A Visit from John

John Irving arrived to spend a couple of days with us on Friday. Its a few months since he was last in Langholm so it was nice to see him and we planned a couple of walks. The first was a 4.5 mile circular walk round St. Bride's Hill which takes you up towards Arrisgill and then over into the next valley to Westwater. 

The start and finish of the walk at Wauchope School House.

This is the Forestry Road which takes you down into Westwater

The beautiful new house built up at Shaw by a young Langholm Businessman who has done so well in his contracting Forestry business. It is the perfect site with wonderful views.

The early part of the walk and the road up to Arresgill

This is a Falconry Breeding Centre established fairly recently at Westwater

The Forestry Road that takes you from the Logan water up the hill towards the Westwater Valley

This is the start of the last section of the walk which is on the B7068 road. We were fortunate in that this road is closed at the moment so there was no traffic at all on it. 

A view from the highest point up the valley towards Arresgill

The Logan Water on the way up towards Arresgill

The Farmhouse at Westwater

 

Saturday morning and another walk but this time it was not as clear and sunny as it had been on Friday. Tom joined us and we walked round The Pheasant pens and The Curly Snake

Taking it very carefully down the road from Pathead as the road was very icy underneath a light covering of snow. 

Tom and John on the Castleholm which hopefully will soon below to the community. It has been a hectic 36 hours and included dinner at the Eskdale on Friday evening and a visit to The Market at The Buccleuch Centre on Saturday morning. 

Walking With the Southwells at Kippford

It is 2 years since we last saw Doreen and Norman from South Wales when they visited Langholm in 2019 but at long last they are back in Scotland and staying for 3 weeks at Barend near Sandyhills. Gaye and I and Tom Stothart met up with them this morning and after morning Coffee at their Chalet we took off to Rockcliffe to walk the upper footpath to Kippford and then back via the lower footpath.

The weather was glorious and both Rockliffe and Kippford was busy with walkers and bathers

Doreen and Norman's daughter Lindsay was up staying with them for a few days with her husband John.

Gaye with Doreen and Lindsay near Rockcliffe on the lower path

A few years ago I wrote an article for the E & L Advertiser about the walk from Kippford to Rockcliffe and I mentioned this Ice Cream van at Rockcliffe and we were delighted to see it is still there so Lindsay and Tom took advantage of it. 

This is Heston island viewed from Rockcliffe

All 7 of us at the start of the walk with dogs Findlay and Milo

This is Kippford from the upper pathway and the tide is coming in and will be at high tide in another hour.

Tom and Norman and Findlay the dog named after a Scottish Rugby Internationalist Findlay Calder

Gaye on the sea front at Rockcliffe in front of some lovely plants. After our walk we headed back to Barend and had a lovely meal courtesy of Doreen and Lindsay with new potatoes grown by Norman and brought specially for us from Wales.

 

Peter's Birthday Walk at Kelso

As this was Peter's Birthday walk deferred from earlier in the year he decided to take us to what I think is one of the nicest Border towns, Kelso with its lovely Town Hall. Of all the Border towns this must be the best Market Square with loads of room for people to park and many good shops. 

After a short delay due to discovering we could only park for 2 hours in the square we moved the cars and set off on our walk along the river Teviot which is a tributary of the Tweed. Note our war wounded walker Ken on the right at the back. More about his accident later in the blog.

The first place of interest was Roxburgh Castle and Peter had planned to take us up this small hill to see the ruins. Unfortunately the route was deep in Nettles and our brave leader led the way but most of us eventually decided it was not for us and headed back the way we had come. Poor Tom was wearing shorts and had many Nettle stings before he too gave up. 

The view from the top just before we turned back at the site of Roxburgh Castle was stunning with Floors Castle in the distance.

Having walked the right bank of the River Teviot we stopped for a lunch break near where 2 railway lines met. One line was to Kelso and the other one was to Jedburgh. The second half of the walk was along the now disused Kelso railway line.

This was the road just down from our lunch stop with 2 old bridges that would have taken the 2 separate lines over the road. 

Tom giving his stung legs a rest with Elizabeth keeping him company

This is the old curved viaduct that crosses the river Teviot. Upstream of the viaduct is the village of Roxburgh and the Roxburgh Hotel and Golf Course

There are many new houses in the village and they look a bit out of place here and not very attractive, although very expensive.

The band of walkers all giving their views on the houses in the village. 

The walk was 8 miles and we finished up having a lovely lunch in the Cobbles. Ken is sporting a  black eye and cut on his head which was the result of a fall while out walking earlier in the week. At least that is his story and he is sticking to it. In a weeks time we will be heading for Cromer in Norfolk where we have booked a large house and will walk stretches of the North Norfolk Coastal Trail and the Pedars Way.