Paisley Canal to Glengarnock via Glennifer Braes & Beith

From the top right (Paisley Canal) to the bottom left (Windyhill) via the dark blue line.

Around the southern edge of Barcraigs Reservoir and through the single track back roads of upper Beith.

The Glasgow rail network is a joy to travel outside the rush hours of commuting times. Indeed, even the rush hours aren't so bad. This is not London after all. It is Glasgow, a geographically spacious and liberally populated metropolis, that always seems (outwith the crazed shopping corridors of Buchanan Street and Sauchiehall Street) to have breathing space all around. Part of this space no doubt filters in from the perimeter hills that are always visible from the city no matter where you are. The other part comes inevitably from the 600,000 population, a far cry from London's 5 million plus or Edinburgh's congested tourist hub. 

With the most extensive suburban rail network outside London, Glasgow for the bike + train stravaiger is a joy to explore. And, as you've probably guessed by now, I have a rather broad definition of what and where Glasgow actually is. As the American anthropolgist Edward Twitchell Hall was apt to say, the limits of the self extend far beyond the body.

Living as I do in Cessnock just a couple of miles west of the city centre, I have a constellation of train stations to choose from and which will propel Pegasus and I to the furthest reaches of the Glasgow universe. It means that the day-trip is now extended across a wider territory, ostensibly almost as far down as the English border. At the moment however I am rippling out slowly, so it may be a year or two before I take that wonderful train down to Berwick upon Tweed and cycle out to Lindisfarne.

Today, I kick off from Dumbreck Station, another first for me, despite it being the nearest train station to me, a mere few minutes away on the bike over the motorway overpass and by Bellahouston Secondary School. The line is one of the quaintest in all the rail network, and is possibly the only railway line in Glasgow that is also a cycle path (when it arrives at its terminus Paisley Canal, the platform seamlessly joins the Sustrans 75 cycle path).

It's a 13 minute ride from Dumbreck to Paisley Canal and there is a touch of the bucolic (and the historic) along the way as the fields of Bathgo Hill swell up at Ralston, and Leverndale water tower and Crookston Castle pass by.

Exiting from Paisley Canal Station, looking north, you can just see the tops of the Kilpatrick Hills amidst the cupolas and roofs of Paisley. (The route heads the other way, south, up the hill...)

From the station to the 'car park in the sky' on the Glennifer Braes it's no more than a few kilometers in distance, and yet, it is a fair old slog due to some of the hills and the helter skelter nature of the route there. Like the climb up from Barrhead station into the Lochliboside Hills, this is a climb that really gets the blood flowing. By the time we are up on the Glennifer plateau, and with those views behind us, body and mind have fallen by the wayside and we are now fully enlightened beings ;)

Looking over Stanely Reservoir and Paisley towards the Kilpatrick and Campsie hills. (Stanely Castle, well worth a visit, is obscured by a bush at the bottom left of the reservoir).

The roads up on the plateau are sublimely empty and the open wide space palpable. 

The view from Cuff Hill looking north over Kirkleegreen, Cuffhill, and Barcraigs reservoirs towards the Kilpatrick Hills. On the far left in the hazy distance is Ben Lomond, and on the far right, not too far away, is Walls Hill Fort which we skirted round the back of in order to get here.

A view of the west front of Lochlands Hill, upon which Saint Inan used to give his outdoor sermons. One of the stones is known as the Logan Stone or Inan's Chair. See if you can discover which one!

Not too far from here, and perhaps carrying on where Inan left off (c.835AD), is the mill farmhouse of Davies o' the Mill where the Scottish apostle of the simple life Dugald Semple lived for some time with his wife Cathie. Semple (related to the Semples of Castle Semple fame) was a very interesting character who sought to live the simple life in tune with nature. He was known as the hermit of Linwood Moss when he spent a year living there in his bell-tent and then a 'wheelhouse' (a horse-drawn wagon) before vast crowds forced him to decamp to Bridge of Weir. The title of his books (extremely hard to find) speak for themselves: The Joy in Living, Life in the Open, A Free Man's Philosophy... Semple was particularly fascinated with food and how we had strayed from a natural, healthy diet to one which clogged our arteries and clouded our brains. He was writing about this in the early 1900s (he lived from 1884-1964) until his death. If he were alive today and privy to some of the absolute nonsense we put in our bodies (and the absolute nonsense being put on our supermarket shelves), not to mention the scale of obesity around the westernized world, he would simply say (and be quite right to do so), 'I told you so...' Too many people 'making a living' and not living itself.

