20 February Muirkirk – Cairn Table – Glenbuck Loch - Muirkirk

Andy, Allan, Davie C, Davie Mc, Ian, Jimmy, Johnny, Paul, Peter, Rex & Robert

            Muirkirk in the eastern extremity of Ayrshire is a fascinating place; geologically, historically and archaeologically fascinating. Today we would explore some of these fascinating aspects of Muirkirk. (For an introduction to Muirkirk see Stuart Thomson’s webpage at www.freespace.virgin.net/stuart.thomson1/stpages/muirkirk)

            The town and parish of Muirkirk date back to the twelfth century when the monks of Melrose founded an outreach at Mauchline. They built a chapel of ease on the moors of that part of Ayrshire known as Kyle. This came to be known as the Muir Kirk of Kyle (Moor Church of Kyle) hence the name of the township that grew up round it. But we were not to explore this part of the parish today instead we would turn our attention to the southern part and to the top known as Cairn Table.

            Rex was late, mistaking the time of departure, but we waited patiently – well as patiently as we wait for anyone – at the walkers' car park at the ironworks institute at Kames for him coming before setting off along behind the institute to take the road signed for Sanquhar. The ironworks institute is all that remains now of the once thriving industrial centre that was eighteenth and nineteenth century Muirkirk, having been built as a recreation centre for the workers in the ironworks here. These Ironworks were established in the late eighteenth century and continued through the nineteenth and into the early twentieth. Nothing now remains of the works themselves only the institute and the place names - Ironworks Row and Furnace Road – to remind us.

The tarmac gave out after a few hundred metres but the old road continues as what was once a shooters road. This marks the old turnpike road that was built in the late eighteenth century as a short route from Glasgow to England and to take the produce of Muirkirk Ironworks to the centres where it was needed. Only the section of the turnpike north of Muirkirk is maintained as the public road to Stra’ven, the southern end having been abandoned early in the nineteenth century. It was along this southern section that we walked, waiting for Rex to catch up.

The reason we didn’t stop altogether and wait was the bitter east wind biting into exposed flesh and chilling even through layers of outdoor clothing. We wandered on slowly. We did stop eventually, in the lea of McAdam’s Cairn. This cairn marks the site of the British Tar Company’s works. The tar works was established here by the Earl of Dundonald to exploit the abundance of surface level coal around the town – coal that was suitable for tar extraction. The works were managed by, and eventually owned by, one John Loudoun McAdam who later made his name in England as a civil engineer and road builder. McAdam was a Trustee in the Cambuslang and Muirkirk Turnpike Trust that had the Sanquhar road built. He must have learnt his road building technique from James Finlayson, the engineer on the old road, a technique he was to refine in England and patent under the name macadamisation. There is nothing left of the Tarwork to remind us of its existence now only some bumps in the ground and this modern cairn.

Rex caught us up at McAdam’s cairn and we walked on. Evidence of early coal workings is dotted all over the moor here. The self-same monks who established the Muir Kirk of Kyle found coal easy to extract on this moor, the seams running close to the surface. The remains of medieval bell pits can be seen even from the old road as strange circular hollows in the ground where the old pit has collapsed and formed these weird-looking depressions. We noted some in the passing as we walked on round the Whisky Knowe – a conical mound by the side of the road in which, as legend supposes, casks of smuggled whisky are buried – and on to the Sanquhar Brig.

The old brig as no more, having been washed away on a flood of the late twentieth century but a modern footbridge takes its place and allows the pedestrian to continue the walk to Sanquhar. Our self-appointed guide for the day, Jimmy, pointed out the Minister’s Well on the other side of the burn, a green patch on the otherwise brown heather-slope and told us we could find other springs all around here, a result of some weird geology. We would be told more later.

We didn’t continue along the road to Sanquhar. We left the turnpike here and took to a path on the left-hand side to start our climb of Cairn table. Not so very far above the old road we crossed an artificial cut in the ground. This, explained our knowledgeable one, is the lade used to carry water to the tar works and the ironworks in the eighteenth century. And as our attention was drawn we could see the scar of it running across the hillside just above the track we had come along. But it wasn’t day to hang about and we set of again, upwards through the heather. Now we found the strength of the wind as well as its temperature. We kept moving.

