We’ve booked a train north with the flash sale Scotrail had this week, we saved around £70 on the tickets and there’ll be some trekking and a wild camp between the out and back journeys.
Some miles were needed to see how we were feeling about the mileage I’ve planned for us and get us in the right mood. Linda’s health and fitness stuff is her story to tell, but mine has been a simple mechanical: my right knee on descents and it’s really screwed up my plans the past few weeks.
I needed an easy descent, Linda needed distance, the Greenock Cut then?
It was frosty as we stopped by the Tesco in Port Glasgow and still no warmer as we claimed a spot in the surprisingly nearly empty and always tiny Overtun car park. Leaving early ftw? Who’d have thought.
I was wearing my just-washed vintage-ish Buffalo Mountain Shirt that had arrived the day before from a nicely friendly eBay seller and I was feeling just-right. Worn over bare skin as designed and with a beanie and liner gloves on I was set.
It was bright enough but to the north it was hazy, the cloud looked to be down to 600-700m and that robbed us of the views we get when cutting over the hills that rise in the middle of the Cut.
We stopped for a cuppa and I gauged the misses’ mood, she seemed happy and had energy to spare. Linda doesn’t not like a change of plan though, I mean at all, but I risked it, I mean we’re best pals after all.
“How do you fancy taking a detour? We won’t get the views today, we could walk to Wemyss Bay and get the train back for the car, maybe catch the butcher/deli place…”
We had a new plan. It was brighter but not much warmer as we swung round to the visitor centre where getting another cuppa and some hot food was a necessity. It was still morning, just, so this was breakfast, pre-lunch maybe?
It’s nice in the wee cafe at Cornalees, the lassie is always friendly and grub’s good.
After a wee sit down wee took to the road briefly and started on the Kelly Cut which I walked for the first time last year. It starts well, smooth paths well maintained, but that doesn’t last.
We stopped to talk to some volunteers fixing the nature trail which is good news. It’s a raised wooden walkway through the heather and woodland which has been shut for repairs for years. Looking forward to trying it for the first time.
Soon we’re into bog, haphazard floating bridges and a wilder trail with different views. It’s lovely going this way.
We stopped for a rest and what remained of our snacks with patches of sun flitting by. It was beautiful light through the day, the hills this fat south got the best of it and it was lovely.
It was windy all day but I was comfy, I used the vents now and then to keep cool and found that maybe a single garment can work. More testing needed of course, but that’ll be no hardship.
After around 13km there’s a sign bolted to a rock that says “Half Way to Weymss Bay” but it means from Cornalees of course, it’s just 3 miles to the trail end. But the look on Linda’s face…
We sat in the sun at the Kelly Reservoir for a wee while as ferries criss-cossed the Firth of Clyde below, What a busy wee stretch that is, Rothesay still pulling in the punters for a day trip.
The walk down is pleasant at first, a farm track through moor and then woodland with a short quiet road section before a dark wooded, steep sided gorge that felt a lot more sinister than last time took us out onto the main road just as the butchers audibly pulled down their shutters. Good grief.
The cafe in the station was shut half an hour early too. The toilets were open though, yay. We caught the next train to Drumfochar where a shin up the brae found the car and a quick run up the road for home made dinner and getting our feet up in a bath.
19km or so and not a whisper from my knee which is good. The Buffalo shirt was something of a revelation which was also good. Linda had no trouble with the miles either, the good kept on coming.
