Sandwood Bay, Sutherland (A non-tech TR)

Compo

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Aug 21, 2006, 4:01:05 PM8/21/06

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[The following TR is a strictly non-technical account of a day out
walking in the far north of Scotland. Full GRs and more accurate
distances available if required.]

At Seven thirty the alarm went off by our bedside in East Caithness,
telling Julie and me that it was time to prepare for our trip out to
Sandwood Bay.

The journey began as it was to continue, in mist and light drizzle. We
made our way via the many small fishing and crofting villages that dot
the near infinite number of inlets that make up the north coast of
Scotland. A place where the south of Scotland is at a greater distance
than Bergen in Norway.

At the furthest west settlement on the north coast, Durness, we pulled
over briefly to check the price of petrol/diesel. Fortunately, we
didn't need any because it was 110p/l, no doubt they sell little at that
price!

From Durness, our progress was marked not, as you might imagine, by the
rolling boglands or the precipitous quartz capped mountains that line
the single track road south, boasting such evocative names as
Cranstackie, Arkle, Foinaven and Quinag, for we could barely see their
bases with such a low cloudbase of around 150 feet or so. No, it was
marked by my progressive travel sickness due to the constant start-stop
of the car as we were continuously forced to pull into passing places to
allow other tourist traffic through. The last couple of weekends are
the busiest of the holiday year with many tourists, both home grown and
European, in campervans and caravans all out on the road together. But
I digress; by the time we were within a couple of miles of the old
fishing port of Kinlochbervie I was forced out of the car by the need
for a fence to lean over. This accomplished we continued through the
picturesque port and on to the end of the road near the crofting
settlement of Oldshoremore where a small car park has been provided for
those wishing to walk to the beach at Sandwood Bay.

The walk begins on a smartly graded track and continues past a number of
lochans and two large moorland lochs before it becomes an eroded
footpath. The path continues across the peat moor to the haunted ruins
of Sandwood House and thence down a hill to the long, unspoilt, sandy
beach and sandunes. The house is said to be haunted by the ghost of a
shipwrecked mariner and he is supposed to appear to people who wildcamp
nearby.

As the path turns the final corner it becomes suddenly and startlingly
plain that both the beach and bay are stunningly beautiful, with about
two miles of open sandy beach, a dune system and a large freshwater loch
just behind the dunes. The north end of the bay is protected by a
series of headlands that reach the seven or eight miles to the tip of
northwest Scotland at the infamous Cape Wrath, where the sea runs wild
and there are only seabirds and moorland wildlife for company. It is a
beautiful sight with the purple heather in bloom and the low cloud
creating an atmospheric setting around the bay. At the south end of the
beach stands the silent sentinel called Am Buchaille (The Herdsman).
The herdsman is a sea stack standing clear of the cliffs that entrap the
drifting sands to form dunes. This really is -the- beach to take a
picnic.

Why is this beach so clean, quiet and unpolluted? Simply because the
car park is a five miles walk from the beach at Sandwood Bay making a
ten mile round trip and walking is the only option!

The weather treated us as well as can be expected during a low pressure
weather system and we stayed mostly dryish and warm throughout the day.
The car journey home was much easier than the outward bound leg, it
being Sunday evening. We saw little traffic, probably no more than a
couple of dozen cars in the 95 miles between Kinlochbervie and Thurso,
and none of this held us up for more than a minute or two, even on the
bendy 15 miles single track section around the deep sea-Loch Eribol.
Loch Eribol was known to servicemen during WWII as Loch Horrible, due to
its isolation on the sparsely populated north coast. The low cloud
remained with us throughout the journey home and little was seen of the
majestic Bens Hope and Loyal. A Chinese takeaway was felt earned and so
we broke our journey just 16 miles from home in Thurso to buy a Charlie
Chan Chinese special fried rice each. I remain convinced that Charlie
makes the best special fried rice in the whole of the far north.

--
Cheers,
Compo: Start every day with a smile - and get it over with!

Chris Gilbert

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Aug 21, 2006, 5:21:24 PM8/21/06

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Compo wrote

> The house is said to be haunted by the ghost of a
> shipwrecked mariner and he is supposed to appear to people who wildcamp
> nearby.

