Club weekend away, Badaguish, May 25-27

Boy, did we get a weekend for the club weekend away! Wall-to-wall sunshine, temperatures hotter than the Mediterranean and no broken bones!

Friday was a slow start, with folk arriving over the course of the late afternoon and evening, and much congenial chat. By contrast, Saturday was a fairly brisk start, with an assortment of runs around an assortment of trails round Rothiemurcus and Loch Morlich, and by all accounts, a good time was had by all. Al managed to confuse a few folk (including himself) by losing contact with the group he was running with, taking a wrong turning, and eventually joining up the second group. All did eventually end well.

The hordes of children seemed to be doing a fine job of keeping themselves entertained, so those of us not on the low-level runs weren’t called upon very much. Four of us (Phil, AndyGa, Emily and me) headed off for the hillrun, up Bynack Mor. It was pretty fantastic. The first part of the route was gently ascending, up the Ryvoan Pass and round to where the Bynack Stable used to be, before heading more steeply up the hill. On the final part of the hill we were accompanied by assorted ptarmigan, croaking their approval (or disapproval – it’s hard to tell). The top was terrific, with views for miles. It did seems a bit bizarre, sitting atop a Munro in running vets and shorts, but it was all glorious. The descent was short and sharp, and did incorporate a bit more tramping through heather and bog than might have been ideal, but hey, it was all nice and warm and sunny and all was well with the world, so we coped. Over the last couple of miles, Andy pushed on a bit as part of his marathon training. This was the only part of the run where we started to feel the heat, but we knew we didn’t have far to go. We got back to Glenmore Lodge in about two and half hours, which was considerably quicker than we’d anticipated.

At about the same time we were heading down, the bike ride was getting underway and we met near An Lochan Uaine. Top marks to everyone involved in organising this one.

Most of the afternoon was spent at the beach, which wasn’t what might have been expected a week earlier, when the Cairngorms were covered in snow! The brave ones were swimming, Doug was providing canoe rides, and there was a fair contingent of sun-worshippers soaking up the rays. There was something pretty fantastic about sitting on the beach with a view of the loch and the hills behind with snow patches to remind us we were in Scotland.

Eventually we all dragged ourselves back up the hill to prepare for George’s karaoke, which went off well and without any smoke alarms. So, progress from last year!

 

Sunday morning saw the now-traditional hare and tortoise race, with teams assembled after much careful consideration from PhilT and Seonaid. Sol and Dominic were promoted from the juniors to the hares, and sure enough, although Digby set a storming time over the first leg, Sol wasn’t far behind and did well to keep Andy Greaves at bay. As usual, the performances of all the kids were totally inspiring. The race for first place was a genuine race, with Levi and Christopher sprinting it out over the last 100 metres, with Christopher just edging it eventually.

 

And then it was back to the beach for some folk! More swimming and canoeing, and a beach barbeque or two. Lots of happy campers. Looking forward to next year already.