The long trek north - Day 1

After a morning spent stocking the cupboards and freezer with enough food and drink to keep three young men fed and watered for eleven days, rushing into town to pay urgent bills and packing the car, we finally sent off on the first leg of our journey just after 2.30pm.

According to the AA it's approximately 655 miles from Peterborough to the cottage we were staying in at Stenness in Orkney, and we'd decided to break the journey twice, firstly at an inn near Lockerbie and then at Thurso. The first stretch up to Lockerbie was easy but boring - A1, A66, M6 and M74.

Because we'd left rather later than planned we didn't have time for much of a break, and this photograph was an emergency blip, taken from a layby on the A66, looking south across the flat-topped Pennines. At this point the weather was still very warm, with a veil of high cloud. I rather liked the way the late afternoon sun was highlighting the topography of the plateau with its incised valleys.

We arrived at the Hightae Inn just before 8pm - at first it seemed to be deserted and we wondered whether we'd made the right choice of stopover. But once inside our fears were allayed. The owner, Mark, couldn't have been a better host; the room was perfect with crisp white bed-linen, a goosedown duvet and sweetly scented toiletries; and the food was simply but perfectly cooked - one of the best meals I've ever eaten in a restaurant.

And the quiet location meant we got a good night's sleep, before the seven hours of driving it would take us to cross the rest of Scotland.