I made sure Hilda's battery was at 100% before I set off, and didn't take the range extender. (I must weigh that thing!) I stopped at the gate before the Turret Bridge, where I met some nice livestock.
The flat delta beyond that looks interesting though, and I might go back to go further. Look up into the glen where the water from Glen Gloy exited during the ice period, and then follow the track the other way towards the 350-metre col with the Spey. Depending on the state of the track I think you could get another four miles or so, but on Friday I'd had enough of rough tracks for a bit. I was also wearing ordinary trainers, which are fine on tarred roads, but I need my heavy-duty waterproof hiking shoes for tracks with puddles and fords.
According to the woman with the 650 watt motor you can get all the way to Melgarve on the Corrieyairack road through there, and there is a footpath marked, but it's a long way - maybe another five miles beyond the end of the track, say nine miles from the end of the tarred road - and as she said, you'd need a seriously heavy-duty mountain bike. Like hers.
There's a disputed "road" up there, which I may have photographed accidentally. By that stage the 260-metre one has petered out, and there should only be two. But the OS map marks three, at 325 and 350 as expected, but also one in the middle at 335 metres.
I thought at first that my photo showed three lines, but now I'm not so sure. I think I'm looking at two streaks
above the real thing, which may be illusory. I don't think I can see anything between the two lines. The OS map does show one in between, but some of the time I think the OS is pandering to the geological debate in what it shows. It also shows a "road" at 400 metres in Glen Spean, which isn't even possible, but then Darwin thought he saw it...
You can also see the huge banks of river silt in that photo, which as has been pointed out are much greater than can be explained by the wee burn flowing down from the 355-metre col between Glen Gloy and Glen Roy. But five hundred years of all the water from Glen Gloy flowing down that way, when the exit to the Great Glen was blocked by ice, will do it.
I still had 38% of the battery left when I got back to the car, so all in all pretty decent performance, particularly as I only pushed the bike for one short stretch on the way up. I had thought, standing at the viewpoint on the way up, that I might have to push up to that level on the way back, but in fact I was able to ride it on maximum assist.
The roads idea is so fanciful I imagine people telling the stories of them being Fingal's hunting roads, or made for the same purpose by the ancient kings of Scotland at Inverlochy castle, with the same twinkle in their eye as you see in modern boatmen on Loch Ness telling the tourists where the best places are to see Nessie. It's Darwin thinking in all seriousness that they were sea beaches and the land had risen 1,000 feet that's the real puzzle. It's
obvious nonsense. But apparently it fitted with his pet theory of the moment so he wouldn't give it up.