No cows on the road, but before I get into that, you can skip to the bottom and see that yes, we made it to John o’ Groats today.

Bettyhill was so beautiful that I thought I needed a morning photo as well as yesterday’s evening one. Our host entertained us at breakfast with a story about a cyclist who stayed with him last year, on his way to John o’ Groats. Not long after he left the hotel, he received a call from aforementioned cyclist asking for help. He had come round a bend going downhill at some speed and found cows on the road. Unfortunately for both him and a cow, he ran into one, fell from his bike and smashed his collarbone. The kind hotel owner stayed with him until the ambulance arrived, and looked after his bicycle. I gave husband a look, to which he replied he doesn’t go too fast around bends in the road. In the end, there were only sheep and no cows.

From Bettyhill, the road follows the coast, with coastal sorts of hills, some long, some steep, but lots of them for the first sixteen miles. And the dreaded headwind had returned, so it was a bit of a challenge. And we had cold feet. It’s not really spring yet in northern Scotland.

After Caithness, the road flattened, but the headwind never stopped. Husband very kindly offered to go in front after I petered out early on, so I had the advantage of his shelter. I’m not sure we go fast enough for it to be a slipstream. I do have to concentrate quite hard to stay very close but not crash into him, and not to be left behind.

For the first time we had a deadline for arrival at our destination, due to the complicated travel arrangements mentioned yesterday. We were being collected at 3:00 to be driven to Inverness so that we could catch an early  morning train on Monday. I wanted to arrive at John o’ Groats well before, in time for photos and to drink in the views and atmosphere of our final destination.

We had never yet arrived anywhere at 3:00, though it was certainly easily possible if we set our collective minds to it. And so we did. I still stopped for photos, for the occasional fueling break in addition to the fuel I ingested  as we cycled. It did help that it was cold and cloudy, so not conducive to a long picnic lunch.

It also helped that the landscape wasn’t the most beautiful after we left Bettyhill. First it was a bit bleak, then more fields of sheep. But the bleakness must disappear when the brown heather blooms into colour later in the year. And I never get tired of watching the lambs.

We saw these sculptures in a small wood as we went by, stopped and looked up to see dozens of crows’ nests and a cacophony of caws.

As we continued, we came across two more colonies of crows. Wouldn’t want to live nearby, but also didn’t realise that they nest in flocks.

Thurso is much bigger than anything we had seen since Inverness. It does have a train station, but we’re not sure what supports it through the winter, unless the residents are employed by the nearby nuclear plant.

We did stop by the shelter of a stone wall for half of our lunch, one of the best we have had when we have asked for a packed lunch from the pubs or hotels where we have stayed. Usually we just get a sandwich and maybe crisps, but today we had a sandwich, banana (eaten well before now), crisps, shortbread fingers and a full sized Mars bar. During all of our cycling, food has become fuel, necessary two hours after breakfast and then pretty much every hour until lunch, then after another two hours if we are still going. Then tea before dinner, with cake if possible.

After our half lunch, it wasn’t long before we arrived at the end, just over 50 miles from Bettyhill and over 1000 miles from Land’s End. We had expected the total to be a bit under that, but we had some navigational errors that added miles, plus the miles from Penzance to Land’s End when we began.

We didn’t set any records, and have nothing but respect for those who have. But ours was a different kind of journey, to see the UK from bottom to top, slowly on bicycles. And we did that.