Kiltearn to Inverness

Today was a tale of two bridges, and the island in between. Last night, my rest was interrupted by fiery agony from the red raw skin on my thighs. I was forced to adopt the gait of a man who has experienced an unfortunate accident for the rest of the day.

I had been able to escape the clutches of the A9 so far, but the shortcut provided by the bridge over the Cromarty Firth is just too tempting to avoid. Trundling lorries and speeding cars passed me on my comfortable but narrowing grassy verge. After days in the wilderness or on single track roads, it was a brutal reassertion of civilisation. A fat grey snake was lying across the dark water ahead, the concrete stained and chipped by the climate. I walked in a kind of limbo of frozen scenery, the repeating sections of the bridge endlessly stretching into the distance. The end never came closer, the beginning never moved further away. I passed the time thinking about what would happen if something encroached on my thin strip of tarmac and I was knocked over the low barrier into the cold waves. Didn’t happen though.

Small lanes led through the forested hill of the Black Isle, under the dual carriageways of the A9 and along the shores of the Beauly Firth. The slender beauty of the North Kessock bridge loomed ahead. Views from the sweeping arch of distant hills and the water far below made having to share it with the traffic tolerable. By the time I crossed the bridge my feet were on fire, the dampness and distances of the previous days had taken its toll. Toddling through the streets of Inverness, I was being overtaken by elderly women with disintegrating hips. Time for another day off.