Exercise is good for you. All the latest health advice says
so including the eminent doctor who presented the prizes at this year’s Isle of
Skye half marathon. In fact Dr Hanson was in full flow regaling us with how low
cardio vascular fitness was the single biggest killer, bigger than smoking, diabetes
and obesity put together, when Davie entered the room. Now Davie has completed
every Skye half marathon there has ever been as such should be held up as an
example of fitness par excellence and so the timing was just
perfect. At the very moment when Dr Hanson was extolling the virtues of exercising
in later life Davie crawled up the stairs, dragging a leg and grimacing all the
while completely oblivious to the thread of the good doctor’s speech. A true
example of the benefits of exercise. It was enough to have us rolling around laughing especially as Davie had no idea what was going on. Coincidentally enough the pub chat the
evening before the race was all about plotting a graph of the gradual physical
decline of runners over time and to hear some of them talk you would think they
were at death's door. The graph was supposed to give figures that we could extrapolate (the word of the evening
although by closing time its pronunciation was causing problems) I’m not quite
sure what the extrapolation of these
figures was supposed to prove but the overall trend did seem to point to a downwards
decline…
The Isle of Skye half marathon has that effect on your legs.
The hills coupled with a strong wind made it a testing day out and having other
team members gunning for a team prize definitely meant no slacking on the day.
Soon after the start of the race I had clocked that Perth Road Runners had a
strong team so I made an effort to keep the two who were a little way ahead of
me in sight over the first 6 miles without going too fast and blowing up later
on. Robin had passed me at about two miles and although I was very tempted to
go with him I knew I would probably suffer badly for it later so I held back
and watched as he gradually worked his way up the field. When Mairead went past
me and the two Perth road runners up ahead I decided that I should probably do
the same although I was more keen to wait for long climb after 8 miles before
starting to up the pace as I have “previous” for running too fast in the early
miles of this race and paying the price later on. However this time it paid
off, I didn’t die on the hill and HBT took the team prize. In fact I felt
pretty strong running down into Portree and wasn’t in my usual wobbly legged
state.
This was the coldest Skye half marathon that I can remember.
Just moments after finishing the race I was starting to get very cold so there
was no hanging around at the finish line and I headed for the sauna swiftly
followed by the BBQ set up by the RNLI. In previous years we have sat out in
the sunshine at Marmalade enjoying a few pints but this time the cold saw us
retreat into the snug interior of the Isles hotel where the few pints did an
amazing job of reviving runners who seemed to be very crocked just hours
before. Beer is the secret to recovery… Unless of course you are John McKay who
professed to drinking 15 pints the day before the race and wasn’t seen again
after the race. Fortunately Dr Hansen didn’t cover the topic of alcohol
consumption in his speech.
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| Warming up with a post race burger |
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| The winning team had an average age of... |
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| HBT men and women's team prizes |
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| And the prize was....beer! |
The next day the weary limbs were crammed into a kayak and
transported out on to the waters of Loch Eishort which were reasonably sheltered
from the strong winds buffeting the Isle of Skye. Still, the outward journey across
the loch was into a strong headwind and for the first 10 minutes I felt ever so
slightly unstable in a different kayak.
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| Setting out from Ord |
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| The blue skies and clear water were deceptive - it was quite chilly for June |
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| Seals basking on the rocks |
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| Heading to Boreraig |
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| Looking over towards Knoydart |
We headed across the loch eventually landing at Boreraig for
lunch and to explore the ruined village, the fossilised rocks and go searching
for adders which are known to sunbathe on the stones of the ruined houses. As
we arrived at the shore we noticed other people walking around the village and
I felt irrationally irritated – I’m here to escape people! How did they get
here?! Some of them were certainly not
equipped for the long walk that would have been necessary to walk there.
However when a little boat appeared it all became clear.
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| Fossils |
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| Boreraig was destroyed during the Highland Clearances |
The gorgeous waterfall was just too tempting not to take a
dip in however the water really was cold on my hands and head (the rest of me
was protected by a drysuit) but splashing around in the clear water was lovely.
In fact we had so much fun we hadn’t noticed the incoming tide was starting to
pull the kayaks out to sea!
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| The waterfall |
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| Jump... |
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| and vanish |
The next couple of hours were spent exploring the islands in
the loch looking for seals and other wildlife and no paddle around this loch is
complete without a visit to the coral beach. This time we were rewarded with a
plovers nest on the beach as the adult birds ran round pretending to be injured
so as to lure us away. Another nest yielded an egg that was in the process of
hatching and although I would love to have stayed longer and filmed the little
beak as it poked in and out of the hole in the shell I didn’t want to be there
so long that it caused undue stress on the adult bird so I took a quick
photograph and left. The birds seemed to be hatching much later in the year
than normal reflecting the cooler than average temperatures that we have been
experiencing.
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| The coral beach |
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| Stunning views |
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| Exploring in depth... |
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| Aww cute |
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| It was hatching! |
At the end of the day we paddled back to Ord tired and happy
with the day finished off with a dip in Gordon and Morag’s hot tub – the hot
tub with one of the best views in the country.
