The Critical Walker

St Monans to Crail (The Fife Coastal Path)

Distance: 12 km

Date: Saturday 1st May 2010.

Weather Conditions: Overcast, strong breeze, occasional bright spells.

Temperature: 8C

Guidebook: Fife: 40 Coast and Country Walks

Critique:

Whinney Hill from Balloch, Loch Lomond

Distance: 10 km

Date: Friday 2nd April 2010.

Weather Conditions: Sunshine with  clouds growing overcast

Temperature: 8C

Guidebook: Glasgow - 40 Town and Country Walks

Critique:

Another walk from this gem of a little book.  I've been so impressed with this book from 'Pocket Mountains' that I've bought a few more that I will test out and review here.

Anyway, back to this walk......

It was relatively easy to find a car parking spot at the station, however there is also parking available at Balloch Castle Country Park. As usual, I struggle to find the very beginning of thee walk, and I suspect this was because the instructions in the book were not crystal clear (instruction to turn left when it should have said right), however, I quickly found my way back to the intended route. Balloch Castle Country is in a beautiful setting on the side of Loch Lomond and is worth a trip on it's own.

The timing of this walk is fairly important as it can be very boggy and muddy in places, as it was why I went. If you don't mind getting muddy and wet feet, then this won't be a problem for you. You could wear wellies, but this is quite a long walk, so be sure that you can wear wellies for walking in. The view from Whinney Hill is worth the walk, but this is definitely a 'Moderate' Walk in terms of strenuousness and distance.... I was very stiff the next day!

   

Stirling, Wallace Monument & Cambuskenneth Abbey

Distance: 5 1/2 miles / 8.9 km

Date: Tuesday 13th October 2009.

Weather Conditions: Cloudy & Overcast

Temperature: 12C

Ordnance Survey Map: Landranger 57 (Stirling & The Trossachs)

Guidebook: Pathfinder Guide - Loch Lomond, Trossachs, Stirling and Clackmannan

Critique: 

Donich Water & Lochgoilhead

Distance: 2 1/2 miles / 4 km

Date: Monday 12th October 2009.

Weather Conditions: Sunny but clouding over during latter part of the walk

Temperature: 12C

Ordnance Survey Map: Landranger 56 (Loch Lomond & Inverarary)

Guidebook: Pathfinder Guide - Loch Lomond, Trossachs, Stirling and Clackmannan

Critique: 

This was the second in the guidebook and was labelled 'easy'. I had my Mother, who is in her 60's with me for this walk and had deliberately picked a walk which had been classified as easy for this reason. However, this walk should never have been classified as easy in my opinion, yes it is a short walk, but the steep and prolonged climb (the book calls it an initial climb and suggests that it is only for a short period) must surely render this particular walk as 'moderate'.

That being said, the setting is gorgeous, especially on a clear, dry Autumn day such as the one we had.  The views over the Loch and the waterfalls and pools are very inspiring, so as soon as you get over the initial shock of the steep climb, you quickly forget the pain and focus on the beautiful surroundings. On this walk there is a good chance that you will see Highland Cattle, as they are grazed on some of the hillsides that this walk takes you over. 

Stronachlachar, Loch Katrine & Loch Arkel

 

Distance: 5 miles / 8 km

Date: Saturday 11th July 2009

Weather Conditions: Warm & sunny with white cloud

Temperature: 19 - 21 C

Ordnance Survey Map: Landranger 56 (Loch Lomond & Inverarary)

Guidebook: Pathfinder Guide - Loch Lomond, Trossachs, Stirling and Clackmannan

Critique:

This is a pleasant walk with relatively easy instructions to follow.  However there are a couple of points that you should note before commencing this walk. Firstly, the walk details state that there is nowhere for refreshments. This has obviously changed since the book was published, as the Stronachlachar Tearooms have opened at the pier carpark where you commence your walk. In addition, the very last section of the walk which is listed as optional, is no longer accessible. It appears that the Lochside pathway that you are recommended to follow has become private property.

The walk itself starts quite gently along a water authority access road. Towards the end of the road, the instructions become very hazy, it talks about the end of the pathway being at a cattle grid but actually it is before the cattle grid, however you only discover this by reading a sentence or two of instructions on. The Royal Cottage is actually private property, so be careful if you want to take a look at it.