The steeple of Beith. Coming down from the golf course and the quarry.

Beautiful Beith (from Old Irish 'beithe' meaning birch tree).

Through Beith, a beautiful old Scottish toon with 'inns' not pubs, it is another 10 or fifteen minutes to Glengarnock train station and the train back to either Paisley or Glasgow Central.

Newton to King's Park via Dechmont Hill and Carmunnock

Each time I come back from these 'outings' I feel as if I am more self-aware than ever, as if I know my self (that greater Self that co-arises with all things) that little bit more intimately. I'd always wondered since a young age how one got to know oneself since it seemed by all the great civilizations to be the one imperative that would cast out all others. 

Well, here's the answer, and it is really quite simple: know your territory. As many wise minds have elucidated (scientists included), the organism and its environment evolve so closely that they may be considered as a single evolutionary process.  

The problem today is that we think we can know our selves simply through a fact-based techno-science which offers us statistics ad nauseum, and manufactures identity from the outside in. Consequently, everyone believes themselves to be unique or somehow more special than the next guy leaving the way open for all sorts of conflicts and chest-puffing. If people united themselves with the land that feeds them more often - explored the local not by car but under their own organic steam - the case of 'mistaken identity' that afflicts so many of us in the wasteful west would fall away leaving what is in fact the true and beautiful, and wonderfully naked, Self.

Anyway, enough meditating, and on to the trip for today: Newton to King's Park via the epic Dechmont Hill and the monk's fort (Carmunnock). Again, I have decided to combine the bike with the train, since (a) the trains are so comfortable, empty and reasonably priced, and (b) it offers another perspective on the city, travelling through these often hidden arteries, and (c) I ain't getting any younger! and a little help is much appreciated.

 Waiting for the 11:53 to Newton.

Maxwell Park train station, an ancient idyll in its own little vale, is almost an extension of the park itself. All I could hear this particular July Tuesday morning whilst waiting for the train to Newton was the sound of birds and a light breeze whispering through the trees. Some of these stations were originally built in open country which might explain the bucolic aura and the almost rustic appearance of these charming chalet-style buildings.

This slender path on Manse Brae (between Hallside and A724) used to be a country road - it has now been closed to car traffic, and is a dedicated cycle/walk way. I often think that many of Glasgow's back-roads (no longer needed by car traffic due to bigger roads and motorways) should be closed to cars and left to wild out like this.

The stunning view from the summit of Dechmont Hill (with Gilbertfield Castle and Flemington Farm in the foreground).

When you get up here, (there is a rocky path all the way to the summit from the road through Dechmont Farm), the aperture across the whole of the midland valley is astonishing. Here, perhaps more than any other hill around Glasgow, is the nearest highest (186m) mount from which to gain an overall view of Greater Glasgow. At barely a couple of hundred metres high, it is simply amazing how much this seemingly small height can open up a landscape. Indeed, one could argue that the higher you are the less fascinating the view is since it distances you even more from some of the interesting details. Here, and especially if you have a decent pair of binoculars, you can take to the north face where there is a greywacke perch of sorts and chart the whole city and its environs all the way up to the highlands and all the way down to the coast. And then, maybe, you will feel like shouting out what the Swedish writer and painter August Strindberg was apt to say:

I am everywhere, in the ocean which is my blood, in the hills which are my bones.

Or indeed the British scientist Andy Clark:

It may be wise to consider the intelligent system  as a spatio-temporally extended process not limited by the tenuous envelope of skin and skull.

It is up here, on these perches - timed out, spaced out - that ones get to thinking - real thinking - through the act of not thinking. One becomes so cleared out (from the climb and the view) that pre-fabricated thoughts can't get any purchase on the mind. They just slip off, leaving the absolute bodymind the possibility for original thinking (thinking that originates within you and it is not superimposed from the outside).

This return to the source (as opposed to a fragmented, out-sourcing existence) necessarily confides a solidarity with all things. Indeed, one can now claim to be being, unadulterated and uncontaminated from the outside.

Highflat Farm between Rogerton and Carmunnock. 

