If you search on social media for the hashtag vanlife you will find happy smiling people living out of campervans, classic VW campers and converted Ford Transits. You’ll even find some couples who have converted a full sized bus into a home. Yet, what none of these photos will show is the sheer unmitigating horror of living in a van.

First, in order to sleep at night you need to black out all windows. This can be as simple as a curtain but, if you’re anywhere warm, you’ll need thermal reflective pads to counteract the sun roasting you like a turkey in a metal oven. What they don’t tell you is that vans don’t come with air conditioning when the engine is switched off but the sun still rises in the morning and will turn every window into a magnifying glass with you as the poor hapless ant set on fire for it’s amusement.

But to stick up thermal pads you need to have the reflective screens as close to the window as possible, ideally stuck on them. This involve plastic suction caps that stick on the inner windows – but only if you lick them first to provide some liquid to act as a glue. Licking it stops air getting in and reducing the grip.

So, vanlife means you need to spend every night licking the suction caps to attach the reflective shields to every window and, if you don’t lick them they fall off, which means you wake up covered in sweat because the sun has got through your defensive shield, and your window is open to the world for everyone in the camping site to look in. You’re in your PJs, sweaty and bedheaded. Vanlife!

And then you have to pack away your bed and restore the seats so you can have breakfast and drive away. Which you think would be simple but WHY WILL THE BED/BACK SEAT NOT ROLL BACK LIKE IT SHOULD?!?!? And you have to elbow drop it like The Rock winning Wrestlemania to close it.

And at the end of that day you have to do exactly the same thing but in reverse to get from a seat to a bed and you realise you’ve spent two hours sumo wrestling a sofa bed. Every single day. Twice. Vanlife!

I hated vanlife. I drove round France for two and half weeks to follow the Tour de France. And every morning and every night I hated that van. So much so that by the end I was booking into hotels rather than spend any more time gargling a two litre bottle of water just to get ready to French kiss one hundred suction caps.

Vanlife? Avoid! More like banlife! If you want to live like a Blur song then I recommend Country House. He lives in a house, a VERY BIG house…!

If you want to know Scotland’s most popular lay-by (excluding any featured in late night Channel 5 documentaries) then the lay-by next to Ben Cruachan in Argull must be among the leading contenders for the top stop.

Ben Cruachan is the highest mountain in Argyll. From the top, on a clear day you can see all the way from Northern Ireland in the west to Ben Nevis in the Highlands. Yet, for such a popular mountain, it only has a lay-by for around five cars at the start of the walk. If you want to climb then you normally have to park at Cruachan power station and visitor centre, around half a mile down the road.

When we got there in early September, we were lucky, we’d arrived early and got the last place. But if you really want to bag a space then you need to do what the car in front of us did. Put your backseat dow, convert your boot into a mattress and sleep the night in the back of your car.

If you want to know Scotland’s second busiest car park then you don’t need to go far to find it. Aproximately a mile down the road towards Tyndrum there is another lay-by with great access to Loch Awe. It has plenty of space but just be prepared for cars to pull in and out of it all day. In 30 minutes we saw four cars pull in, stop and then people getting out to admire the view of the loch, before getting back in and driving off.

So, if you love to swim with an audience then this spot is for you!

Ease of access

Very rocky so bring shoes or flip flops to get to the water’s edge.

Water Quality

Very clear.

Other people

No one swimming but you may have spectators from the lay-by!

It’s said that after Roger Bannister broke the 4 minute mile it only took a few weeks for someone to beat it again. And, by a year later, three runners ran under four minutes in a single race. Once someone does something seemingly impossible for the first time, it redefines what we think is possible. And the impossible becomes normal.

Unless you watch this video.

I cannot believe there is anyone thinking, “you know what, I want to do this too! He might be the first, but I will be the second!”.

I don’t even know why anyone would even think to ski down K2. It’s like asking someone if they’d like to Hula Hoop in a shark tank or solve crossword puzzles while being fired out of a cannon. Why would you even think to do something where clearly you are going to almost certainly die?

Anyway, this guy did it. Good on him. But you won’t catch me skiing down K2 anytime soon – even if it does become ‘normal’.

I. CANNOT. FIND. THE WORDS.

This year’s Toddman was won by a dirty, rotten, cheat. Even Lance Armstrong is saying “hey, that’s not fair!”.

