by cbuchanan3 » Mon Aug 02, 2021 8:07 pm
Date walked: 02/08/2021
Time taken: 4.5 hours
Distance: 12.5 km
Ascent: 657m
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Looking over to the Ochils from Falkirk, could see the tops were still in cloud so thought an ideal chance to gwt over and get a bit of navigating practice in. So we decided to head over to Dolllar and head up King’s Seat with the option of potentially taking in Tarmangie/Whitewisp or possibly back down the Glen of Sorrow.
We parked up at the middle car park and then set off up the road towards Castle Campbell (steep!) and then through the woods and over the fence to pick up the paths. Having never been over here for years we did a bit of exploring on some of the lower paths to see where they went (nowhere!) and had a look to see if there was a route up the slope to pick up the main path, before heading back and picking it up and heading up the hill. We took the “lower” path skirting between Bank Hill and the Banks of Dollar and then picking up the shoulder and heading towards the top, pausing briefly at the Spitfire memorial. By now we were in the cloud and the rain was hard enough to make us put on the waterproof jackets. It’s a fairly steady plod up to the top but nothing overly difficult and once the ground starts to flatten out you’re almost there. We stopped briefly for a snack and a quick discussion about whether to head back down the way we came or whether to head down the Glen of Sorrow. My son says back down, but I thought it’s a shame to do a “Up and Down” and we should go down the Glen and explore……..rookie mistake on reflection given the weather!
We followed the path off the top of the hill and down into the Glen to the head of the burn. There is a path shown on the Harvey map on the high side of the burn, but we couldn’t see it, so picked up the one on the East side (which isn’t shown on Harvey’s?) and followed this for a bit. We popped over the burn and headed up the hill a bit to see if we could see the high path, but nothing doing so picked up a path down the side of the burn and we followed this along its length. It’s pretty overgrown and slow going with big ferns as you get further down although the path is easy to follow and by this time we were well and truly soaked! With the steep sides it can be fairly tricky to work out exactly where you are (not that it’s an issue as you just need to follow the burn) but again as you get further down there are a couple of fence lines you can pick up. By this time the weather had really cleared and there was excellent visibility and the sun was even starting to come out.
We picked up the path at the top of the Glen and decided to follow the path from the viewpoint back down through Dollar Glen and back up again to pick the road to the Car Park. Not a bad wee walk and a couple of lessons to take back in terms of thinking about route choice etc but all in all a very enjoyable day.
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