Out here on the backroads, sometimes it looks as if we've taken a wrong turn and we're headed right into someone's back yard. Earlier when approaching Dechmont Hill you literally have to walk/cycle through Dechmont Farm (there are no signs telling you of this awesome hilltop). Don't be shy though, you have the right to roam wherever you please in this country as long as you go responsibly. Moreover, the farmer here is perfectly amenable to people coming through his farm.

The hills and windfarm behind East Kilbride, Eaglesham et al.

From Dechmont Hill it is possible to clamber down its north face and down to Flemington Farm and Gilbertfield Castle, or, if you prefer, follow the red route on the above map off Dalton Road to Flemington and Gilbertfield before clambering up Dechmont's north face. From Dechmont then the route continues on quiet country lanes through the village of Nerston and across the busy A749 towards Rogerton and Carmunnock. There is another opportunity here to see a castle, this time East Mains tower house (now a privately owned residence) which is just to the south of Nerston. [For more information on castles in and around Glasgow check out Gordon Mason's wonderful book Castles of the Clyde Valley]. Otherwise, continue on through these empty back roads to Carmunnock (the fort of the monk) and onwards (and downhill!) through Castlemilk and King's Park to the train station.

A lone crow observing the national speed limit ;)

The lovely village of Carmunnock spoiled slightly by too many cars racing through it (in spite of the bypass).

The way back via Castlemilk. It's all downhill from Carmunnock!

Little Switzerland: Barrhead to Lochwinnoch via Barcraigs Reservoir

Why stress yourself out travelling the world when the world is right here on your doorstep? Finding the global in the local, and remaining true to the earth in the process, is not as hard as you might think. In the bucolic and pastoral environs of the great city of Glasgow you can find the Eurasian Steppes, the Alps, the Riviera, Provence, and a whole lot else to boot. When you manage to transcend 'the place of nativity and familiarity' and see your city as might a visitor, then you can boldly claim to have discovered a new land. As Marcel Proust once noted: the voyage of discovery begins with new eyes not new lands.

And with these new eyes, everything is undiscovered.

From Barrhead Railway Station we are shot northwards into the Kilpatrick Hills and its highest hill Duncolm. The road we take for this particlular route is just below the bridge, on the corner there, at the co-op, to the left.

So, from Barrhead station, follow the quiet backroad parallel to the railway and beneath the Fereneze Braes up towards Gateside and onwards. It's a tough little road with its steep gradients and endless ascent. But don't be afraid to get off the bike and just walk. Indeed, all these trips are as much walking (and trudging through fields and up hills) as they are cycling. I suppose it's all 'cross-country' by whatever non-mechanical means necessary. The bicycle, as I see it, is simply the modern day horse with a fraction of the upkeep.

From Foreside the views across Neilston are impressive.

From here it is empty back-roads all the way with the exception of a short section on the B775 (watch out for those idiot boy-racers steaming up from Paisley). From here on in, it is all downhill, albeit in certain sections slight. Just follow the road around the back of Walls Hill Fort (you really get a sense of the size of this hill-fort when you circumnavigate it) down towards Barcraigs Reservoir. Again, no-one to be seen, save for a couple of guys in a field with remote-controlled model aircraft and a couple of walkers enjoying a summery Sunday afternoon at the edge of the world.

Barcraigs Reservoir and its little isthmus, a great place to open your flask of coffee and sit back.

The rolling Inverclyde Hills over Barcraigs Reservoir.

There is a little overgrown path round the north edge of the reservoir through some wonderfully wild fields which you can take until you reach the old stone wall (which someone has punched a hole in). The wall is low enough to sling the bike over and your body too. The onward road is right there, which will take us down and round to the little hamlet of Newton of Belltrees and on to Auchingrange House (for sale!) before plummetting us down to Lochwinnoch and the station from where we can jump a train back to Glasgow Central or Paisley. 

The quaint little hamlet of Newton of Belltrees.

The view from Newton of Belltrees towards Lochwinnoch and the Inverclyde Hills. The train station is about 5-10 minutes from here.