We saw our first deer of the year as we walked above the cut and started on the hill proper. Allan hasn’t been feeling too well recently and this showed as he struggled upward. Eventually he had to call a halt and retreat. Johnny and Peter offered to keep him company and left us to climb on while they went for a lower level walk. We await a report.

The wind was chilling so the progress upward was constant. No time for hanging about getting cold. Davie Mc in his usual manner was well to the front and by the time we were half way up, he was nearly at the top. Still we plodded upwards in his wake. Near the top of Cairn Table the old red sandstone of the Devonian era outcrops. Trickling from this is another of Muirkirk’s springs. At around the 1900ft contour, it is higher than the surrounding hills. ‘An artesian spring’ announced our self-appointed guide ‘The water apparently has the same chemical constituents as Loch Katrine in the southern highlands.’ Whether it is the same water which by some freakish geology makes its way from there to here, he wasn’t convinced but this is the story that’s told about it. The spring does run at the same temperature summer and winter indicating a deep source but where the source is nobody is quite sure. Ian sampled the water and pronounced it tasting like - water! An excellent recommendation for your dram.

Another forty feet of climbing brought us to the frost-shattered boulders and native old red sandstone outcrops of the summit. The county boundary between Ayrshire and Lanarkshire crosses the summit with the highest point, a bronze-age burial cairn, being on the Lanarkshire side. Not to be outdone, the striking miners of 1926 erected a huge war memorial on the Ayrshire side. This is the cairn that can be seen from the town. Rising some twenty-odd feet above the natural level, it is now the highest point on the summit. To build it to such an excellent standard needed skilled men and equipment. These were brought to the summit in a lorry driven by a local man. How he managed this we can only guess but it was some feat of driving not one that we would relish.

On the summit we hunkered down in whatever shelter from the cold wind we could get and had a bite to eat.

After coffee we crossed into Lanarkshire, crossed the burial cairn and started our descent toward the young Douglas Water. It was on the descent that we encountered our first snow, hard as concrete and great to walk on. It wasn’t until Robert found the softer stuff and sunk up to his knees that we left the snow patches and took to a quad-bike track alongside the fence. Then, much to the irritation of some of our number Davie Mc took us along another set of tracks that he said was a better way. We all trust Davie Mc, don’t we? So we followed. And to everybody’s surprise these tracks brought us to the end of the shooters' road in the Douglas valley.

We kept to this for a while now, stopping only once for a lunch break at the bridge over the burn. As the road climbed away from the Douglas, we met a four by four pick-up bouncing down the rough track towards us. In it was a young man, a keeper on the Douglas Estate. He warned us to keep an eye out for Holly for he had just set some fox traps by the side of the road bated with choice leg of hare. We kept an eye on Holly for the duration. Good job as well for when she caught smell of the hare leg she was nearly in the trap after it. We caught her in time.

Then we crossed over from the valley of the Douglas to the valley of the infant River Ayr. The snowdrops were not quite into full flower on the high ground around Parishholm farm but there was enough there to suggest a superb show later in the spring. Then we crossed the road, climbed a fence and came to the shores of Glenbuck Loch.

Glenbuck Loch is totally man-made as can be noted from the dams at each end. It was created in the late eighteenth century to provide a constant head of water for the mills at Catrine amongst other things. Dams were constructed in the valley and the natural springs and runnels filled it up. It is now part of Glenbuck estate and is managed by Muirkirk Angling Club as a trout fishery. By its nature and situation it attracts wildlife and a hide has been built overlooking the fishery. It was in the hide that we chose to stop for another cuppa.

Glenbuck village no longer exists, the opencast mining of the area seeing to this, but a memorial to one of its greatest sons sits by the side of the road. This was of course Bill Shankly of football fame and something of a latter day saint to Liverpool supporters. It was at the instigation of the Liverpool Supporters Association with money from the opencast fund that this memorial was built. Some of our number can remember meeting with Liverpool supporters at the monument when we did this walk before. They had made a pilgrimage to Glenbuck just to see where Shankly was born and we can well remember the reverence with which they spoke about him.