Does he have any clothes on ? or was that just another camper
that we bumped in with a slightly greater urge to get closer to
nature than we did ;-)

> At the south end of the
> beach stands the silent sentinel called Am Buchaille (The Herdsman).

http://www.whirleygig.co.uk/~cgilbert/G7/pages/Am%20Buchaille.htm

A truly wonderful place.

Chris

Malcolm Stewart

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Aug 21, 2006, 8:00:01 PM8/21/06

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"Compo" <co...@norabattys.stockings> wrote in message
news:3130303036343...@norabattys.stockings...

> [The following TR is a strictly non-technical account of a day out
> walking in the far north of Scotland. Full GRs and more accurate
> distances available if required.]
>

> From Durness, our progress was marked not, as you might imagine, by the

> rolling boglands or the precipitous quartz capped mountains that line
> the single track road south, boasting such evocative names as
> Cranstackie, Arkle, Foinaven and Quinag, for we could barely see their
> bases with such a low cloudbase of around 150 feet or so. No, it was
> marked by my progressive travel sickness due to the constant start-stop
> of the car as we were continuously forced to pull into passing places to
> allow other tourist traffic through. The last couple of weekends are
> the busiest of the holiday year with many tourists, both home grown and
> European, in campervans and caravans all out on the road together. But
> I digress; by the time we were within a couple of miles of the old
> fishing port of Kinlochbervie I was forced out of the car by the need
> for a fence to lean over.

I trust you weren't driving?
Or were you suffering from engine fumes exacerbated by your slow progress?
(Partner's car suffers from oily fumes into the cabin at slow speed.)

--
M Stewart
Milton Keynes, UK

--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

Lindsay

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Aug 22, 2006, 3:56:37 AM8/22/06

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Despite having climbed all the higher mountains in Scotland, I have
always wanted to walk to Sandwood Bay so hopefully one day I will set
some time aside to do this and onwards to Cape Wrath.

I did some work out of Durness. Fuel is always expensive up there and
there aren't many choices for filling up in the North-West. When you
see a garage top up or you may regret it.

The Youth Hostel at Durness is a very quaint place to stay a few nights
and you can walk to the nearby Smoo Caves.

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Aug 23, 2006, 3:46:42 AM8/23/06

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Paul Simonite wrote:

> My home part of the north coast is very close to John O'Groats, Just 7
> miles from Orkney by sea.

Ah - maybe you can help me, then? A little bit OT for this group, but
can you suggest anywhere quiet I could stop for the night with a camper
van and a 4x4 pulling a trailer? I'd prefer not to be on a camp site.
Somewhere between Thurso and John O'Groats, but not necessarily on the
coast.
--
Steve Loft, Glenlivet.

Compo

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Aug 24, 2006, 4:50:28 PM8/24/06

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The message <BJTGg.6968$zw6....@fe02.news.easynews.com>

from Steve Loft <st...@nybbles.co.uk> contains these words:

> Somewhere between Thurso and John O'Groats, but not necessarily on the

> coast.
> --
> Steve Loft, Glenlivet.

Here's a few places that are large enough for your needs:

Landranger series map 17 GR ND 066204
1. A loop of the old road that is large enough to hide your vehicles for
the night and popular with campervans in summer. If travelling from the
south on the A9 you pass through Helmsdale and on up the Ord of
Caithness on a new section of road. After the top of the hill you will
go downhill and into a right hand bend. The loop is just after this
bend on your left. This area is known as Ousdale.

2. Just south of Berriedale at the top of Berriedale Braes on the A9 is
a large pull-in popular with lorries although not always occupied.
There is room for several lorries in this pull-in. It is on the left as
you travel north. Shown as a small white triangle on the map at GR ND
107218

OS Landranger map 11: If travelling north to Thurso you will find a
number of old road loops on the south side of the A9 between Latheron
and Spittal. Some have No overnight parking signs but people tend to
ignore them.