Stewarton to Pollok Country Park via Lochend & Neilston Pad

This route takes off from the oldest train station in Glasgow, Pollokshaws West, on the edge of Pollok Country Park. It's a lovely cycle from the city centre if you decide to do it like that, over Bell's Bridge or the Arc Bridge, and following the sustrans cycle route across Cessnock and Dumbreck into Pollok Country Park. Furthermore, the train station has recently been refurbished as a community cycle resource centre, and so it seems particularly apt to start one's journey by train and follow through with the bicycle.

Entering the park at the north end, follow the road round to Pollok House and onto the path that runs alongside the White Cart Water. This will spit you out virtually at the door to the train station where you can get the 35mins. past the hour train to Barrhead and change for the connecting train on to Kilmarnock getting off at Stewarton. Just like the Neilston line, this Barrhead line has sweeping views to the north as it approaches its terminus. The rolling stock on these southern lines also have ample provision for bicycles compared to their northern line counterparts. Yet, this never seems to be a problem when I go out since (a) There doesn't appear to be many cycle/train users about, and (b) Mid-morning, like the middle of the night, always appears to be ghostly empty (which is what I love about Glasgow!!).

Early July, mid-morning, a deserted railway platform, waiting for the train to Barrhead. 

Having jumped the 11:35 at Pollokshaws West, by midday I am in Stewarton, and beginning the uphill climb into the hills to its north. Not far along the Old Glasgow Road there is a road to the left that leads up to Fullwood and Gabroc Hill. To the west, there are some interesting little villages, like Dunlop, Lugton, and Uplawmoor, but we shall leave these for another day. 

This particular backroad, at points with alleys of oak and alder sheltering us from the summer sun (which this year, 2014, is hotter than I've ever felt it!), is a joy to cycle. The only people I met were two other cyclists, a pair of horseriders, the postman, and a few fishermen at Lochend, Harlelaw and Snypes dams. Beautiful!

Stewarton to Harelaw Dam via Gabroc Hill.

Harelaw Dam to Pollok Country Park.

The amazingly quiet 'leisure lanes' of East Ayrshire!

 A leafy lane near Fullwood.

 

The summit of Lochend looking north to the city and hills beyond, with Neilston Pad on the left.

The backroad just beside the entrance to Snypes Dam. (Compare this photo with the blog title photo taken in 2006).

The 'craigie' of Duncarnock, a pre-Christian hill-fort with awesome views north over Glasgow and the Midland Valley.

The road down from Snypes Dam is the title photo for this blog. The country roads here are empty save for the odd tractor. At some point a couple of kilometres down the road there is an entrance to a field (easily missed) which you have to cross to get to the walkway around Balgray Reservoir. The route is marked on the above map. The way follows around the reservoir, crosses the main road and heads down to Waulkmill Reservoir and beneath the rail viaduct for the Neilston line. Continue north down through the wonderful Waulkmill Glen and out into Darnley Mill path. A kilometre or so from here we meet the main road and a great oak tree on the corner. Continue straight on towards Priesthill. Now, here, you could jump the train at Priesthill Station back into the city or get off a few stops down the track at Pollokshaws West for the entrance to Pollok Country Park. I say this because the next part with the bike can be a bit tricky.

On the road opposite Kennishead station I always cut through Cowglen golf course. It can be a bit hairy since there is no pavement on the left side of the road and sometimes cars wonder what on earth you are doing getting off the bike and heading into the bushes. From here, there is a right of way trail through the course down to the clubhouse where you come out onto the main road. Head straight across it and through (or over since it's invariably locked) the gate into Pollok Golf Course. Follow the path straight on (avoiding errant golfballs and observing golf etiquette!!) until it veers off to the right into Pollok Country Park. Pass Pollok House, and just follow the now marked Route 76 to Bell's Bridge. This little section does involve lifting your bike over a ten foot fence and wading through a hundred metres or so of dense undergrowth, so it isn't for the lighthearted, but it will put hairs on your chest.

Overall, whether you take the train, the main road, or go full commando, it's a fantastically invigorating cycle with plenty of significant landmarks along the way. There is also, as you discover from actually doing it, this airy green corridor still penetrating the city from the breezy leafy hinterlands. Escape routes in a city are essential, and ones like this, in exiting from the city, are themselves not so much escapes as entrances into a whole other world.

