3 February Arthur’s Seat, Edinburgh

A different sort of outing was planned for today. We would drive east for an adventure in the capital. There was a little consternation in the ranks when we heard that there was to be more snow in the east but fears were soon allayed and we set off on the long drive to Edinburgh, all eleven of us today.
Most of us parked in the car park at St. Margaret’s Loch as had been arranged before we left Killie. Why the others chose to wait for us at Duddingston Loch is beyond the understanding of the scribe, but they did while we waited for them at St Margaret’s. Mobile phones are wonderful devices and the lost souls were soon re-united with the pack. Slightly later than expected we took the path for Arthur’s Seat.
On the way into the city we could see the snow on Arthur’s Seat and now we encountered it, new and soft and powdery, and almost five centimetres deep. But the powdery nature provided excellent grip and it was no hindrance to our upward progress. That didn’t stop a ‘view stop’ being called. The view, for all that we could see of it for we were down in a bit of a gully, extended northward over the city to Fife. ‘They’re burning Fife’, said Jimmy pointing to two plumes of grey reek rising into the sky. It had to be pointed out to him that this was the petrochemical cracking plant at Mossmorran near Cowdenbeath. ‘They bring the liquid gas from the North Sea and crack it into ethylene, the basic building block of the petrochemical industry’, said the knowledgeable one. We knew there was a reason we bring Alan.
The soft snow continued to provide good footing up the lion’s shoulder. But climbing the last few feet onto its head was a different story. Ice, probably left from the big freeze, lay under the new-fall and proved tricky, especially with Vibram soles. Feet had to be placed carefully to avoid a nasty backwards tumble. But we all made it to the trig point without too much difficulty.
The view from Arthur’s seat is remarkable. From a height of 250.5m (814ft) the compass must reach some fifty miles. Across the snowy rooftops of the city the landscape gleamed under an overcast sky. Immediately south, the Pentlands look grand, rising to fill the skyline; to the east Berwick Law and the Bass showed though a haar hung over the sea; across the Forth, the Lomond Hills rose above Fife and beyond the white foothills of the highlands, the Braes O’ Angus gleamed white in sunshine; to the west, Ben Lomond appeared in a distant haze.
Some time was spent on the top picking out the distant features as pointed to by the viewfinder and trying to identify the landmarks of the city. There was the castle and Calton Hill – easy. There was Easter Road, home of Hibernian FC – also easy. There was Murrayfield - slightly more difficult - and the dark smudge to its left was Tynecastle, home of the other half of the Edinburgh ‘Auld Firm’, Heart of Midlothian FC - really difficult.
As we stood, we were joined by more and more people out to enjoy the day in the snow. When the time came for us to leave Rex was for down the south side of the slope carefully picking his way with hands and feed along the ice. Jimmy wasn’t very sure of this route and was for the north side. A young couple standing close by told us that the easiest way was down the north path. Rex retreated and joined the rest on the easier path. Easier, it may have been but it was still coated in slippery ice. We came down to the shoulder every man for himself. Some picked their way carefully on the icy path, some strode out confidently but whichever method was chosen, we all arrived on the shoulder without breaking bones though Rex sat unexpectedly in the snow a couple of times.
On a broad top to our right, above Salisbury Crags, a pair of young ladies cavorted in the snow, turning cartwheels and doing handstands. When we joined them, they enthusiastically showed us the photos they had taken of each other; two young ladies delighting in their youth in the wintery conditions. Ah nostalgia! Whether they cavorted further we don’t know for we left them there and took the downward slope towards Duddingston Loch.
The snow was deeper on the grassy slope and it was a treat to walk downward through it. Robert and Jimmy led the way down to the road above the loch. A lot has been reported in these pages about old bladders so it was a great relief to some to reach the road and find convenient shrubbery. Away from prying eyes there was a great streaming of relief.
We kept to the road above Duddingston Loch and came to the bottom of the Salisbury Crags. The blether was good and the pace easy, yet the group split in two. The first group approached the end of the Radical Road and, much to the concern of the others, Jimmy immediately turned up it. ‘Where are you going?’ asked they. ‘This is the quickest way’, replied he. They remained unconvinced until the second group arrived and turned up beside Jimmy. We all came back by the Radical Road.
At the high point of the road we stopped for a view of the city. The castle looked splendid from this angle. Then Davie pointed out that it was nearly one o’clock and the gun would soon be fired from the ramparts. Jimmy drew our attention to the Nelson Monument of Calton Hill and to the ball at the top of the post. ‘When the gun fires, the ball drops to let ships on the Forth know what time to set their chronometers’, said another knowledgeable one .(That’s the beauty of this group. There’s always somebody who knows something about something that others don’t.) A certain amount of disbelief was expressed but the speaker held to his guns. The gun fired and the ball dropped. Most of us saw the ball drop but Bob was so intent in trying to spot where the smoke from the gun was that he missed the ball fall. Still, there’s more chance of him seeing this in the future than there is of him spotting a kingfisher.
With a slightly disappointed Robert in tow, we made the descent of the Radical Road. Perhaps the choice of this way back was a mistake after all. Ice covered the road, wet ice and slippery. Extreme care was taken by all but we managed and came down to the level in one piece.
On the level we met the young couple who had directed us from the top. She stopped, beaming. ‘Just after you left the top’, said she,’ he asked me to marry him’. The news was greeted by clapping and hearty congratulations until the cynic asked ‘And did you accept?’ The answer was affirmative, but the cynic doesn’t expect an invitation to the wedding.
A quick five minutes saw us back at the cars.