 ‘Football is not a matter of life and death – it’s more important than that.’- Bill Shankly

We would now follow the River Ayr Way back to Muirkirk. Leaving Glenbuck, we came to the old railway – Ayr to Edinburgh – at the platform of Glenbuck Halt. Only some rotting sleepers holding back a bank that used to be the platform remind us that these ‘halts’ were once a common feature of country railways. But now even the railways that served these outlying communities have gone only to remain as level tracks across the open country. And the ‘halts’ are no more than grassy banks beside the track.

Not that we were in particularly ‘open’ country. No, for the first two or three miles we were in the valley of the infant Ayr, a burn that ran through the moss beside our track. There is not too much to be seen in the first two or three miles of the Way, only old railway tracks coming from long forgotten mines and quarries. The blethers of fellow Ooters were the only thing that provided amusement on this section. Then we came to the Muirkirk Canal.

In the early nineteenth century a better, more efficient way of transporting the produce of Muirkirk’s works to the customer was sought. Taking a leaf from the midlands of England, the works owners decided that if a canal could be made to the harbour at Ayr, much more could be exported at a greatly reduced cost. So began Muirkirk’s canal. It was never finished. No sooner had they started to dig than the railways arrived and the scheme was abandoned. No more than half a mile or so remains of the Muirkirk’s canal, no more than a waterlogged ditch beside the railway track.

We continued to follow the railway track back through the site of the ironworks to Kames and the waiting cars. This must be the longest walk of the year so far – around twelve miles and a hill taken in as well. Not too bad for old blokes.

Muirkirk is a fascinating place and we had just explored half of it. We look forward to exploring the northern part of the parish some other day. 

FRT was taken in our usual Muirkirk howf, The Coachhouse where an enjoyable hour or so was spent.

Muirkirk 31 October

Alan, Allan, Andy, Davie C, Davie McM, Ian, Johnny, Malcolm, Paul, Rex, Robert

Congratulations to Alan and Rex for completing their final Munro at the weekend and for raising an amazing amount for the Speur Ghlan charity.

As we met at the car park at Sorn cemetery for the proposed walk from Muirkirk back to there, the rain, which had fallen continuously overnight, continued with a vengeance. Discussion ensued as to whether to do the walk, do the walk to the Haugh, or do the Lunky Hole walk round Muirkirk. The last option was agreed as it would be the least affected underfoot by the rain.

Kaimes was soon reached and, having donned waterproofs, we set off on the well-established route (see 29 June 2011 for details) at about 10a.m.
We had hoped that the rain would relent but we were wrong for it was to be dreich for the rest of the day. As we suspected, parts of the path by the river were well sodden and the wooden bridges had to be negotiated with care, but good progress was made until coffee was called for just beyond the memorial to the covenanter, William Adam. Here Davie C demonstrated how not to sit on a portable seat by falling off his not once but twice. At least he didn’t have far to fall.
As there was little shelter afforded by the adjacent trees we didn’t wait long and were soon on our way again reaching the former opencast quarry - now a massive lake- just before half past eleven.
Having then crossed the A70 we made our way through the heronry and up the minor road to where it meets the B743. Robert then suggested walking back down this road to where it meets the A70 and continuing straight back to Muirkirk. A sort of vote was taken- not a real ooters vote since Rex was there- and the majority opted for Robert’s suggestion despite having to walk down the main road. Quick progress was made back to the cars, and having changed into dry clothes, we went down to the Coach House where the ever-obliging barmaid allowed us to eat our lunches as we partook of FRT. The next time we are down there we are to phone ahead and she’ll make us pie and beans for a nominal charge, but only if we want to!  
The walk had only lasted 2 hours 40 minutes today but, given the conditions, it was long enough for most.

29 June Return to the Mysterious Lunky Hole

Alan, Allan, Ian, Jimmy, Johnny, Peter, Rex & Robert

Robert and Jimmy turned up in shorts today. Well Jimmy turned up in shorts; we feel certain that Robert had just climbed out of bed and came wearing his pyjama bottoms, pale tan and stripy things they were. The reason they turned up in shorts this morning was that the recent spell of summer weather had given us a morning of gloriously clear sky and warm summer sunshine, a morning meant for T-shirts and shorts. Yet, by ten o’clock when we eight of us gathered at Kames in Muirkirk, the sun had gone, the sky was overcast and there was the usual Wednesday threat of rain in the air. Would this be another disappointing Ooters day?

