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| In all my years living in Langholm I have always stood on the Kirk Wynd to watch the horses head up the hill on Castle Craig's Day so today I decided to do something different and walked up to The Castle Craig's to see the horses there. |
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| The Front Three |
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| Despite a bad forecast the rain stayed away and I managed it there and back without getting wet. |
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| On Common Riding Day I may go to the Monument to see them going round it just to see the Common Riding from a different perspective. |
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| It was Niall who selected a walk for this Wednesday and he took us to Hoddom Castle for a 4.5 mile walk along the river Annan and through the Hoddom Castle estate. No Tom this week because he is now in DGRI having an operation so our thoughts and best wishes go out to him. |
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| The only fisherman who wont pay for a license |
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| Hoddom Castle in the distance |
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| Hoddom Castle |
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| On a hill near the castle is Repentance Tower built at the same time as the Castle |
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| The view from Repentance Tower at the top of the hill but it was very hazy with rain due soon. |
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| In among the gravestones |
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| This is one of the fairways at the very attractive Golf Course in the Castle grounds |
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| The bridge over the River Annan on the estate. |
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| An interesting signpost in connection with the Salmon that come up the river Annan. |
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| A sculpture depicting the migrating Salmon |
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| This represents the Salmon eggs among the gravel on the bed of the river in the upper reaches of the Annan or on its tributaries |
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| Peter almost lost in the long grass |
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| This 6 mile section of the Canonbie walk was selected for David as it is fairly level but unfortunately he had succumbed to an infection and was unable to be with us. It was only as we headed for Rowanburn that Niall announced he had never done this section of the walk before. This is the lane above Rowanburnhead |
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| The river Esk at Byreburnfoot and one of the nicest views on the river. |
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| As part of the Langholm walks Group job is to repair and improve the network of 14 way marked walks it was good to see the repairs done the day before with non slip panels on the bridge through the wood at Canonbie. |
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| On the old railway line from Rowanburn the pathway was white with these seed parachutes that had obviously come from somewhere but we left without solving the problem. |
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| A closer look at them |
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| The intrepid 3 at Byreburn. At the end of the walk we visited the Community Cafe in Canonbie Kirk and had an excellent afternoon tea, scones, and cake at very reasonable prices. |
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| In January 2016 we attempted this walk but after many discussions on the route we managed to go in the wrong direction. Peter was most annoyed over this and a week after he and Elizabeth explored the walk again to see where we went wrong. We therefore decided today to have another go at it and Peter was confident we would be fine. The walk is shown as 6.5 miles but we measured it today and it was about 9 miles. The above photo is at the Museum in Wilton Park at the start of our walk. |
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| A scarecrow in a field of Barley |
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| There are loads of wild flowers on the road sides |
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| The Eildons at Melrose often show up in our Border walks and today was no exception |
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| This was a very boggy part of the walk |
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| A bleak landscape but plenty of wildlife about including several Deer and the constant song of the Skylark |
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| The highest point on the walk at Drinkstone Hill |
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| A great view of a field of Barley |
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| It was at this signpost at the mid part of the walk where we went wrong 18 months ago |
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| About 6 miles into the walk Niall had problems with his boot but Tom came to the rescue with a ball of tangled string in his rucksack |
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| On the last stretch of the walk we met this Border Collie and Peter threw its ball for it and from then on he continually brought the ball back to throw it again |
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| Niall's repaired boot. |