However that wasn’t the day finished. We wandered up Canongate in search of a place to lunch. As we passed Canongate Churchyard, somebody mentioned Adam Smith so we had to go in search of the great man’s grave. This was found easily enough, to the left of the church, and suitable homage was paid to ‘The Father of Modern Economics’.
Not to be outdone by the economists, the Burnsians took us to see that grave of Robert Fergusson, above which Burns had a monument erected. The monument was repaired later at the expense of RL Stevenson but Burns words remain:-
‘This simple stone directs pale Scotia’s way
To pour her sorrows o’er her poet’s dust’

Then it was over to the other side of the churchyard for the grave of Agnes M’Lehose, Burns ‘Clarinda’.
‘Fare-thee-weel thou first and fairest,
Fare-thee-weel thou best and dearest’

Alas we had to bid a farewell to the cemetery for hunger definitely called now. Lunch was taken in the Old Tollbooth Inn, overlooking the ornate grave monument of Adam Smith.

After lunch we came back down the Canongate to the parliament. Despite Davie’s opinion of the building, we had to visit it. We went in to the debating chamber to see how the great and the good govern this little country of ours. Each of us has his own viewpoint but the consensus on this question was ‘Not very well’. If they would just leave it to us in the pub, what vast improvements we could make.

Yes, this was a different sort of outing but one which was thoroughly enjoyed by all, especially by those seeing things for the first time. We will need to do something similar in the future.

