Mt Kilbreck the Monro out the back of Crask Inn

You can see the name if you squint hard!

Several hundred years old the Inn was built just after the infamous land clearances of the Scots by the English to make room for the very profitable wool industry and of course the sheep that went with it. Designed and built as one of several to service the new passing trade of the stock men on their way to and from market I suppose?

As we were eating our 'Stovies' I got talking to Mike and Helen a couple that were planning to climb the Monro in the morning before moving on to their next Monro in the afternoon. A Monro is a mountain of which there are 275, surveyed by Sir Hugh Monro who died in 1909.



I had been very hopeful of this day for many months and so could not believe my luck when waking up at 6.30am it was beautiful bright sunshine with not a cloud in the sky.
We packed our things and I went across for breakfast. Proper runny Scots porridge, followed by a farmers fried breakfast and toast. Mike made me some sandwiches and packed a slice of his wife's cake.




We went by car down to the start point and set off across the inevitable bog, climbing always toward the first much lower summit that would take us onto the ridge that led to the foot of the conical ascent.
All the time unbelieving that the clouds were not just about to form up and shroud us from the views.
Hard work, but oh so worth the effort, the view from the top was as if we could see the whole of the Highlands, and maybe we could? We could see the North sea, the Atlantic and some of the Orkney islands.

Six hours round trip including our lunch stop at the top. What a treat!






Just what the Doctor ordered, a change of use of muscle sets. My contracted hamstrings and achilles got to stretch in a different direction and boy did they let me know it wasn't really what they thought was good for them!
Six hours later and we were back down and ready to set off on the next leg of our respective journeys.
I had 32 miles to ride in glorious weather down hill along the side of a small loch and river into Bettyhill for my first sight of the North sea!

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