Wednesday 11 January 2017

Mallaig. It will be Mallaig.

After tossing and turning for several nights in agony over deciding where to start my big adventure, I have finally come to the conclusion that I will take a train/bus/train combination from Edinburgh  to Mallaig via Fort William. Why is that, you ask (well I doubt that anyone really asks but I'm telling you anyway). Because having already planned that I might do that (or choose from the dozen other plans I had schemed out), I came across a Challenger blog from last year and realised that travelling by train to Mallaig I will actually be crossing the River Finnan. ON TOP OF THE GLENFINNAN VIADUCT. Oh yes, the Harry Potter bridge, that is. Being the overgrown child that I am, I was thrilled to to be able to nail my starting point choice with a little help of Mr. Potter. Thanks Harry, much appreciated!

So far my itinerary is as follows:

Tuesday May 11th: Fly into Edinburgh from Finland with the kind help of British Airways. Spend a day and a half out and about Edinburgh.
Thursday 11th: Travel to Mallaig for a night at the Mission Bunkhouse.
Friday 12th: hop on a ferry to Inverie. Recover from possible seasickness . Start walking towards the East coast. Over the hills and far away. The actual route is still being plotted reverently.
Thursday 25th: arrive somewhere in between Stonehaven and Kinnaber Links. Bus to Montrose, a Challenge party and a night in Montrose. Flight home on Friday 26th. Arriving home in the early hours of Saturday 27th.

There! Wasn't that hard now, was it?




6 comments:

  1. Welcome to the Challenge! I completed my first crossing last year and am going back again this year. My hiking partner and I will also be starting in Mallaig this year.

    Just wanted to say good luck with planning and all that entails. I'm from the US, so I also had to deal with planning a route across a country I've never been to. If you have questions or anything feel free to email me and I'll do my best to help you out (not that I necessarily have all the answers, having only done one Challenge) but maybe another foreign perspective can help.

    Hopefully we'll see you out there!

    Brian

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    1. Thanks Brian, I appreciate it. See you in May!

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  2. Hi! It's my first time on the TGO challenge this year too and we're also still route planning. I do like your reasoning for starting in Mallaig! We're starting from Shiel Bridge hopefully. Good luck and perhaps see you in May. Jessica

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    1. We also have a blog....https://cjoutdoors.wordpress.com/2017/01/10/the-great-outdoors-challenge-2017/ but not just about the Challenge :)

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    2. Hi Jessica, maybe our paths will cross, as I've noticed that parts of the route I'm plotting are very popular among the Shiel Bridge starters. Have fun planning! I'm going to go read your blog now. I also have a "real" blog, but it's in Finnish so I doubt you'd get much out of it ;). There's a link to my Flickr page on the sidebar though. One picture is worth thousands of words :). Hopefully I'll see you in May!

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  3. you didnt write aboutScotland - yet..

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