Sound-Trek

The West Highland Way started with Jim'll Fix It. Or to be precise, the Jim'll Fix It theme tune. Initially I wasn't sure why, but the seed had been planted in Brian's head when we mentioned that Jimmy Saville had a house in Glen Coe. So, being the sharing type of guy that he is, he told us that, all the way from Crianlarich to Tyndrum, he'd had the tune in his head. And thus began a peculiar and unexpected journey deep into the aural memory banks in all our heads for the rest of the trip.

For some reason I managed to link the 'Jim'll Fix It' theme tune with the opening brass section of 'Sweet Caroline', which looped around for most of the next day. Not a bad tune for a good steady hiking pace it turns out.

Every now and then a shout would arise from one of us, announcing a change of internal soundtrack which led us through Disco, Ska, 'The Bluebell Polka', and many obscure tunes which none of us could remember the title of, or the artist, but the lyrics all seemed to be lodged in some deep mental recess somewhere.

I was expecting the physical challenges, and the accompanying mental challenges but I wasn't expecting either of these to be accompanied by music.

And so, like some bizarre, slow-mo, linear marching version of a techno club, we padded on for 50 miles across the glorious glens and moorlands of Scotland to our surreal soundtrack.