West Highland Way With a 3 Year Old - Day 6 Trail Notes - Inverarnan to Crianlarich - Anna Hardie

day 6 trail notes | inverarnan to crianlarich

stats

weather:

overcast

accommodation:

home

steps:

25,328k

planned mileage:

6.80 miles

actual mileage:

8.70 miles

total day mileage:

11 miles

the morning when we woke was a lovely overcast, moody type of day. my favourite! i love scotland when the weather is like this, it makes the hills look so much more dramatic & beautiful. it is also so much easier to walk in as there's no sun to make you sweat or tire you quicker. by the time we were packed & ready to go it had started raining, but only light, passing showers which was quite refreshing after so many days of hot days before.

we set off just after 9 to start the next section towards tyndrum. this day is relatively easy as it's either access tracks or a clear path the whole way, but it is gradually uphill for the most part of it. the girls were excited to get going & decided they'd start the day by holding hands & having little toddler chat together.

the good mood between the girls didn't last as long as we had hoped, they started bickering between themselves over who would get to lead the walk & of course, they both wanted themselves to be that person. they were both determined to be the only one in front & didn't let turns be taken, so tears & tantrums from both started. snacks were offered & the issue was soon forgotten.

the trail so far was lovely & easy to walk on, but the girls didn't think so. they were both were struggling a little with motivation & wanted to play rather than walk, so stopping for a food break was the next choice to give them a moment. we stopped at a lovely opening which looks over to part of the falls of falloch & they played around the tree roots while we chatted away. at this point we decided we would part ways, us carrying on towards tyndrum, nikki & jamie back to their van. we had only walked a few miles by this point, much less than we had planned together, but at least we got a nice morning together. we said our goodbyes & carried on for the day.

it was actually a lot harder to get little motivated & moving after she said goodbye to her friend than i expected. of course she wanted to play, she didn't want to say bye & walk alone so she kept asking when she was coming back or if we were meeting them again. i felt terrible at this but told her we would plan something again soon. a wee game of hiking pole trains managed to cheer her up enough to get going & she liked being the train conductor choosing the speed.

i thought we would cover a lot more ground quicker than we did, as the ground terrain should've allowed that. however, i found the easier the path the more bored little was & the less likely she was to go. we sung a lot of songs, we told a lot of stories & played some eye spy which was distracting us both from this quite bland day. the only real motivation to keep going today was the fact my dad was due to join us on the trail tomorrow for a few days.

the west highland way is incredibly sign posted with signs & arrows up everywhere to lead you in the right direction. little took joy in spotting these posts & it became her job to tell us which way they were leading us. a great way for her to learn her left & rights!

by mid afternoon both of our energy levels were pretty low & we were getting a bit snippy with each other. the trail wasn't exciting either of us today & boredom from the slow pace was setting in. we had reached the point where the trail leads under the main road & man, that was a tight crawl with a big bag on. the tunnel under is pretty low that you have to crouch, but my bag being so high meant i had to go at such an awkward angle, but little was the perfect height & breezed through it. the climb after this was killer, felt like it just went on forever.

we had finally reached the half way point which is the crossroads towards crianlarich. it was around 430pm by this point & we still had somewhere to find for camping for the night. i had a few spots in mind, but a lot of people were passing us & i knew a lot were camping, so could only hope they wouldn't be taking the spots i wanted. we sat at the crossroads for probably too long, once i was sitting i didn't really want to get up again, so took this opportunity to phone kieran for a wee encouragement boost.

he could see that i looked & felt deflated from the day & asked if i wanted to come home. my mind said yes but it also said no. i really didn't know what i wanted & half hoped he would just decide for me. i hadn't enjoyed the majority of the days so far so the thought of having the same distance again to cover just wasn't it. i told him i'd find somewhere to camp, sleep off these thoughts then it would be fine because my dad would be here in the morning.

the uphill after the crossroads was steep. my water was pretty low by this point & i was really hoping for a stream or something which we could fill up at. most of the day was spent walking through sheep lands so the streams weren't safe to fill from or they either weren't flowing quick enough to risk it either.

the woods we were walking through showed no signs of suitable camping spots as they were either too uneven, covered in bog or fallen branches. i started to get slightly unsettled at this as i just wanted to find somewhere, but it wasn't happening quick enough.

eventually i spotted a what i thought was the remains of a fire pit on a small wee clearing off the trail on a mound & thought it could possibly be an option. i was right! it was a large, relatively flat area which could fit 2 or 3 tents in it & was untaken. what luck. we sat here for a few minutes to gather our thoughts before setting up, but little started saying she wanted to go home. she wanted to see dad.

i was pretty taken aback by this as at no point had she expressed she wanted home, nor did she when i phoned kieran at the crossroads & he asked if she was wanting home. she had been firm on her no but was now changing her mind. i asked if she was sure & if we should make dinner first to see if that helped.

we had some noodles & she was still asking so i phoned kieran to ask his opinion. once again he said it was my choice, which wasn't the answer i wanted. tell me if you're going to come or not lol!

the final decider moment was how little water we had left after i had made dinner. we had enough if we were thirsty during the night, but not enough for breakfast & possibly not enough until the next safe stream. that was it for me. that, her asking to go home, our moods & the overall experience up to this moment all came together & it was time to officially call it.

we were going to quit.

it would take kieran 3 hours to drive down to meet us in crianlarich which was fine as we had about 1.5 miles to walk down from where we stopped, past the crossroads & into the village. we would just find a pub or something for some food & wait for him there. instantly i felt relief. i knew it was the right choice & my body felt it as soon as it was agreed. i felt like i had a spring in my step as we were walking back on ourselves. i popped little into the carrier as she had so far had a long day walking & honestly i just wanted to get down to the bottom as quick as i could.

we stopped in the first place we seen which was the rod & reel pub. it served food & was on the main road which i thought would be handy for kieran to find us since signal was spotty. we had some chips & a wee juice each then waited for our lift.

when kieran finally arrived i was so happy to see him. it was about a week since we left & it was nice to see him again after a few rubbish days. he told me we stunk then off we went home.

we were coming into tyndrum when he asked me how i was feeling & in that moment i just lost it. i seen walkers on the trail as we were passing from the road & it just made me burst into tears for some reason. it had hit me that we quit & that we were going home, like failures. i was most looking forward to the section from tyndrum onwards as the mountains & views are my favourite, but we had chosen to quit before we reached that point. the walkers on the trail highlighted this for me, making me feel awful.

dramatics cut short - we decided that i would take a few days rest at home & on kieran's next day off, in 3 days, he would drive us back to crianlarich so we could restart & finish. this made sense to me so i agreed. the rest, the showers, the restocking of the bag & taking out the unused / unneeded items would all help us finish. i knew the pace that worked for ourselves, the comments to expect & the milage we could do, so i replanned the remaining half into more days & more manageable chunks. i wouldn't fail twice, so it wasn't going to be an option.