Record-breaking hiker's agony at 16-mile walk for bus home

Matt Girvan was relieved when he reached Cape Wrath after smashing the record for hiking a trail which runs the length of mainland Scotland - only to discover he had to walk another 16 miles to get the bus home.

The 29-year-old was suffering from the onset of trench foot and was in excruciating pain when he completed the Scottish National Trail, with his blistered feet having swollen up by a shoe size.

And that was when he discovered that the ferry he was due to catch had been cancelled.

Matt said he was "heartbroken" when he realised he had to do an extra walk to reach the bus.

"I had been pounding along 40 miles a day for two weeks, lancing blisters and in crippling pain to reach the finish line - so to find out the ferry was cancelled was almost unbearable," he told BBC Scotland.

"I was in agony from the throbbing pain in my feet and I felt desperate.

"The time I had spent on my feet had caused them to swell from all the blood rushing to them and they had been so wet I had the onset of trench foot."

His last leg of the hike was along such remote terrain that there was no path.

Matt, who lives in Edinburgh, then had to go back along 16 miles of the route that he had walked just hours beforehand, to catch a bus from Kinlochbervie.

He had originally been planning to catch a ferry from the finish line to Durness, where he could catch a bus back to Edinburgh.

"The terrain up there was pretty terrible. It was the worst stuff, rolling pathless bogs," he said.

"I didn't know if my feet could take it but I knew I had to get to the town where the bus stop was."

The Scottish National trail stretches 537 miles (864kms) from Kirk Yetholm, near the English border, to Cape Wrath in the north.

The route, created by Cameron McNeish in 2012, links up sections of Scotland's best-known walking routes.

Matt, a Scottish Water mechanical engineer, completed the record-breaking solo unsupported hike in 13 days, 19 hours and 35 minutes in September 2020.

He shaved more than three days off the previous record set by Graham Nash, who was supported in his attempt.

Matt also recorded hours of video footage during the journey, which he later edited into a 20-minute film, called Dawn till Dusk.

That film has now won the best solo film award at the New Zealand Mountain Film Festival.

It will be screened at a five-day-event later this month before being part of a national tour of New Zealand, where Matt grew up.

The documentary includes footage of Matt coming close to giving up his charity hike due to fatigue and his painful feet, as well as squelching through miles of bogs and running over rough and bleak terrain in the dark.

Matt, who moved to Scotland from New Plymouth two years ago, said: "It was amazing to really test myself to my limits and attempt something when I thought I had at best a 50% chance of pulling it off.

"I had a gigantic blister on my toe after only two days, and wet weather and exhaustion on day six brought me to the point of tears and really questioning what I was doing."

Matt came up with the idea of the solo challenge at the start of the Covid lockdown when travel was restricted and many endurance races were cancelled.

He said: "It was a trail of two halves. You cross a line as you go north and you drop off the face of the earth, where it became difficult to find food.

"I didn't do enough research and got timings wrong, so at points I was surviving on a few sweets and biscuits."

At one point he thought he was hallucinating when he saw a white orb light up from his head torch in Glen Almond, near Aberfeldy.

However, it turned out to be a sheep wedged sideways in a cattle grid.

"It had pretty big horns but I managed to grapple with it until I had it around the stomach and I could pull it out," he said.

He said the hike was tougher than he thought it was going to be, but added: "I've learned a lot of lessons."