday before then, we needed a recuperative walk in the local hills. It's a month  before Challengers depart (less for us) but some might be interested to see the quantity of snow on, for example, Ben More and Stob Binnein. Unfortunatley the vile Burnfoot windfarm has ruined this lovely view.

Snow and 'my' blackbird

It's snowing heavily this morning and the birds are hungry.

He waits patiently

then

Follows me into the garage while I get his food

Quite a contrast to Saturday when we checked out the Nallo