TGO Challenge Day 5 - 16 May 2022

Distance remaining 115 miles

A crazy day today. For the last week, I've been taking antibiotics for a cut on my shin which had become infected. I had just one day's capsules left and didn't feel that they had cleared up the infection and I was about to be in the wilds for a couple of days before coming back to civilisation. In the very early hours I woke and started worrying about the wound turning septic and all sorts of things. At the bothy I had no phone signal or Wi-Fi and decided to head back down to Fort Augustus with a view to catching the first bus to Fort William and get to the hospital A&E and assumed the first bus might be around 7am.

I packed up in the dark and was away by 3.15am. I was thinking I might have to bail out of the Challenge. On the way down I got a 4G signal and found that the first bus was at 10am so stopped to make tea. I had more than enough time. On reaching the village I found that there is a pharmacy and a medical centre. I was at the centre when it opened at 9am and managed to bypass the now usual rule of a prior phone consultation but was told to come back at 11am when a doctor would be there.

I went off to while away the time. I had a somewhat lacklustre full Scottish breakfast at the canalside centre but chatted to a young couple who had been at the bothy.

The doctor was very helpful. The likely reason my leg hadn't healed was that I hadn't rested it and kept it elevated. Far from it! He gave me a prescription for the same antibiotics but double the dose. We discussed whether it would be sensible to continue walking. Basically, the decision was mine. I got the capsules from the pharmacy and texted Challenge Control to say that I was back in the game.

It was five miles down to the village and another five back to the bothy which I reached at 2pm and had lunch there. I left at 2.45pm to see how far I could get. It was a long, long ascent up to the summit of the Corrieyairack Pass, the weather closed in and it rained for much of the afternoon. The wind, coming straight at me, was horrendous. It seemed to go on for ever and I have rarely encountered worse anywhere. At the summit I stopped to talk to a cyclist coming the other way. He looked a little battered.

There then followed a long descent and the rain stopped and the wind died down. I thought about finding a place to pitch but there wasn't much. I picked up water from a stream and in the end decided to head for Melgarve bothy, right on my route. I scoffed jelly babies which really helped. From bothy to bothy was 12.5 miles so altogether I've done 22.5 miles today. I arrived here at 6.30pm.

The bothy is lovely and three Challengers, Rob, Michael and Andrew had a fire going. I decided to sleep there. There are several rooms and I have a room downstairs to myself with my sleeping mat on the floor. What a day. No photos, the weather was so awful.

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