I
spend a day in Edinburgh, leaving in the early morning of the next day.
I get a lift on a 27 year old Ford where the driver has to manage the
steering
wheel as is well known from Humphrey Bogard films. I get to
Killin
in the early afternoon, starting a walk that will turn out in the end
to
be one of the best I've ever made.
From Killin I follow the river
Dochart towards the west.
Carrying
a heavy pack I don't get as far as I want. I have to put up
my tent
at a little loch not far from my original target, the youth hostel of
Crianlarich.
I love this little hostel with its pure atmosphere, its strict but
friendly
warden, Harry, if I'm not mistaken, remotely hidden underneath
the
railway damm. In 1993 I shall return to find a modern hostel not worth
visiting any more.
*
After
one night in that poor village of Crianlarich I make my way further
west.
After following the
Strath Fillan road for a few miles I turn
to
the left to walk uphill through the woods. «Woods» means something
else in Scotland compared to Germany as the trees are widely spread. I
go straight for the summit of
Ben Lui where I put up my
double-roof
tent in the evening. What you really need in Scotland is a good tent.
It
does not rain very long, actually, at most 7 days and nights, but if it
rains it rains cats and dogs. This evening, however, I am lucky: A
lovely
sunset follows a day of foggy clouds covering the top of the mountains.