Day 2: On Arran

Starting out at Lochranza, lots of small subgroups had their own ideas about what to do for the day. I chose the sightseeing group with DA and CF and R. which promised standing stones, caves and many tea stops. A few deer had been fighting outside out back of the hostel, the weather seemed hopeful and as I remember, somebody gave me some porridge too. Oats, I ate a silo full of the things. It is amazing how many different forms oats can take.

Anyways, heading off down the west coast, we ran into G. at the small shop down the road, starting another theme for the day, and for the trip as a whole, of G. disappearing and reappearing at random times. Where he went, nobody seems to know. We ride off and I'm quickly distracted by a cute little graveyard just a bit further on. But we have a tea stop to get to, where strangely enough (or perhaps not strangely at all), we run into everybody else who had left so much earlier than we did. After tea, we make our way to Machrie and the standing stones there. We walk, we pass sheep and climb over fences and there they are. Most are tiny and mostly missing stones, but two of the circles have pretty impressive tall stones still left.

Head back to collect our bikes. Hi G., bye G.. And ride south to Blackwaterfoot and have lunch in the golf course cafe. Head back up north to trek through the woods, across a ridge where we can see the plains where we just were with the standing stones, and down the coast to see King's Cave where Robert Bruce hid out, much like the dozens of log cabins (built out of modern logs years after his death) across Illinois where Abe Lincoln (who wasn't born in a log cabin) was born. Still the walk was nice. Hi G., bye G., and then we make our way down to the ocean and try to figure out which cave is the right one. Must be the one with the steel grating in front, which fortunately was unlocked so we could experience history first hand. Much like the family in the cave next to it who was living history by camping out in that cave.

Ahh, then the fun starts, although I don't know how we came out better off than GC did in Iona with his muddy shoes. But anyways, we could have gone back over the same trail or taken the adventuresome trail through the woods, which was noted might be somewhat boggy. Ok, wiser now. It was fine going up the hill and into the woods, but at that point the trail disappeared as did a lot of the dry footing. R. had a compass which was probably good otherwise we would have ended up probably even further off the trail. Eventually we ended up back on the original trail and had to backtrack a ways, but at least it was dry.

We called it a day and headed back, up a few steep grades and through 45 minutes of rain. Dinner was prepared and the walkers tried in vain to get us to join in with their Scottish dancing. They actually looked like they knew what they were doing and didn't have somebody calling out confusing and contradictory instructions, and somehow skillfully avoided the big pole in the middle of the room. So, way beyond my abilities. 35.91 miles for me for the day.