Disappointing or not, since we were gathered, we decided that the planned walk should go ahead - we would seek out the lunky hole - and set off up the old Sanquhar road towards Springhill, following the River Ayr Way. That’s when the rain came. There was general rush of digging into rucksacks for waterproofs for by the look of the sky, the rain might stay for a while. But it wasn’t to last. By the time we had turned right off the Sanquhar road on the track for Tibbie’s Brig, it had gone and there was a general discarding of waterproofs and stuffing them back into rucksacks. By the looks of things this might be the pattern for the day.

We stopped on Tibbie’s Brig. The eighteenth century brig (recently restored) is named after Isabella ‘Tibbie’ Pagan, keeper of an inn of dubious repute here, and a writer of poetry of sorts. It was Tibbie who wrote the poem ‘Ca the yowes tae the knowes’, a poem that a much more famous Scottish poet took, discarded the bawdy verses, rewrote more of it, transferred the setting to Dumfriesshire and matched it to an ‘auld Scotch air’. It is Burns’ version that is familiar to us. Perhaps Tibbie’s version should be more widely sung – but not in polite company.

The site of Tibbie’s ‘inn’ is marked by a cairn near the brig. At this cairn we had a minor decision to make. The track rises up the west bank of the burn and disappears round a knowe but a pad runs down the side of the burn and rejoins it further down. We took the burn-side pad for Jimmy mentioned a fossil bank some fifty yards downstream. We think Jimmy’s whisky induced hallucinations are kicking in again for, search that bank as thoroughly as we might, we found no fossils. Jimmy’s reputation is in tatters again.

Five minutes after the futile fossil search we were back on the River Ayr Way heading towards the old Muirkirk to Ayr railway. What early summers treat greeted us on that old railway. The last of the spring flowers were giving way to summer ones. A profusion of orchids, Heath Spotted and Early Purples, and white Heath Bedstraw grew on the old track and a swathe of pink Ragged Robin clothed the bank of a cutting. Small Tortoiseshell and Argus butterflies flitted from flower to flower in search of nectar. An absolute delight for the nature lovers amongst us.

But we were to leave the old railway before long and follow the path down to the river side at Adan’s Cairn. This cairn commemorates William Adam who was shot here in the killing times of the late seventeenth century. Adam was a shepherd at Wellwood. On a Sunday morning he was waiting at this spot for his fiancée when he was approached by a party of dragoons. In their eyes the fact that he had a bible in his possession was enough to mark Adam out as a Cameronian and he was shot on the spot and his body left there for his fiancé to find. He was buried where he fell and a stone was later erected over him by Old Mortality. All of this is displayed on a modern information board erected at the opening of the River Ayr Way.

We left Adam's Cairn and continued down the riverside. The caffeine addicts were beginning to grumble that their habit needed a fix so, on a wee wooden bridge over a wee burn that emptied itself into the river, we stopped for coffee. While we sat at coffee, swallows old and young skimmed the river feeding on insects totally invisible to us. A buzzard ‘meowed’ somewhere above the Wellwood trees and brown Argus butterflies flitted. And the sun came out! What a pleasant coffee stop.

Post coffee we continued down the ‘Way’, crossed the Cumnock road (with extreme care as suggested by the sign with the River Ayr Way icon on it) and came to the unclassified road for Dalfram. This road has recently been resurfaced and the walking up it was smooth and easy. We crossed the Sorn road (no ‘take care’ signs here!) and came over a moorish tract to Netherwood in the valley of the Greenock Water. Whaups and buzzard and oystercatcher all made themselves known to us as we walked along the moorland road in search of a place for lunch. And the haunting cry of the peesie accompanied us finding a suitable place.

As we sat with our backs against a drystane dyke listening to the birds and watching the changing patterns in the sky (auld romantics, we), the sun went and an ominous charcoal grey cloud, pregnant with rain, crept over us. And it wasn’t long before the expected rain came. Waterproofs went on. But the intensity of the rain and its duration were as before. Waterproofs were on and back off before we had finished the peece and peece-stops are notoriously brief in the Ooters. The sun had returned by the time we set off again.

We left tarmac at Burnfoot Farm and took to a forest road. This took us through the forest and towards the houses of Smallburn. But we didn’t want to go there. When we found a road coming from the left we took this, came past a pond with an island full of resting gulls (seagulls!!!) and on to the Glasgow road at the cemetery. Then we crossed the road and came to a small car park.

