Day 22 – To Shieldaig

Monday 17th May

I was the last to leave the beach car park at Londain, and spoke to a park ranger who was checking the place over. He asked how many had stayed, and made a call about the overflowing bin. There had been 14 all together. Two vans, a motorhome and couple with a 3 month old baby, and 5 month old boxer dog, and a group of about 8 young lad, late teens, from Edinburgh in their cars. The lads had been driving the NC 500, surfing and swimming on various beaches. Nobody left any rubbish, but the bin, which gets emptied only every two weeks, couldn’t cope. The car park is very busy during the day also. In these ‘virus days’ places like this, and indeed at home in the Lake District, are receiving a different type of tourist, and lots of them. The odd one who does leave litter, or toilet waste, gives all a bad name. The local councils by us will be more preventative this summer. There will be more employed, as after all, more money is coming in, and a visible presence at busy sites. For example, the popular wild camping spot at Angle Tarn will have a Park Ranger present most nights. This site at Londain would benefit simply from either a more regular litter collection, or no bin at all.

After an hour or so on the beach we headed just a few miles up the coast to Shieldaig, and took a campsite for the night. It was about time for a few items, including me, to be washed in a shower. The site was reviewed to be excellent, and have good WiFi, with which I’d watch the rugby this evening. Indeed it does have a fantastic situation, but no internet signal of any strength of any kind, but to compensate I had just started Jon McGregor’s new novel, Lean, Fall, Stand, set for the most part, in Antarctica.

In the middle afternoon we headed out around the small peninsula on a short, but rough track. In a couple of places are fixed chains to aid passage around the rocky beach headland. The weather remains incredibly calm, the very occasional shower, so excellent conditions indeed, especially compared to the rest of Britain. Right at the point an old renovated croft, and living in it, as you might not expect, and 85 year old Yorkshireman and his wife and dog, long grey disheveled hair, and keen for a chat. He told me how he had rebuilt the place 26 years ago, a two mile long track to get to the road, and a huge shed for his fishing business that he has since retired from. A real character… the place has all mod cons… he assured me.