Allan, Davie, Ian, Jimmy, Johnny, Paul, Peter
The leaflet said the walk would be thirteen miles on mixed terrain of moorland tracks and quiet country roads. We had to take the word of the writer for none of us had done the walk and this was new territory for the Ooters and we looked forward to exploring this part of Ayrshire. The morning was slightly overcast when seven of us gathered at The Green in Maybole at half past nine but the forecast was favourable so we didn’t care what the terrain was, we anticipated a good walk.
Paul was put in charge for the day for he had the leafletand we trusted his ability to read it. (As well as that we wanted somebody to blame and Paul hasn’t been blamed for a while) With one eye firmly fixed on the leaflet, he led us from The Green down to the High Street and southwards along the A77. A few hundred metres of the main drag and he had us turning down a road exotically named Coral Glen towards, he said, the football ground of Maybole Juniors. Then he turned us upward on Allan’s hill.
Allan’s Hill was a street of council houses that rose up one side of a hill and dropped down the other side, but it took us out of the town into the quiet rural landscape of Carrick. Sheep, with our first lambs of the year, grazed the fields only lifting their heads to watch our passing and keep an eye on Holly. They needn’t have bothered for our passing was swift and Holly was, as always, more interested in sticks and ran on oblivious of the wary watching eyes. And Holly, stick in mouth, led us down the lane, over the Abbeymill Burn, under the railway and towards Kildoon Hill with its monument rising high on the skyline in front of us.
Fortunately for us we didn’t have to climb the steep front of Kildoon for the leaflet said, ‘Less than half a mile from the railway bridge a sign indicates the line of the old coach road which is our path’. We climbed the old coach road on a well maintained track. By now the blood had been warmed nicely and halfway up the track a stop was called to remove extra layers. Looking back from our halt on the hillside, we could see the lane run away to climb Allan’s Hill into the build-up of Maybole; and see the sun beginning to break through the layer of high cloud.
We continued to rise on the well maintained track until it topped out. Now we had a choice. An indicator pointed out a path to the top of Kildoon; our guide, human quoting leaflet, said go straight on. Only one voice spoke in favour of a visit to the hilltop, the rest preferring to leave it ‘till next time’. The eejit being outvoted, we walked straight on. Then another sign pointed out a track on the right, a way back towards Maybole but we left this one for ‘next time’ as well and carried on down the old road.
The old turnpike degenerated on the other side of the pass, only the parallel drystane dykes and a foot-trod showing it to have been a major road in times gone by. Whin has begun to colonize it and in one place this was so thick that the field had to be taken to, but it was only for a short stretch and we were able to join the line again before crossing the Altewan Burn. We reached tarmac at the burn. While the line of the old turnpike ran on, our guide said turn left on the tarmac. We turned left and came down to Lower Burncrooks.
Lower Burncrooks looked to be abandoned, outbuildings crumbling and windowless but the dogs barking in the kennels showed that the house at least was still occupied. And, because of the dogs, we didn’t spend any time looking over Lower Burncrooks. We came to a T-junction and turned right, our leaflet reader doing a wonderful job – so
far.
But now, for once, the reader let us down. Not once did he tell us to look for the Sunny Brae – it might have been a pleasant place to take coffee – nor did he mention the supernatural dangers of the Ghaist Glen. (Then again, being from Lancashire, he probably doesn’t know what a ghaist is.) He did draw our attention to a reservoir on our right though, a reservoir that we couldn’t see for it was beyond the ridge on our immediate right. But he drew us to a halt where the tarmac ran out at Lochspouts road-end and, with our backs to the fence and the Ghaist Glen, we sat down for coffee.
After coffee we followed another track, part of the service road for Craigdow Farm. Where this turned away northward, we were directed to leave it and take to a grass road through a newish plantation a grass track that may have been a continuation of the old turnpike according to our roads expert. The Green Well that we should have seen was not at all obvious unless it was the slimy water and spongy green sphagnum we waded through before the track rose to firmer footing. What was more obvious, well more obvious to the second group for the first three were for walking past it until called back, was the Drummochreen Cairn.
Drummochreen Cairn marks the spot where, in 1599 when our track was a thoroughfare, Andrew Macalexander was waylaid and murdered by Hew Kennedy of Girvanm
ains. The cairn is ancient – stones probably robbed from a nearby burial cairn - but the plaque was erected in 1982 by a descendant of Mcalexander, Col. G C Alexander. Being as we are cynical by nature, we came to the conclusion that Macalexander was likely an obnoxious so-and-so and was probably nane the waur o’ a guid murderin’.
This was turning into an excellent walk, far better than many expected. From the high ground by Drummochreen we had our first long view of the day, looking down to the coast and over to Arran. And that wasn’t the last of the views. As we gained the top there was Arran in all its magnificence, and beyond that the Mull of Kintyre. Even Ireland showed well in the clear air, Belfast Loch being a marker to help identify the Antrim Hills and the Mountains of Mourne. We rounded a ridge and looked down the lower Girvan valley, over Dailly to the coast at Girvan.
But we weren’t for the Girvan Valley. Paul told us to turn along the track to the right, a track signed for Kirkoswald and a track along which Holly was already trotting. We followed Holly to find tarmac again near High Newlands.
This was a quiet enough road and brought us by twists and turns to a track heading towards Kirkoswald. Taking the track - Holly had already turned on to it – we came down to Carrieston, up past the new church of Kirkoswald and down into the village. Three hours after leaving Maybole, in the sunshine, in the ancient churchyard of St Oswald’s Kirk we sat down for lunch.
Those with a Burnsian interest took the opportunity to seek out various graves of those associated with the Bard – his maternal grandparents, the Brouns; Hugh Rodger, his schoolmaster here; John Davidson (Souter Johnnie); Douglas Graham (Tam o’ Shanter); Jean Kennedy (Kirkton Jean). Meanwhile the philistines were gathering at the kirk gates champing at the bit to be off again.
The walk back from Kirkoswald wasn’t quite as interesting as the walk to it. We ambled up past Souter Johnnie’s house and out of the
village following the main A77 for a wee bit before being directed onto another quiet country road. This took us the two miles over the hill to Crossraguel Abbey. The abbey precinct was closed so there was no visit today. Next time perhaps. Now came the worst part of the walk, alongside the main drag of the 77 with lorries and buses and white vans threatening to lift bunnets off heids as they wheeched by. The only highlights on this section were seeing how the old road twisted and turned before the ‘improvements’ of the latter part of last century and watching the sun play on the distant Galloway hills.
We were happy to turn off the Maybole’s main street early and come back to The Green using side roads.
According to leaflet today’s walk was thirteen miles but it didn’t feel anything like this. Perhaps this had something to do with the interest of the first part and it being new territory. Our thanks go to Paul for leading us so expertly and to the English education system that taught him to read leaflets.
FRT was taken in the Greenside Inn, Maybole
