The clouds rolled in overnight and just before I set off there was some rain. Fortunately it soon stopped and it was dry when I started. I was away earlier than normal as I’m aiming to catch the train from Kinbrace, about 25 miles away. I continued along Loch Naver but soon left it to continue along the west side of the River Naver.

The bike on Cross Country train

I hadn’t been going long before I saw a stone monument which I had to check out. The metal plate reads:

Destruction of Rossal

And next to it was an information board about the nearby village if Rosal which was evacuated during the Highland Clearances in 1814. The interesting thing to note is the spelling for Rosal on the metal plate is double s.
After a mile I came to Syre Church (Church of Scotland) which is a late 19th century small corrugated-iron building. It is also interesting to note that it is a listed building.

Syre Church

When I booked my bike

Syre Church interior

I now had a right turn to head over to Kinbrace. The sign said 16 mils to my destination and the map looked fairly empty of buildings, except one. I had a steady climb up of about 2 miles with a manageable gradient then the rain returned for a time. Up ahead was a transmitter mast and at the summit I check my phone and found I had a signal. This would have been a great place to camp yesterday but I had no way of knowing that. Over the summit was a small lay bye and a stone marker saying MacKay Country. Behind was the oddly named Palm Loch.

Palm Loch

The road up ahead vanished over a distant rise but there were no more big climbs. After several miles I saw a distant view of a large white building off to the left. At the entrance road a sign said it was Garvault Hotel. I later check its website which says it is the most remote hotel in mainland Britain with a telephone that has the longest cable from an exchange in the country at 12 miles.
It was wonderfully easy cycling as I almost cruised by towards Kinbrace. I still had about 8 miles to go and had just passed a stone milepost.

MacKay Country

I kept an eye on my cateye milometer and looked around after each successive mile but didn’t see any more. I descended to Strath Beg and could see the Railway platform ahead. It was still early, just after 9am. I checked the timetable board and saw that a train was soon due but not scheduled to stop at this station. I thought I’d try and flag it down anyway. About 09:20 the train arrived but putting my arm out had no effect and the train trundled by. The next train was 13:52 so I had over 4 hours to kill. Across the road was a garage so I wandered over to get some water from an outside hose pipe. Back on the platform I cooked an early lunch and sat around reading to while away the hours. I hadn’t a bike reservation for the train so I used the station phone to check with Scotrail. They said I couldn’t make a reservation on the phone, only via the internet. This wasn’t helpful. So I had no option but to take a chance.

Kinbrace Railway platform

When the train arrived it was quite full but thankfully no bike on so I was OK. The only problem was the low platform. Getting my heavy bike up on to the train took quite an effort. When I got in the bike compartment there was an empty child’s pram so I had to wheel the bike through to the next carriage where there was space. I paid my £10.45 single fare to Dingwall. I had an enjoyable ride of over 2 hours. When we reached the coast I was amazed how near the rails ran to the waters edge. I reached Dingwall about 16:15 and set off though the town towards Strathpeffer.

Room for the bike

I had to ride along the A834 for a few miles and the fast busy traffic was a complete contrast to the 2 vehicles I’d seen in 16 miles earlier in the day. I reached my car outside the Square Wheels cycle shop but they were closed. By the time I’d taken the panniers off, the front wheel out and packed everything in my car it was 17:20. I’d filled up with diesel in Inverness on the way up so had a full tank. I decided to set off home and decide how far to go once I got on the road. It was an easy drive with only a few slow large vehicles. A succession of good music programmes on Radio 2 helped the driving so I decided to continue all the way home. I got in about 15mins to midnight.

Moray Firth from the train