he following morning, we awoke and packed up early while our six roommates slept on. The six were actually three couples from Oxfordshire who were walking only the first half of the SUW to Sanquar so, as today was to be their last day of walking, they were in no hurry. It had rained heavily in the night and showed no sign of abating as we stepped out into the gloom with our hoods pulled over heads and headed off along the forestry track. Despite the weather, I was glad to be on my way as I had found sleeping eight in a line on a small platform fairly claustrophobic. As the rained poured down I began turning my attentions to the surrounding countryside. We were plodding fairly quickly along the broad forestry track surrounded by wooded hills with a deep river valley below to our left. I wasn’t sure why but something was nagging away at me. I searched inside to find the source of my unease when it suddenly dawned on me. The previous evening I had been studying the map for the next days walk and noticed that it began by following a track with a river valley on the right. To make things worse, I seemed to remember the track was actually a metalled lane. I quickly looked at the map and compass which soon confirmed my suspicions; we appeared to be going the wrong way! I voiced my fears to Ian who agreed that something was wrong, as we had not seen an SUW marker post since starting out which was unusual as the route had so far been superbly waymarked.

As we stood deliberating, an empty logging lorry appeared ahead and came bouncing down the track toward us. As it stopped alongside us a familiar face appeared at the window, it was Gordon the driver from the previous day who expressed surprise at seeing us. He told us that we should have turned right just after leaving the bothy but with our hoods up and with the rain pouring we had made the mistake of just following the obvious forestry track. He offered to return us to the bothy and we gratefully accepted his kind offer. So it was that an hour and a half after we had set out we found ourselves back at the spot from where we had started! We thanked Gordon for his kindness and started the sixteen miles to Wanlockhead all over again. We calculated that we had added an unnecessary four extra miles to the day’s walk, which was not what we needed, as the walk would be hard enough without extending it. We marched along the tarmac lane with the river valley now on our right and soon caught sight of six familiar figures ahead. It was a little embarrassing explaining how we had come to be behind them despite setting out over an hour before them. We exchanged a few jokes with them then said our goodbyes and left the road at Polgown for the hills once more (above) and as we reached the top of a ridge, Sanquar came into view (below) in the valley far below. It seemed to take an age to reach the town but once there, we phoned ahead and booked accommodation in Wanlockhead. The walk over the hills to Scotland’s highest village was very tiring and Ian was now having problems with blisters. We staggered past some old mine workings into the village and, after locating our hotel, both collapsed onto the beds in our rooms where we lay unable to even speak for a while. When Ian eventually found the energy to remove his boots he found that his feet were covered in ten blisters. The walk was close to failure.