Here’s what happened.

But before that: what is Toddman? I’m glad you asked. It is a triathlon race open to everyone with the surname Todd who is related to me or Iain TwinBikeRun. You can find more here and here.

This year’s race featured a new course as we changed the bike route to incorporate two iconic central Scotland climbs: Tak Me Down and the Crow Road aka Todd Me Down and the Todd Road. We also changed the run route by changing the start from Lennoxtown to Todholes aka Toddholes while keep the mid point as a climb to the summit of Mickel Bin before a downhill sprint back to Toddholes car park where the winner is the first to touch the green gate at the entrance – and, for which, they get to wear the now iconic black Peat & Diesel cycle jersey.

Last year, I won Toddman fair and square. This year, it was stolen from me!

SWIM

We both completed the swim at the same time, albeit I’d started swimming 10 minutes before him as he was trying to get some drone footage. But do I bring up the fact I was 10 minutes ahead of him and therefore finished 10 minutes earlier but had then swam an extra 10 minutes? No, because I’m a gentleman. I would never repeatedly mention that I was 10 minutes ahead of him as the end of the swim because I would expect that would be something he would acknowledge. 10 minutes is a HHHUUUUGGEEE gap. But do I mention it? No. Not me. Even though it was 10 minutes.

Anyway…

(10 minutes!)

I don’t mention it.

CYCLE

We complete the bike in the same time. I’m happy to call this a draw.

RUN

We start together. We reach the top of Mickel Bin together. We run back down together until, with a mile to go, I stop and tie my shoelace. I thought Iain would stop. I thought I could rely on him to recognise the unwritten rule that you don’t attack the leader when the leader has a mechanical.

I know this is a bike thing and not a triathlon thing but triathlons also use a bike so I’m borrowing this rule for Toddman.

And what did Iain TwinBikeRun do when I stopped to tie my shoelaces? He ran off, that’s what he did. He didn’t even hesitate. He just kept going and going until he reached the Toddholes gate and declared himself the winner.

But he’s not winner. He’s a CHEAT.

And while the general public doesn’t back me on this. A poll on the Glasgow Triathlon Club Facebook page showed 90% of members supported his claim for glory, it’s worth pointing out that people cheered when Lance Armstrong crossed the line too. But he was still a crook.

So, while Iain TwinBikeRun may think he wears ‘the Black’ and is proudly cycling round in the Toddman Jersey, I think history will be his true judge and the true winner of Toddman will be acknowledged as me!

(Also he only won by 5 mins and I was 10 minutes ahead of him after the swim, which I don’t like to mention. Even though it makes me the winner. 10 minutes!).

Just because you can do it, doesn’t mean you should do it. I can, if I want, pour myself a nice bath of baked beans and spend the day soaking in Heinz’s finest. It wouldn’t be against the law to marinade myself in toot juice. It might be unusual, but, provided I did it in my own home, then no one will ever know I did it. Yet… yet… just because I can do it doesn’t mean I will ever pop into the supermarket and buy enough beans to fill a tub. 

Equally, I can walk or swim pretty much anywhere in Scotland. Right to roam laws grant everyone very wide rights to access hills and paths, lochs and rivers, regardless of who owns them. 

There are exceptions. You can walk on a golf course, but you can’t walk on a green. But, in general, unless you’re trying to walk through someone’s garden then you can go where you like. 

But just because you can do it, doesn’t mean you should do it. You may have a right to swim in a loch, but an angler too has a right to fish in it, a sailing club has a right to sail in it, and land owners do and should expect that people won’t damage their land or invade their privacy. 

There is one farmer who owns a field near a loch north of Glasgow. He’s a nice man, I’ve spoken with him a couple of times but, the only reason I’ve spoken with him, is that he comes out in his tractor to watch parking spaces to make sure no one cuts through his field to get to the loch. 

He shouldn’t have to ‘guard’ his field and protect his cattle who graze in it. He should expect that people will walk round and avoid the field. 

So, this is less a review and more a plea for tolerance. You might be able to swim in a loch but that doesn’t mean you should. And the Brother Loch and Harelaw Dam have large and active angling clubs. There are plenty of lochs in Scotland, almost as many as beans in a full bathtub, so I don’t swim at either lochs. And I would suggest that you don’t either.