The pathway before the cattle grid, up the hill is  not that clear because of the large amount of vegetation obscuring the way. There are times when you become convinced that you are following the wrong direction,  just because the path is not clear. The path is also not the 'easy ascent' that the guidebook claims it is, and so the sight of the 'iron girders' referred to, is a welcome relief!     

The only other instruction in the guidebook also worth drawing attention to is the instruction 'Return to the line of towers and at the next one, which is just before a hill with a pillar on top, veer right on a faint path to flank the hill and head down towards a gate in the fence'  The reason I mention this phrase is because the 'faint path' that is mentioned is not 'faint' at all, in fact it is a very well defined track for Vehicals from the Foresty Commission to use.  Don't waste time looking for a 'faint' path where there is not one ... the big wide muddy track is the one that you want...    

Douglas Park, Largs (Failed Attempt)

 

Distance: 7 miles

Date: Monday 8th June 2009

Weather Conditions: Pleasant  & sunny, clear skies, with passing clouds

Temperature: 19 C

Ordnance Survey Map: Landranger 63 (Firth of Clyde)

Guidebook: 25 Walks in North Ayrshire (Nicolson Maps)

Critique:

This walk is taken from a small, local guidebook to walks in Ayrshire. At first glance the instructions looked quite easy to follow,  however once I started to follow the instructions in the wooded area near the beginning of the walks instructions, I quickly realised that the instructions were very, very weak. This was not helped by the fact that the map included in the walk's instructions is not a big enough scale to use to follow the instructions.  I quickly became lost, although I did manage to basically go in the right direction, finding the right path was impossible. I even ended up reaching Douglas Park from a completely different direction.

In summary, although the views for part of this walk are stunning, I was unable to follow the instructions properly to follow the correct route and therefore abandoned the walk. I may attempt to do this walk again one day as I suspect the second half of the walk is probably easier to follow than the first part.

Alloway & the Heads of Ayr

 

Distance: 10 miles / 16.1 km

Date: Sunday 31st May 2009

Weather Conditions: Warm & sunny, clear skies

Temperature: 25 C

Ordnance Survey Map: Landranger 70 (Ayr,  Kilmarnock & Troon)

Guidebook: Pathfinder Guide - Glasgow, the Clyde Valley, Ayrshire and Arran (Jarrold Publishing, 2007)

Critique:

Oh my! Instructions on this walk are diabolical, in places the instructions are just plain wrong! This is a very long walk and in fact really this should be split into 2 walks as a good section of the walk is through the town of Alloway which has nothing in that particular section of that walk of note,  so it is far better to split the walk to miss this part out.

Taking this action would also prevent another problem from happening. The car park used in this walk closes at 5.30pm  irrespective of the day or the time of year, so there is a very strong chance you could return from your walk unable to retrieve your car! I moved my car to the second Carpark noted on the map in the book, next to the beach near Longhill point. My recommendation is that you do the short version of the walk around the Burns sites in Alloway and then move your car to the beach and continue the walk from there.

OK - now for the walk - on leaving the car par you are instructed after having looked at the Burns Cottage to 'return to the car park and just beyond it turn left onto a paved path at a footpath sign to Auld Kirk and Auld Brig' - what they fail to tell you is that you need to cross the road opposite the carpark and that you need to look very hard for the sign post as it is completely covered by a hedge. The next flaw also involves the fact that the book does not tell you that you have to cross a road to get to the Tam O' Shanter Museum. Finally the worst sin of all...... the section of the walk between points B & C are wrong. The instructions in the book say 'The path later climbs to rejoin the track WHICH BEARS RIGHT and continues to a road'  Ignore this instruction completely as you will find yourself double-backing on yourself. You need to bear LEFT!!!!! 

The flaw in the second part of the walk near the beach is that it is not made completely clear that there is no pathway and that you are just expected to walk along the beach itself.  Once you know this, you are fine, but you can waste time following small paths just above the beach that don't necessarily lead you in the direction that you need to go. Be aware that you will need footwear suitable for walking in sand, unless you want blisters....

