Mull of Kintyre

Campbeltown is a big place - it even has outskirts.  Lots of shops and places to eat, and a nice, modern hostel.  Worst ever porridge for breakfast, owing to a misunderstanding about the direction the knob worked.  It took ages to get hot, and then simmered fiercely until it was ready.
About three miles out of town, the hills started.   "Lots of chevrons" I had noted when planning the route. The wind was less fierce, and I was sheltered from it a lot of the time.  To call it peaceful is an understatement. Zero cars for the first nine miles.  I actually saw a cuckoo too.

Then, out of nowhere, a traffic jam!  A car coming the other way, a farmer and his dog on a quad bike, and me.  Well, words were spoken, but they were friendly, and without road rage.

Trying not to sing The Song.  I thought I saw mist rolling in from the sea at one point, but it was just my dirty spectacles.  Good views across to the Ayrshire coast, and the rocky island of Ailsa Craig, which is interesting mainly because there was a house by that name on my paper round in Sidmouth. I always wondered what it meant.

The hilly west gave way to the smoother south with a nice long descent. I was in Southend, quite unlike its Essex twin, a small village with a tea room.  Nice.  "You should have been here yesterday" said the waitress. "There were about twenty cyclists here." A gentle ride along the south coast turned into a gentle ride up a valley, brutally ended when the road decided to go across the steep-sided valleys.  Regretfully I couldn't take the 14 mile detour to the the Mull of Kintyre lighthouse, where Ireland is only about 15 miles away.  I had a ferry to catch, up at the top of the Kintyre peninsula.