My decision to hike the West Highland Way came in a rather roundabout way this year. I really wanted to take a ‘sister trip’ with Amy after the kids returned school in September. Originally, the idea was to head to Spain’s Basque Country, which is always lovely that time of year. But airfare was just stupid expensive.
The same was true of just about every other place we wanted to go. France… Italy… Greece… It seemed that everyone with a little time or money was heading over to Europe in 2023. I guest people just wanted to travel. The lockdowns were a thing of a past, and folks were making up for lost time.
After many, many hours scouring the internet, we stumbled on a location where: (1) we could get relatively reasonable airfare; (2) the hotels weren’t fully booked; and (3) we both actually wanted to spend a bit of time seeing the countryside. The winner was the UK and Ireland.
After a few days in London, we planned to take a week-long walking vacation to western Ireland where we could to walk along the Cliffs of Moher, visit the Aran Islands, and hike The Burren.
A SOLO TRIP
Once we had the details of our mid-September UK/Ireland trip sorted, I went ahead and extended my time in Europe by an extra 10 days of solo time. Once Amy flew back to the US at the end of the September, I would have until October 10th to squeeze in another hike on my own. But where to go?
After some back and forth, I whittled my options down to two shorter scenic trails in Europe:
- The Cami de Cavalls – a 185-km trail that circumnavigates the island of Menorca; or
- The West Highland Way – a 115-km trail through the Scottish Highlands
The weather in October would undoubtedly be nicer in Menorca. But I was worried about the logistics of getting to Menorca (and back) in such a window. On the other hand, my travel to and from Scotland would be super easy. I didn’t even need to fly. I could take a train from London to Glasgow for a very reasonable cost. And committing to the shorter of the two trails would even have time at the end of my trip to see a friend of two in the UK.
And so I set about booking accommodations for the West Highland Way (WHW) along with a baggage transfer service for the entire journey (what a luxury!). All I needed to carry was a daypack containing the items I needed for each day. And this was a good thing too, because hiking in Scotland during the shoulder season was a roll of the dice. I could get a dry, sunny weather or cold, rainy days. Either way, I was going to need a lot of layers, for sure!
Our UK & ireland Trip
So how did I prepare to hike the West Highland Way? I didn’t.
That’s not 100% true. I did walk a lot. But Amy’s joints issues wouldn’t allow big mileage days, so we booked a more moderately-paced trip in Ireland with Mac’s Adventures (a local UK-based tour operator). The itinerary capped our daily mileage to between 7-10 miles, which was pretty easy in my book. But at least I wouldn’t start my solo adventure with blisters or an overuse injury.
It was a good sister trip overall. The weather didn’t always cooperate with us. But, we enjoyed our time together and walking around London and along the Irish coast. Rather than list out everything we did, I’m opting to just present some photos of some of my favorite memories from the trip.
Lessons learned in Ireland
While our mileage might have been meager, this Ireland ‘pre-hike’ would provide some critical lessons that would translate directly to my upcoming West Highland Way adventure:
- Never trust the forecast. It really didn’t matter that average September weather in London or western Ireland trends toward dry and moderate days. That wasn’t what we’d experience. Instead, we got some brisk temperatures, a good bit of rain, and one day or really strong wind. And that pattern of unpredictable weather would definitely persist into my Scotland trip too.
- Bring good rain gear. Directly related to the point above, hiking in hours of chilly rain requires really good rain gear. I was super I’m glad I left my normal lightweight hiking rain jacket at home and opted for my heavier Patagonia Torrentshell 3L rain jacket instead. This solid jacket never wet out, no matter how much rain I experienced. And my rain pants were equally essential to staying dry and warm.
- Not all daypacks are ideal. Given that I’d only need to carry a daypack inn-to-inn, I opted for my travel daypack – the Cotopaxi Batac 16. I’d soon learn a hard lesson though. While this daypack is great for airport travel and walking in dry conditions, it didn’t fare nearly as well in the pouring rain. The red fabric on the shoulder straps bled all over my Patagonia rain jacket and irreversibly stained it. I’d try to remedy this problem in Scotland by wearing a plastic poncho over my jacket and daypack, but that solution only resulted in even more staining when the inexpensive yellow poncho stained my (formerly) white rain jacket a second unwanted color.
- Trail runners are fine. While weather on Ireland was ridiculously rainy at times, the daytime temperatures were never so cold as to result in freezing feet or toes. What’s more, since I was staying indoors every night, my trail runners were able to dry out each night. Our fellow hikers who were wearing boots weren’t able to say the same for their footwear, and this lesson would hold true on my Scotland hike as well.
- Expect a nutritional void. I eat a bit of crappy food on my backcountry hikes. Resupplying in a Dollar General or at a gas station convenience store will do that do you. So imagine my surprise to discover my nutritional woes would be equally abysmal on this inn-to-inn front country trek. The food in most of the local restaurants seemed to involve fried items, with a side of potatoes, and a pint of whatever was on tap. My plates were usually brown and completely devoid of healthy vegetables. My stomach would just have to just embrace that Irish (and Scottish) food was mostly pub fare.