27 January Wanlock Water Circular

Since the big freeze went, the weather has been mixed, sometimes frosty, bright and sunny but mainly damp and dreich. Today was to continue the dreich pattern.
The intention of the day was for a walk on the Lowther Hills before the snow went completely and when a fresh fall came earlier in the week, we were hopeful of a pleasant snowy walk. But, when we gathered in Jimmy’s place in Cumnock, the day was dreich with damp air and a lowering sky. Some were for a local walk round Cumnock fearing a repeat of last week but Davie suggested that we go to Wanlockhead and if the conditions for a climb were poor we could have a low level walk. It was Jimmy who pointed out that Wanlockhead sits somewhere above the fourteen hundred contour and there could be no ‘low level’ walking around there. However, we knew what Davie meant and his suggestion was accepted. We headed for Wanlockhead.
The village was free of snow but great icy drifts lay in the cleuchs and we suspected more lay on the tops; suspected, for there was no way we could see for sure for the tops rose into claggy hill fog the base of which was barely a hundred feet above our heads. There was no way we would get the veterans of last week’s soaking up into that fog so a ‘low level’ walk it would be.
The first spots of rain hit as we prepared to leave the cars, not heavy rain nor long lasting but enough to make us waterproof from the outset.
We set off down through the village, down past the old lead works buildings – ‘I helped excavate this in the nineteen seventies,’ said Paul and we were suitably impressed – and down the valley of the Wanlock Water. The drizzly rain went as we approached Meadowfoot Cemetery. We have amongst us those who love to explore old cemeteries. (It has been said that we only do this because, at our age, we are only sussing out future lodgings.) We interrupted our walk to investigate. That the cemetery is still in use is evident from the modern gravestones but its antiquity – it dates from 1751 - is also evident from the old stones. The earliest we found today dated from 1774 and the grandest was that of the mine manager on the late eighteenth century. The historian suggested that, if Maria Riddel’s account is to be believed, this may well have been the man who showed Burns and the Riddel group round the mines here in January 1792. We have only his suggestion for this but it is an interesting theory.
By the time we had exhausted the cemetery’s possibilities the rain had gone but the sky still showed no sign of lifting. We walked on down the valley on a forest-road type track that dropped imperceptibly down beside the burn, opening and closing jackets as the drizzle continued to come and go. Even when it went there was no drying and sweat built up inside the waterproofs. Then the track crossed the burn by a bridge and started to climb the valley side.
The abandoned farmhouse of Duntercleuch sits above the burn, on the side of the valley. Since it was mow nearing eleven, we stopped here, leaned our backs to the wall of the house and had coffee.
It was a good choice to have coffee at Duntercleuch for a few minutes after we had started on the climb again the rain came once more, this time in more serious mood. And it was up through the rain we climbed to enter the plantation clothing the side of Duntercleuch Rig. Our weatherman had suggested that the rain would go for it was just a front passing through but, at that moment, it didn’t look like it. The rain came straight down and it looked as though it was bringing the sky with it and we would be walking in fog again. Yet we climbed on with the road, Rex and Davie setting a cracking pace on the upward, splitting the group into two parties. And we continued to climb on what most thought would be the last on this ‘low level’ walk.
Somewhere in the mizzle and the trees the fast waited for the slow to catch up, and then they were off again. We continued to climb with the road. Quite suddenly and unexpectedly, the trees gave way and we came into a more open hillscape. The rain eased and was the sky clearing? Would our weatherman be right after all? It certainly seemed that way. We left the road and, at another abandoned, and this time ruinous, farmstead a hundred yards across the hill, we sat down for our peece.
Davie, being first to the ruin, found the only bit of shelter from the remaining drizzle under the still intact roof of the porch and the rest had to make do with an outside wall. But the rain went, and we were first to see the sunshine. A patch of blue sky floated above us and the first shaft of sunlight swept across the hill, to light and warm us. Were we jealous of Davie’s shelter? Were we heck! Now that the rain had gone, some took the opportunity to change into dry shirts. It’s a good job we had finished the peece for semi-naked Ooters are not a pretty sight and we of a delicate nature may well have been put off our food. As it was, we were finished the peece and were ready to set off again.
With the brightening weather came a brightening in the attitude of the group. A brightening until we found out that we had another mountain to climb. We slanted up grassy field to find a green track slanting up the hillside. Davie was being called all manner of uncomplimentary things. He said it was to be a ‘low level’ walk and here he was dragging us up another mountain. But, at least the track was good and well graded up the slope and, with the clearing weather, the views began to open out. The effort of the climb was rewarded by a super view from Wedder Hill. South-west, the hills around Moniaive showed well and in the west Nithsdale ran into Ayrshire with the Afton Hills on one side and Corsencon guarding the other; in the east, the bulk of Tinto looked close; due north, Cairntable and the Muirkirk hills had the wind-farm at Lesmahagow as a backdrop and through a gap, the Ochils were bathed in sunshine. This was a remarkable view for so low an eminence, one which was completely unexpected for us today given the weather at the start. Yet, to the south the Lowthers still held onto the clag as they would for the rest of the day so Davie’s choice of the ‘low level’ walk turned out to be a good one. His ears stopped burning as the comments turned more pleasant and perhaps we will let him choose some other walks in the future.
Wedder Hill was the high point of the day. Now we had to drop back into the Wanlock Water valley. The path found another track. We would follow this downward. This wasn’t as straightforward as it would seem for great wreaths of icy, rotting snow lay across it and these had to be negotiated with some caution for they were slippy. The Irvine two certainly took their time. But this is to be expected of those from the coast who think a heavy frost is a severe winter. But, remembering (eventually Rex and Davie) the new axiom of the ooters, we waited compassionately for them on the bridge over the Wanlock.
An easy saunter saw us back up the valley into the village. But Rex and Davie hadn’t finished with their exploits. In front of the main group, they were seen to veer away to the right, onto the old railway track. But enough was enough for the rest of us who kept to the road through the village. Wrong move! Davie knew exactly where he was going and the fast pair beat us all to the cars, having taken the shorter route.
A good end to a poor start today but as yon English fellow said, ‘All’s well that ends well’. And all was well with us as we took FRT in the Crown in Sanquhar.

Edinburgh visit

Recent Mosset Visit

Vernet les Bains

Kate on the walk from the Prades College to Ria.

Ansignan Viaduct

I have uploaded a few pictures to let you see some aspects of our recent holiday. The weather was mostly clear and bright with a snell breeze blowing combined with occasional snow flurries.

Wanlockhead route

Distance 15.9 km