Day 100: Wick to Keiss (11 miles)

So if you were thinking this was the last day, it wasn’t. I would finish on Day 101.

Starting on a beautiful sunny morning following a thunderstorm earlier, I started at 10:30 - the others doing a road trip up to Thurso. I was just sorry the girls had done their day’s walk for me in fog!

I walked around North Head and onto back roads passing an old corrugated door shed just before the sign to Papigoe - I was astonished to realise a colony of Arctic terns had chosen to nest there!

As I came into Staligoe (In Norse, goe means inlet and stali means stack - sure enough there was a small harbour with a stack within it) a storm gathered to the south of me. I hoped it would pass to the west of me - fingers crossed! The day’s forecast was thunderstorms and I admit I was considering strategies to avoid being a target of lightening as I walked along the low cliffs and beaches of the day’s walk.

Two gull fledglings sat on a house roof above me looking very cute but I wondered if the locals thought that!

The day was humid and it became very sticky as the storm approached. I was grateful that the sun went in and watched as the heavy rain passed to the west heading north. I hoped it wouldn’t disrupt the others’ plans!

 

I was relieved that the path now turned east ensuring I didn’t get wet...or at least not this time!

An oystercatcher became agitated while I watched a female eider duck dabbling in the rock pools and a grey seal bobbing its head out of the water in the little bay south of the lighthouse.

I hadn’t factored in that the storm was drifting north east so was passing largely in front of me but slowly. This meant I was starting to catch up with the tail end of the first deluge with the possibility of another following shortly behind which would almost certainly get me if it materialised. The waterproof jacket went on as I watched the lighthouse in front of me shimmer within the first band of rain passing out to sea. I’ve always got a bit of a kick from being able to actually watch rain coming through and calculating whether or not it will get me - most often something you can do on the coast but I’ve done this all the way along the trek, especially in the Highlands and Black Mountains.

I paused to let the storm get ahead of me. The black cloud was impressive against the pasture and lighthouse. Today I could actually see and photograph the cotton grass - the day before there had been fields of it we could make out through the mists and we had contemplated whether it had ever been gathered for lint or the like.

I passed in front of the lighthouse and dropped down to a small lagoon with common gulls nesting.

I then dropped down towards the ruins of Sinclair Girnigoe castle ruins and the wide expanse of Sinclair Bay. Looking across I could see Keiss looking rather a long way away! Approaching the castle I crossed a small geo and a wheatear flew up in front of me clacking its alarm call.

Looking back to the lighthouse was a narrow stack and while I gazed across at that, a black guillemot flew into the geo below me. With their red legs they are apparently closely related to puffins and are very distinct as they fly with white patches on their wings which flitter extremely fast as they fly.

I was really impressed by the dramatic aspect of the Sinclair Girnigoe ruin sited on a complex part of the cliff with a number of stacks around it. Fulmar and black guillemots were nesting on the seaward side of the stacks.

A kestrel took wing in front of me and did so several times as I walked along the cliffs towards Ackergillshore. These cliffs might have been lower than the day before, but I found them impressive in their own way, not least because of the birdlife.

I was so engrossed that I forgot the time until I realised I was hungry. As it was 13:40, I stopped on a small promontory looking back to the ruins and to the cliffs in both directions. I was just settling down when I heard the mournful cry of a seal. Looking round I realised that there was one curving its body on a rock. Getting the monocular out I discovered it wasn’t the only one - there were probably 20 there. I’d take a closer look as I walked round.

The pitter patter of raindrops warned me rain was approaching, and not long after I set off again, it became heavy enough to put on full waterproofs. The seals of course weren’t bothered and I watched them for a bit before heading into the village wondering whether I had escaped the worst of the rain, as it eased off.

The swallows and housemartins were flying low around the buildings as I came up to Ackergill ruin. A male eider duck swam just below the ruin and a curlew took off in alarm when it saw me, one of a number I had seen today and along the JoG trail. It was good to see and hear them in such numbers here in Scotland.  

As I descended to the sandy beach of Sinclair Bay, I looked across again to Keiss and realised I could see Keiss castle. A solitary tern flying out to sea alerted me to the possibility of a colony along the beach of dunes. I would keep a wary eye so as to minimise disturbing them. Half a dozen ringed plovers scuttled along the sand and seaweed in front of me, some of them youngsters. I dropped closer to the water to stop disturbing their feeding.

I wasn’t bored walking along the beach, long as it was.  I’d kept my waterproofs on because of the wind, but with the rain having gone through without me really getting wet, I firmly packed them away and resolved not to get them out for the remainder of the day!

The different patterns in the sand, and the changing play of light on the waves kept me entertained. I passed what looked like an old shipwreck before coming to the river Wester. Although not deep, there was no way I could cross this without my boots getting wet but I rather enjoyed fording it without them on, and kept them off to continue walking along the beach and paddling in the freezing cold shallows of the sea.

I approached the subsea 7 pipeline assembly rail track unsure how to get across but a sandy ramp was available near the sand dunes as a cross over point, so I was quickly over and heading for the last stretch of sand. I knew I had to head up to a track once the beach turned to pebbles and passed by some motor bikes who were making the most of speeding and wheeling along the beach.

I found a rock to start drying my feet and waited for the family to arrive. I watched some sandwich terns diving into the water until Georgie and Maria arrived, calling down to me having run from the house. Martin and Jordan followed slowly behind with a towel for me, making my job much easier. From here it was just a kilometre or so back to the Harbour, and with another dramatic storm coming through, that was a relief!

As we made cups of tea, we watched the storm pass by with dramatic lightning over the harbour, and sea in the distance. Whilst the others apparently had got soaked up at Thurso I counted my blessings for having had a pretty dry day.

I wondered what the last day would bring ……