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Groundhog Day: Duncolm in First Lockdown

Groundhog Day: Duncolm in First Lockdown


Postby bobble_hat_kenny » Sat Feb 05, 2022 2:29 pm

Sub 2000' hills included on this walk: Duncolm

Date walked: 31/05/2020

Time taken: 8.5 hours

Distance: 25 km

Ascent: 700m

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Strangely enough (or maybe not strangely enough), it's only now that I've been able to motivate myself to write up this outing from the depths of First Lockdown, in late May 2020.
At this stage, as we all no doubt remember all too well, there were significant restrictions on our daily lives (well, for those of us who weren't Boris Johnson, anyway :evil: ), and it wasn't permitted to travel out of one's own council area - which wasn't too handy for me, since my council area is East Dunbartonshire which is about as mountainous as the average pancake or doormat :roll: ... However, on looking at the small print of the Scottish Government guidance on outdoors activities, it turned out that one could actually walk outside one's own council area, as long as the start and finish points of the walk were inside one's own council area. That did put the S2K Marilyn of Duncolm just about within reach: not the most exciting of peaks, and I'd done it before, but still and all - when Life hands you lemons, you chuck them straight back at Life's face, as hard as you can manage...

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So, Groundhog Day. Duncolm from my front door, again. This was towards the end of that spectacular run of weather that Scotland enjoyed during First Lockdown, and that did make those two or three months a lot more bearable than they'd have been otherwise. I set out nice and early from my own front door in Milngavie, feeling a wee bit like Bilbo Baggins, although hopefully my day wasn't going to involve a dragon, talking birds or the Ring of Power - that wouldn't be Plan A, anyway. As on the last occasion when I bagged Duncolm from my front door, back on a very wet January day in 2015, I firstly made use of the popular Cattle Creep under the Milngavie railway line:
WR1 - cattle creep under Milngavie railway line.jpg

I made my way through Milngavie, eventually heading out of the village in the direction of Low Craigton. Almost as soon as I left the outskirts of Milngavie, things were already starting to look surprisingly bucolic:
WR2 - path to Low Craigton.jpg

By the time I reached the hamlet of Low Craigton, the surroundings had become even more bucolic:
WR3 - bucolic scene at Low Craigton.jpg

I crossed the A809 and headed along the northern of the two tracks to Tambowie Farm, passing the farm buildings and eventually forking north uphill under a line of pylons towards the forestry visible at the top of the hill.
WR4 - looking north from Tambowie Farm track.jpg

When I reached the south-eastern corner of the forestry, there was a nice view back south over Glasgow:
WR5 - view back south over Glasgow after initial ascent.jpg

As I'd remembered from my January 2015 outing, there is a narrow strip of grass between the south edge of the forestry and a barbed wire fence, and this grassy strip can pretty much be walked all the way west to Maiden Paps and the Jaw Reservoir, although it is pathless, intermittently boggy and also occasionally encroached on by the forestry, so that there were several Man Versus Spruce moments as I made my way along (Spruce won on points, I'd say :roll: !).
WR6 - the narrow channel between forestry and barbed wire fence.jpg

Eventually, however, I reached the western edge of the forestry, with Maiden Paps and the Jaw Reservoir dead ahead.
WR7 - end of the forestry with the loch and Maiden Paps.jpg

After negotiating a couple of barbed wire fences, I got another fine view south over Glasgow from the larger Pap:
WR8 - looking back over Glasgow from the larger Pap.jpg

There was a pleasing vista westwards towards the Jaw Reservoir:
WR9 - nice view of the loch or actually I think Jaw Reservoir.jpg

...And yes, Duncolm itself was now visible in the distance, over to the right of the reservoir! When I was last here in 2015, I could barely see the reservoir itself through the relentless sheets of rain, so I hadn't realised that Duncolm was such a distinctive wee hill.
WR10 - reservoir again with Duncolm visible in distance on right.jpg

There is a good ongoing path along the south edge of the Jaw Reservoir, as far as the boathouse at the southern end of the narrow strip that divides the reservoir from Cochno Loch:
WR11 - approaching boathouse between reservoir and loch.jpg

Beyond the boathouse, however, there is just a much rougher path that traverses the steep southern flanks of Cochno Loch, eventually fizzling out at the western corner of the loch. This was the view back eastwards:
WR12 - faint path along steep side of loch and looking back east to reservoir.jpg

Now, as I remembered from 2015, this is where this route really gets interesting, with some very rough and pathless terrain between Cochno Loch and Duncolm. On a fine summer's day like today, it wasn't quite as bad as it had been back in 2015, but it still wasn't pleasant - in fact, this is probably some of the roughest terrain that I've ever had the dubious pleasure of walking, anywhere in Scotland!
First of all there was a deer fence to negotiate:
WR13 - Duncolm in distance but over a deer fence and rough ground.jpg

Then ... endless tussocky bog, interspersed with wee birch trees. I made fairly slow work of it, although Duncolm was growing steadily closer...
WR14 - Duncolm closer now but even rougher ground.jpg

A bit more bush-whacking, and I eventually (and to my considerable relief) joined the good path that leads up to Duncolm from Hardgate via Greenside Reservoir.
WR15 - almost at Duncolm with a gate and a good path now visible.jpg

The final ascent up the volcanic plug (presumably) of Duncolm itself was fairly steep, but the path made fairly light work of it, and soon enough I was up at the summit trig point, which boasted surprisingly good views northwards towards the (Arrochar) Alps and the Bonny Banks.
WR16 - surprisingly good view north from summit with Alps and Bonny Banks.jpg

Me in my sexy brown hat:
WR17 - Summit Selfie in cowboy hat.jpg

Looking westwards I think, with a glimpse of sea in the distance:
WR18 - looking west I think with a glimpse of sea in distance.jpg

...And looking south-east over Glasgow:
WR19 - looking south from summit over Glasgow.jpg

Time to head back down, however. Thankfully my return route was much more straightforward then my pathless approach: I just followed the path that leads all the way down to Hardgate via the north-eastern corner of Greenside Reservoir.
Loch Humphrey (I think) visible in the distance now. There is another good route I believe that approaches Duncolm from Bowling via Loch Humphrey, but unless - God forbid - there's ever another lockdown, I doubt that I'll ever attempt that route.
WR20 - next loch on descent.jpg

Greenside Reservoir visible now, with another line of pylons:
WR21 - last loch and some pylons.jpg

From here on, it was a straightforward stoat down to Hardgate, followed by a rather less pleasant road walk all the way back to Milngavie.
Well, this walk was pretty much the only show in town at the time, and on the whole it was none too shabby, I suppose :roll: .
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bobble_hat_kenny
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Re: Groundhog Day: Duncolm in First Lockdown

Postby NeepNeep » Mon Feb 07, 2022 11:24 am

I also walked up this in Lockdown. It had been on my list for ages and just never high enough to warrant the effort. However, this time it was top of the short list. Took a direct route from the slacks and came across many a new dear fence :roll: !! Had a hot chocolate on the summit pleased with myself to be out and returned home safe and sound having seen nobody on the hill. Good walk report and great weather.
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NeepNeep
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