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I spent way too much time in the Green Welly mega-plex yesterday. It is right next door to our hotel, The Tyndrum Inn, and among other enterprises, it offers two coin-op washing machines and a dryer. By the end of Day 6, I was badly in need of both.

Surprisingly, the machines were available — maybe because they are outdoors and the wind and rain were formidable or maybe because the bigger washing machine charges 10 pounds per load. Well, desperate times call for desperate measures — or maybe just digging in deep for some cash.

The washing machine quickly ate the money and refused to work. (That begs for a joke but I’ll refrain.) The shop’s maintenance man, Frank, was there in minutes and got my load spinning.

“It’s an English machine,” he explained. “Very temperamental with Scottish money.”

With time to kill, I went into the Welly’s main restaurant for a coffee and a scone and was shortly kicked out because they were closing. I wandered around the various shops — souvenirs, camping supplies, mini-mart — and bought the three calendars featuring beefy bare-chested Scots in kilts for my hiking companions.

That was enough spending. I grabbed a bench and watched tour bus passengers stumble in to use the public restrooms and buy sad little souvenirs.

The next morning, dressed in clean and dry clothes and fortified with hot Scottish oatmal, I set out in the drizzle for Bridge of Orchy, only about seven miles distant. Unlike previous days, I set out alone. The usual routine starts with a group selfie and a kiss goodbye from my wife, and then the four of them press on at a pace I can only look upon nostalgically as I turn to contemplate the flowers and hills and take pictures.

It works out well. I’m not a great conversationalist to begin with. I’m a dawdler. I stop and contemplate the smallest streams and re-tie my shoes, adjust my raincoat, take carefully considered photographs of almost everything, walk mindfully in meditation, and wonder how the hell I got so old. Well, I’m just slow. Slower than my gang.

I assumed they were already nearing Bridge of Orchy when I set out past the Green Welly, past Brodie’s (the other supply store), and up the gravel road to the old military road that skirts the side of Beinn Odhar.

My companions in the glen were the wide and cursive Alt Kinglass River and the railway tracks to the left, and the steep and grassy hillside with occasional grazing sheep to the right. My most constant companion, of course, was the morning drizzle, a fine misty haze that eventually burned away.

In this open expanse, nature takes on the same layered look as the hikers. At the top is the gray wash of clouds that covers the whole glen. The misty fog below cuts off the mountain tops. The mountains covered in thick fields of grass slope down to the four strands running through the glen — highway, train tracks, hiking trail, and river. There is rarely a house to be seen. An occasional herd of cows, sheep and small stands of trees vary the landscape.

What strikes you most — even with the haze and drizzle, is the immensity of this space.

The low clouds– Or was it fog? — covered the peaks of Beinn Odhar and the mighty pyramid-like Beinnn Dorain farther down the trail — and across the river and tracks, Beinn Breac-liath.

Even with the low clouds you could tell the personality of the West Highland Way was changing once again. The glen did not contain the dense forests of days past. Its contours were smoother, its vistas more open and sweeping. It felt a little like Montana (or how I imagine Montana to be).

There were still small streams (called burns) dropping down from the mountains (called munros if they are above 914 meters). They found their way into the Alt Kinglass which just seemed to go begging for a few trout fishermen in waders to perfect the scene.

While I was contemplating all this, Rose, Brian, Susan, and Kim came up behind me. That was different. We walked together until we got to a sheep crawl beneath the railroad tracks where we paused for the day’s group selfie.

No sooner were they disappearing over the horizon than the clouds began to lift, the munros grew suddenly taller, the drizzle stopped, and the sun began to cast long shadows. Wow, did that come on quick.

The sudden summer moved me to contemplate the poetic sweep of these hills — honed smooth by thousands of years of harsh and unforgiving climate — that guard this glen between them and nurture our walk like gentle giants.

It moved others, too. Suddenly people were finding reason to stop and snack while gazing heavenward. One woman sat on a rock with her notebook out trying to catch the poetry of it all in a furious scribble.

The frustration is trying to capture all this awe-inspiring scale on an iPhone. The digital technology has a marvelous way of flattening out the most undulating landscapes, trivializing the grandest peaks, and defying all attempts to capture the emotion inspired by this landscape.

Thank God Ansel Adams didn’t use an iPhone.

Between the fading drizzle and the punctuation of the sun, I met Martin Hlaváč in full Highland regalia — tweed coat, tam, kilt, leather sporran, buckled walking shoes, and green spats. His beard fell down in two long trails like Highland waterfalls. He had a substantial leather backpack that held all he needed for wild camping.

Martin’s kit not only looked authentic, he looked authentically as if he were transported here from two centuries past. There was a great story in that but I would not get it.

Martin is from the Czech Republic. This was his first time in Scotland. And he was walking and camping the entire West Highland Way. Our language differences failed beyond this point.

The trail eventually dropped to the glen floor and it was a simple if poetic stroll into Bridge of Orchy where my companions were finishing lunch at the eponymously named hotel.

Three of us resisted the charms of the hotel and opted to spend the night at the West Highland Way Sleeper, a bunkhouse carved from the village’s 1894 train station. A station where trains between Glasgow and Fort William still stop regularly.

We shared a room with two women from Paris, Hanke (“with an ‘e'”) from the Netherlands, twin brothers from Germany who were celebrating the imminent arrival of one’s first child with a last-hurrah hike, and a Frenchman in full military gear including tin pots hanging from his canvas rucksack.

During the last few days of the hike, we would encounter our bunkmates over and over, always with a cheery greeting like old friends found again.

It made me wistful for the nights on the Camino during which hikers would share a communal meal, exchange conversation and songs, and bond over the common experience. Nothing really like that on the West Highland Way. Until this day, much of the West Highland Way was composed of narrow and winding trails, not much there to encourage prolonged, side-by-side, conversations.

I stepped out of the steamy bunkhouse that evening to see the early makings of the full moon. It already looked ripe and full but I was told it needed two more days to reach its full potential.

I almost didn’t notice how absolutely clear the sky was. That certainly bodes well for the days ahead.

A footnote: Perhaps it is a stroke of marketing but a lot of the guidebooks urge hikers to load up on food and provisions in Tyndrum at the Green Welly or Brodie’s. While there is no Seven-11 or OXXO on the trail, it isn’t completely desolate.

The Bridge of Orchy Hotel has a fair stack of foot care and repair supplies among other things. They also offer a packed lunch for 10 pounds — same as a load of laundry or a calendar of half-naked Scots in kilts in Tyndrum — if ordered the night before. A few miles down the way, at the wee burg of Inveroran, there is a small convenience store with snacks, sandwiches, beverages and more.

It was there that I was introduced to my first can of the caffeinated orange soda called Irn-Bru, Scotland’s second most-popular drink since 1901. More on that tomorrow.