Landranger map 12 GR ND 216689

1. A car park to the left of the road at Dunnet Links. Marked with a
blue P on the map. This is a square car park intended for visitors to
the centre of the dune system at Dunnet but is occasionally used by
campervans.

2. A little further along the road at GR ND221698 is the car park for
the Dunnet forest walks. This is quite large and is also used by
camepervans.

The road between Thurso and JOG is not very good for overnight pull-ins
and these are perhaps the only two that would be useable by your
vehicles.

3. A few miles to the south on the B870 at the East end of Loch Watten
is another loop from an old road. This is a regular stopover for
campervans throughout the summer and is also used by visiting gypsies
twice per year. Travelling north from Watten village the loop is on the
right at the end of the loch just about half a mile past the Brown Trout
hotel in the village. GR ND 248569

4. a final suggestion is a piece of road that was laid for an
industrial site that was not fully developed. The road is now in
private hands but is open and used occasionally by campervans and often
by me at lunchtimes. Leave Thurso past the railway station on the B874
as if going to Halkirk. Go straight past the Halkirk turning and turn
right about 400yds past the Halkirk turn at a red sign. There is a
_huge_ building on the right here about 150ft high, you can't miss it!
After a few yards turn left into the side road, it is a TEE shape on the
map at GR ND097663 If you stay here you will awaken to the sight of the
Old Man of Hoy across the Pentland Firth.

Hope this gives you some help.

BTW. Wick is 280 Nautical miles from Stavanger (309 Statute miles);
Gretna is 340 Statute miles from Wick, so I reckon that we are a wee
bitty closer to Norway than Southern Scotland :-)

--
Cheers,
Compo

Steve Loft

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Aug 25, 2006, 5:31:30 AM8/25/06

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Compo wrote:

> Hope this gives you some help.

That's brilliant - thank you very much.

> Gretna is 340 Statute miles from Wick,

Ah, by road, yes. I suppose that's fair enough :-)

--
Steve Loft, Glenlivet.

Bernard Hill

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Oct 5, 2006, 5:18:29 AM10/5/06

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In article <3130303036343...@norabattys.stockings>, Compo
<co...@norabattys.stockings> writes
>

>At the furthest west settlement on the north coast, Durness, we pulled
>over briefly to check the price of petrol/diesel. Fortunately, we
>didn't need any because it was 110p/l, no doubt they sell little at
>that price!

The price of fuel is high in Scotland. I reckon on the North coast it
can be 20% higher than the rest of the UK. In an area where car travel
is unavoidable it is a high burden on the inhabitants, and there are no
alternative places to buy. Someone has to pay for getting it there...

I live in the southern part of Scotland and am always amazed at the low
prices when I drive south to England (which of course I try to avoid
doing).

--
Bernard Hill
Selkirk, Scotland

Martin Richardson

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Oct 5, 2006, 1:32:03 PM10/5/06

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In message <5rQ1OeEl...@braeburnsoftware.demon.co.uk>, Bernard Hill
<Ber...@braeburn.co.uk> writes

>
>I live in the southern part of Scotland and am always amazed at the low
>prices when I drive south to England (which of course I try to avoid
>doing).
>
>

You could always cross over from Stranraer to Larne and then drive to
the Irish Republic and be even more amazed.

--
Martin Richardson
618/1554 Marilyns - aiming for 777 60/89 Donalds - only 33% to go
88/211 Irish Hewitts - 123, it's easy 20/220 Corbetts - only(!)200 to go

Steve Loft

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Oct 5, 2006, 4:00:02 PM10/5/06

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Bernard Hill wrote:

> The price of fuel is high in Scotland. I reckon on the North coast it
> can be 20% higher than the rest of the UK. In an area where car travel
> is unavoidable it is a high burden on the inhabitants, and there are no
> alternative places to buy. Someone has to pay for getting it there...

It's currently 110p per litre here, it was 107p when we arrived here a
month ago. Wasn't it supposed to get cheaper?

Anyway, looking on the bright side, we use very little fuel now. The
local shop is only a stroll of a mile away, and while the rest of the
shops are 25 miles away, most of that is sea.
--
Steve Loft
Sanday, Orkney.