Lochboisdale, South Uist

The first stretch of our legs on our week long (or thereabouts) hitch-hiking and camping excursion around the Outer Hebrides.

For the first night we headed out with a new acquaintance, Sam, who had plans to walk round the whole lot.

It was great to have the support of someone in the know, however, he also helped to draw a contrast between the two camps; shining a light on the unorganised nature of myself and Fiona.

We've travelled our way around much of Europe, so slumping a colossal back-pack around was nothing new, in fact the straps slipped on with a familiar and nostalgic comfort (for the first few days, at least...). But as Sam walked along beside us I began to notice the neatness of his snugly packed rucksack, the sturdy boots and easily accesible OS map.

Fiona and I, on the other hand, looked more like recently evicted squatters with our cups tied onto the outside of our bags, our daypacks and camera bags swinging loosely around our prematurely reddening necks, and a hefty, unopened and untested tent strapped hurriedly to the bottom the rucksack.

How hard can it be to whip up a quick tent, though? People have been doing it for years and I'm pretty sure Bear Grylls can fashion a small cottage out of sticks whenever he pleases. What's a couple of poles, then, and a tarpaulin sheet thing?

Turns out it's pretty much the outdoors man's rubik's cube (I'm an outdoors man now). No matter which way we turned this ridiculous contraption it didn't seem to fit. It was probably the wrong tent, we thought, and we'll have to snuggle up with Sam, or get the ferry back to Oban. It'd be so embarrassing to rock up home a day later because you couldn't build a tent. And I'd surely be stripped of my new title.

My new sandals would become defunct and embarrassing. My new fishing knife, which completed my newfound outdoorsiness would be good for nothing but slicing the occasional apple and perhaps some cheddar.

Sam came to the rescue, though, and had us erected in five minutes. Which is pretty impressive.

I helped, though. I loosened it...

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