Despite the terrible instructions, the two walks themselves are very interesting, and in good weather they  pretty spectacular.       

A Walk around Old Madrid

Distance: 2 miles

Date: Saturday 16th May 2009

Weather Conditions: Warm and Sunny, Clear Skies

Temperature: 25-28 C

Ordnance Survey Map: Not Applicable

Guidebook: Madrid (Eyewitness Travel Guides) Dorling Kindersley Press

Critique:

This was one of three guided walks contained in the guidebook. To start with, the instructions on how to find  the beginning of the walk were very difficult to follow and I actually spent a long time walking around trying to find the beginning of the walk and this ended up adding probably another couple of miles to the walk before I even started! This was partly due to the fact that the mapping was not detailed enough, with many of the side streets not even appearing on the map, let alone being named.

The walk itself was relatively simple to follow once I found the beginning, but it did appear to be somewhat out of date. On reaching what should have been the section of the city wall which is supposed to be Moorish, I just found a lot of very high fencing and scaffolding and signs that the whole site is being redeveloped.  I just hope that the redevelopment protects the section of the city wall.

Almudena Cathedral is interesting - it was only finished a few years ago and it is clear that different materials have been used in different sections of the Cathedral, however, the guide makes no reference to this. Dare I say it, but I think the main entrance has actually been created using concrete blocks! This is a pity as overall it is an attractive building, but it looks like a hotchpotch of different materials that will age an look different and this may make the building start to look ugly.

Overall the walk was interesting, mainly due to the beautiful sites of the city, however, it does miss out key parts of Old Madrid such as Plaza Mayor & Puerto del Sol. It would have been very easy to have designed the walk to incorporate these these two key sites into the walk - a missed opportunity.  My recommendation is that if you want to do this walk, start at Puerto del Sol and walk down Calle Mayor past Plaza Mayor which you can then look round. Then continue down Calle Mayor to rejoin the walk route along Calle Bailen...          

Mugdock Country Park

 

Distance: 5 1/2 miles / 8.9 km

Date: Saturday 2nd May 2009

Weather Conditions: Dry, periods of  sunshine

Temperature: 10 - 13 C

Ordnance Survey Map: Landranger 64 (Glasgow)

Guidebook: Pathfinder Guide - Glasgow, the Clyde Valley, Ayrshire and Arran (Jarrold Publishing, 2007)

Critique:

Finding Mugdock Country Park is not that easy, especially finding the correct car park as there are multiple car parks dotted around the perimeter of the park.  However, it is worth pursuing as the park itself is lovely and the starting point at Craigend Visitor Centre has a Garden Centre, Cafe and a couple of Craft/Gift shops so there is plenty to keep you occupied.

Following the walk itself was challenging. The instructions were to start in front of Craigend Visitor Centre and to follow a path to the left of a sign-posted path to 'Mugdock Castle and Loch, Craigend Castle' however, there are no sign posts at all in front of the Visitor Centre. I went around the back of the Visitor centre and there are signposts there, but none with the exact directions noted on it. I therefore made my best guess on which path to follow based on the map and took that one.

The Park is very lovely and has plenty of paths which means a trip to this park would be worthwhile even if you are not going to follow this walk.  However, it turned out that the path I ended up taking was not the correct one, but I did end up at point A (the 14th century fortress/castle) only realised that I had approached it from completely the wrong direction and ended up double-backing along my original route to get back on track. This meant that I suspect that I missed quite a few important features in the park such as the chapel ruins.

Once corrected, the route was pretty easy to follow from this point onwards, although there were times where you felt that perhaps you were going wrong. This was particularly around the reservoir/Milngavie area, but in actual fact the variety of the landscape on this walk is part of the attraction. I now know that Milngavie is a very attractive place to live!

One more correction to the walk - at the end of the stretch of the West Highland Way that the walk follows, it refers to a kissing gate - there is no longer a kissing gate, instead a very modern metal split fence has been put in it's place.  

The part of this walk that moves it from 'Easy' to 'Moderate' is the very steep climb up the hill after turning away from the West Highland Way, if you are not fit, this will be a challenge unless you take it very slowly.

All in all, an enjoyable walk despite the lack of clear directions at the beginning.