Post 4 of 4: Kinlochleven to Fort William July 3rd..LAST DAY

Originally we booked 2 nights in Kinlochleven because of our intention to go to the Ice Factor Activity Center. We had been hearing that the weather may deteriorate before or on the day we had planned to walk the last section of the way. We decided that we would walk to Fort William on July 3rd instead because the weather that day was supposed to really good.

We woke up to a real summer morning on the 3rd and had an early breakfast and was out on the trail by 8:30 am. Which was the earliest we had ever started during the past 10 days. All for good reason, as we had 16 miles that had to be done all at once. Just like the day before, our first task of the day was to climb up another ridge similar to Devils Staircase, this one was not as high but it was just as tiring!

Looking back down on Kinlochleven

If you look at the center of the picture above and you see a mountain sticking out just behind the large one that extends up from the city, that was the area we eneded up coming down from when we came from Kings House the day before. It was a pretty steep walk down!

Dad and Kari resting on the way up the ridge

Looking up the loch from the top of the ridge

Starting to climb up into to the gap between the mountains, not as bad as the others

Well into the gap now, looking back at where we had already walked

Ben Nevis, the largest mountain in Great Britain, we are about 4 miles away from Fort William 

 At this point we had to make a decision. We came to junction and had a choice. We could take the normal WHW trail into Fort William that was 6.5 miles and would take about 3.5 hours. Or we could take the road in which was 4.5 miles and 2.5 hours. Since we had to head back to Kinlochleven for our second night there and meet back up with Mom, we had to get into Fort William before 5:15 to catch to last bus back to Kinclochleven. We opted for the road and walked the 4 miles in on pavement which was not great on the feet. We made into FW with plenty of time. We watched the final match of Wimbledon in pub near the bus station to kill time. We probably could have taken the normal way in but needed to be better safe than sorry.

Fort William at last!!

The original end of the West Highland Way, we made it!

Since we were worried about catching the bus on time we didn't get a chance to see the end of the way until the next day. Even more annoying is that we didn't know the new end of the way is now at the far end of Fort William's main street. We walked right by it when we hiked in the day before but since we were looking for bus info we didn't even notice! So no true pictures of the last day but it is still a great accomplishment. We saw some awesome stuff and are glad to move on to seeing some new stuff for the rest of the time we are here!