Bolinn Loop

We thought we were on for seperate days out again this week, but all of a sudden the hostel cleared so we took the opportunity to head out. Matt wanted to go for a run, I had a sore knee so wanted a walk - in the end we compromised and headed out on our bikes.

We decided to have a go at the Bolinn Loop, a 12km route which takes in some of the nice local forestry tracks around the hostel. I tried to ignore the fact that the website described the difficulty level as 'Intermediate / Advanced', and just hoped that my new clippy pedals wouldn't cause me too much trouble.

We headed out straight from the hostel, down to the end of the lane where we picked up a good forestry road. This took us uphill for the next 20 minutes, and we were well out of breath by the time we arrived at the faint track leading away from the road. As we made our way along the track, we began to wonder whether we had taken the right path - it disappeared a couple of times, only to re-appear as what looked like a stream-bed further on. After consulting the map we realised it was definitely the correct trail, so pressed on. The trail continued, sometimes rocky, sometimes muddy, and sometimes totally overgrown with grass and bracken, and there were more than a few 'wet-feet' occasions, but at least it kept things interesting!

After a while we left the single track behind and rejoined the forest road, and soon found a lovely spot to have lunch overlooking Loch Garry.

After admiring the scenery for a while and getting increasing lethargic in the sunshine, we got back on the bikes. The road wound its way around a hillside before we arrived in a field full of highland cattle - we didn't want to start any fights with those horns, so made sure they knew we were coming. I had always wondered why I had a bell on my bike and now I know!

The sun was beating down by now, so the last little bit of uphill was fairly sweat-inducing. After this though it was a great cruise back downhill towards home. Luckily we'd been home about five minutes when the heavens opened and it started pouring down - thank goodness that lunch stop hadn't been any longer!

Jen x