Round this car park are built examples of different types of drystane dykes and information boards describing them. This is where we found the lunky hole. For the uninitiated, a lunky hole, according to the blurb, is a hole left at the bottom of a dyke for hares to get through but as our expert* pointed out, any form of wildlife would get through. So perhaps the blurb should reflect this.

We might have gone straight down the Glasgow road into the town but we didn’t. We found a path through the Kirk Wood and followed this to the Kirk. In the kirk-yard are buried the great and the good of Muirkirk past. Had we time to spare we might have investigated this but time was at a premium today for some had appointments to keep so we walked on down to the Douglas road and back into the town that way. That’s when Alan mentioned his Muirkirk connections. His wife, Ann, is a Muirkirk body and one of her relations was Professor Tom Symington BSc, MB, FRSE etc. etc. who is commemorated by a monument on Main Street. We admired the monument on the way past. And we admired the garden at the corner of the Glasgow Road as well, a garden commemoration the mining heritage of the town and the many famous people who were born, lived and worked here. This is well worth the visit.

Now we were only half a mile or so from the starting point. We turned up Furnace road and came back to Kames and the cars.

This is a good walk in mixed terrain, one that is worth doing again.

FRT and entertainment were taken in The Coachhouse on the corner of Furnace Road.

*The Early Ooters is full of experts on all subjects under the sun. If only the authorities would consult us, we would be able to put them right on so many things.

17 June The De’il’s Back Door – Third Visit

Since it takes eight pints of water to make one pint of whisky, I console myself by thinking ‘The more it rains, the more whisky they can make '.

Jimmy’s philosophy for life

The rain came in the night and put an end to the dry spell we’ve enjoyed over the last few weeks. When we gathered at Jimmy’s in Cumnock, it still poured down and the forecast was for a wet day. But our weatherman had consulted his seaweed and predicted that the rain would go by eleven o’clock so, while not fully trusting our weatherman’s prediction and despite Allan’s protestations, we set off for Muirkirk and the De’il’s Back Door. (We felt this was a far better alternative to looking at more of Robert’s holiday photos)
Logistical problems were overcome the same way we overcame them on our first visit to the Back Door (26/4/06) by leaving two cars at Dalblair, though we had to prevail on Jimmy’s good lady to get all of us to the walker’s car park at Kaimes, Muirkirk.
Still the rain came down.
Waterproofs were worn from the outset and we set off, heads down, into the weather. The rain came down and a wind blew but it wasn’t particularly cold and sweat built up under the waterproofs with nowhere for it to evaporate. It was to be a wet day one way or the other.
We took the old Sanquhar turnpike road, past McAdam’s Cairn and the Whisky Knowe, to the Sanquhar Brig, Rex and Robert setting a good pace. There was to be no hanging about to examine silly things like cairns, flowers or stones today. And no looking back for the view either for in that direction blew the wind. We walked on with heads down.
Still the rain came down.
But the fast pair did ease the pace as the slope steepened and the track climbed to the highest point of the day at the Black Gitter but there was still no halt to look at things and the only time we looked back was to check on those bringing up the rear. We waited for them at the gate at the Gitter. ‘The walk hasn’t been too bad so far’, said the novice.
‘Just wait till we get to the dougals’, said Rex.
It was now ten past eleven and still the rain came down. And the wind had freshened as well. We were beginning to loose faith in our weatherman.
The old road degenerates after the fence. Having been abandoned some two hundred years ago, it is now being claimed by the bog around it. Normally this is continuous sphagnum swamp but the long sunny spell had dried it so that, despite the day’s rain, some relief could be found in drier sections. Yet, we had to take time to loup the many sheughs that cut across our path. And by dint of walking and jumping and plunging through bogs, we came to the Ra’ens Cleugh.
Coffee was called for, for it was now well after half past eleven, and in as much shelter as a grassy bank could provide, we sat down for a bite. And still the rain came down.
‘That was slightly harder’, said the novice, ‘but not as tough as I expected’.
‘We’re not at the dougals yet’, said Rex and passed round the Aussie soft liquorice before comment could be made.

