Inverarnan to Rowardennan

I was full of enthusiasm for a short walk (14 miles) after clocking up 21 the day before. Nae botha. This would take me halfway down the east side of Loch Lomond to a nice place with evening food. I left the Drovers’ and some bloke offered to take my photo.

I walked upstream to a bridge over the river to the east side and yomped down. I took a poor turn over the bridge onto a WHW link that turned out to be problematic due to fallen trees and small landfalls. This cost me precious time. 

The clouds were developing around local hills as I headed south to LL. 

LL are great initials as Superman only had girlfriends with the LL initials. So he must have right fancied Loch Lomond. The first mile or so was ok, and I came to a bothy, Doune Byre, which was in decent shape, although an Irish couple I had met earlier said they’d stayed there and it was infested with mice. What do you expect for nowt? 

After the bothy the path started to deteriorate. And a mile later it was very difficult. I had to climb, scramble and jump across problematic blocks of stone over a few miles of the route. The views of the lake became lovelier and despite the tough nature of the route the view continued to compensate.

Eventually I made it to Inversnaid, a small community with a hotel and outside seating where I could eat my Drovers packed lunch without a problem, and with a nice view.

Carrying on to Rowardennan the path followed the shore and looked more like the South West Coastal Path on occasions.

Often, between the beaches and difficult boulder strewn stretches, there would appear a patch of new-growing bracken and Bluebells, destroying the myth that blue and green should together not be seen.  

I was running late however and compounded the problem by taking a minor lakeside route that was swamped with path works and difficult boulders to negotiate. In the end at 7.30pm I made it to the hotel/hostel and moved to the bar/restaurant to get my food and drink. The view was awesome.

I had a place booked and slept easily through the night. I’m ready. Night night.