The Way to Tomtain

Tomtain is the sentinel hill on the east edge of the Kilsyth range of the Campsie Fells. It is easily reached from the Tak Ma Doon Road by way of a path which works its way up the remaining 130m (after scaling the initial 322m on the Tak Ma Doon). The views from its summit, as you might imagine, are all encompassing, stretching north to Stirling and the Ochils, and the Highlands, and south over the Clyde Valley. To the east, on a clear day, you can easily see Edinburgh and the Pentland Hills. Again, on this fine Saturday afternoon - a Saturday afternoon at the edge of the world - there is no-one to be seen. I have only seen a couple of cyclists, on this the opening day of the 2014 Tour de France, putting their mountain climbing skills to the test.

The train from Queen Street is effortless and half empty. Takes about twenty minutes. Four pounds seventy return. From Croy train station, head down to Auchinstarry, through Kilsyth, and up the Tak Ma Doon. At the top of the Tak Ma Doon, about 100m beyond the car park is a sign for the path up to Tomtain. It really couldn't be more simple. It's not the longest distance in the world, there and back amounting to less than 10 miles, but it's the quality of the trip that counts here. It gets the blood flowing and the brain spacing. A lot of hills, steep and gentle. All in all, it's another epic route that can be done on the bike easily in an afternoon.

Looking from Nethercroy path over Auchinstarry and Kilsyth to Tomtain. On the very top right of the photograph, where the small copse of trees is, is the summit of the Tak Ma Doon Road and the car-park in the sky. It is from just beyond the car-park that the path to Tomtain starts.

Nearing the summit by the old stone bridge (built 1834)... and Tomtain looming in the background.

From the summit of Tomtain looking north-west, with the Meikle Bin (570m) on the far left and the Carron Reservoir and the Fintry Hills on the right.

Looking north towards Stirling and the Ochil Hills (directly over the route covered in the post 'Flower & Freedom on the Backroad to Bannockburn').

Looking south from Tomtain over Kilsyth in the foreground.

A Little Piece of Provence Just Behind Johnstone: On the Way to Walls Hill Fort

Just follow the sustrans path from Paisley as far as Elderslie when the path cuts onto the main road. Stay on the main road passing by the Wallace Monument and heading towards Johnstone. Just before Johnstone proper take a left into what looks like a residential area and follow the road up the hill to where you will find Johnstone Castle. From here just follow the road up the hill and there is a small section of path through Craigston Bluebell Woods which you can follow for 500m or so before cutting back onto the road at the quarry.

Approaching Elderslie on the sustrans cycle path...

Johnstone castle is now a well-tended private residence, and it is said that Frederic Chopin once visited the castle in 1848. During World War II the MOD took over the castle and a POW camp was set up in the grounds. A Polish soldier who died at the castle is buried in the nearby woods, and supposedly, on those full moonlit nights, Chopin’s preludes can be heard resounding between the castle and the woods.

The haunted bluebells woods of Craigston...


























An alley of beech trees between Hartfield and Mid-Hartfield.

For a moment I thought I was in the south of France, or Poland, anywhere but up behind Glasgow. Yet, this is the thing with cycling these backroads: the discoveries, the un-coveries, pulling the mask back on what you had presumed to be Glasgow in the first place.

Walls Hill Fort from the path at Mid Hartfield...

Perched (on a peculiar cloven stone) on the north edge of Walls Hill Fort, with expansive views north over the western half of Glasgow and beyond... (and I haven't seen any humans since Elderslie!) The peace and quiet up here is really quite something!

As for the hill fort itself, according to Susan Hothersall's wonderful book Archaeology Around Glasgow (2007):

Ptolemy's map of Scotland in the second century AD, based on the campaigns of the Roman general Agricola, shows this part of central Scotland occupied by the Damnonii tribe. It has been widely assumed that Walls Hill - perhaps because of its size - was their tribal capital.

The triangulation point atop North Castle Walls just to the west of Walls Hill Fort. This outcrop just to the west of Walls Hill was most likely part of the original hill fort.

Looking south-westish from Walls Hill Fort towards Beith and Lochwinnoch...

From Walls Hill Fort it's simple enough to get over to its adjacent promontory North Castle Walls (actually the name of the abandoned farmhouse whose remains are still here). From here, just follow the path northwards through some conifers and then down into Skiff Wood where there is a circular path that you can follow either way to get out at the bottom. From the exit of the wood, it's no more than 10 minutes cycle to Milliken Park train station and a well-deserved seat back into central Glasgow.