We left the old road at the sheep bucht and took to the open hill. One thing we have come to expect of a Jimmy walk is that, it may not involve a lot of climbing, but it is never easy. This section was tough. Feet had to be lifted high over the tussocks, reeds had to be skirted round and sheughs had to be louped. Every step was a different length and at a different height. It was tough. The group split into two, Rex, Jimmy and Johnny making up the first and the rest taking a sensible pace, as we contoured the flank of Connor Hill.
And still the rain came down.
Only two things took the mind off tiring legs. The first was witnessed by all. A deer, some distance away, stopped its grazing to watch and listen to the noisy bunch of men getting too close to it before bounding effortlessly over the stuff through which we struggled. We envied it its grace and energy.
Only Jimmy and Johnny saw the second thing. The skylark showed exactly where her nest was by flying off in a panic as a foot got too close to her. And in the nest were two mottled brown eggs. ‘A second clutch, at this time of year’, said the expert.
They left the nest to allow the adult to return and tried to catch up with Rex who had marched on oblivious to the pair nosing about in the grass. The rest trailed on behind.
Rex was carried away by his enthusiasm for the rough stuff and overshot the gully we should have gone down. The rest followed him only to have to turn back over the flank of the hill to find the top of the stone-chute that dropped us down to the base of the waterfall known to the locals as the De’il’s Back Door.
And the rain stopped!
The rain stopped and the wind dropped. Lunch was called. We settled down on a grassy island in the burn to eat our lunchtime sandwiches. The novice could contain his curiosity no longer. ‘OK, Rex’, said he, ‘What on earth are dougals?’ Rex let him in on another piece of Ooter-speak. ‘They are the tussocks of grass we have just come through.’ Only in the short upland summer do these show green shoots. For most of the year they are covered in long, brown trailers of dead grass, each tussock looking for all the world like the dog, Dougal, from ‘The Magic Roundabout’. Hence, Rex christened them ‘dougals’, and dougals they have remained.
The rain had stopped, the wind had dropped and the midges took full advantage. Fresh blood was on their lunch menu. They bit cruelly and bit often. And there were many of them. We never thought that we would wish for the rain to come again. Now we did. The rain did come again, but not until the midges had driven us away from our island and down the burn towards Glenmuirshaw.
We had to cross the burn to avoid the Connor Crags that dropped directly into the water. Once across we decided to stay on this bank rather than risk watery accidents. (Remember, we had Paul and Jimmy with us.) This was a bad move. Two rocky outcrops that hung above the burn had to be negotiated. The adventurous hung close to the burn and swung precariously round the rock. Those who think themselves more sensible opted for a higher route and a scrambled descent. They thought this would be the safer route. More fool them! It was on the second descent it happened.
Allan, spread like a stranded crab, searching for a foothold on the wet rock with his left foot, lost traction with his right. Down he came, the full four feet to the grassy ledge above the burn. Fortunately, he stopped there but not before bashing himself about a bit on rocky spurs. With nothing but a large graze on his arm to show for his misadventure, a rather paler and quieter Allan walked down the side of the burn. But he had recovered his colour by the time we came to the bridge at the sheep fanks at Glenmuirshaw.
And still the rain came down.
At Glenmuirshaw, we picked up the track that we would stay on for the rest of the walk. The abandoned farmstead of Glenmuirshaw had to be examined, mainly to get us out of the rain for a while but the rain hardly let up at all so we went back out into it and continued along the road. It was now a four-mile walk along the road to Dalblair.
And still the rain came down.
Three miles form Glenmuirshaw there was a brightening in the sky and a cooling in the wind. Was this an indication of the warm front passing through and bringing and end to the rain? Yes, it was, but by the time the rain went, we were only half a mile from the end of the walk, a dry half-mile for a change.

Somewhere else in these annals, it has been said that some of our walks will be remembered for a long time while others have probably been forgotten about already. Today’s walk might have fallen into the second category – it ticked all the boxes – but, for some reason, was quite enjoyable. Or is your scribe showing his masochistic tendencies again?

We returned to the Coach House Inn in Muirkirk for a pleasantly dry, warm and convivial FRT today.

17th June 2009: The Deil's Back Door

Lunch at the Back Door

Allan's Trophy

The Twins

Refreshments at the Coach House Inn.