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Couple of Borders hills in the sun

Couple of Borders hills in the sun


Postby Fife Flyer » Sun Apr 22, 2018 9:21 pm

Sub 2000' hills included on this walk: Calkin Rig, Scaw'd Fell

Date walked: 21/04/2018

Time taken: 4.5 hours

Distance: 20 km

Ascent: 930m

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Another trip down to England for family reasons and as the forecast was rather good I planned to visit a couple of solitary Marilyn's on the way home. Left Cheshire at 8am and as the satnav in my car is absolutely useless I had typed out directions to both start points. First port of call was Calkin Rig slightly NW of Langholm (never been before), I had studied the single WR and based my walk on it. Huge thanks to inca :clap: :clap:
There was hardly a cloud in the sky and when I parked up I was greeted by an incessant noise from a field next to the track where the local farmers were tending to umpteen sheep and lambs.

Calkin Rig, 8km, 1hr 45mins, 400m of ascent

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Parking area for Calkin Rig

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The source of all the noise

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The way ahead, nice dry track

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Not the friendliest of signs

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The way ahead with the target in the distance on the horizon

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Take the right hand fork in the track

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The only muddy bit on the track

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The track weaves its way round the lumpy bits

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Bridge over a tiny burn

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Abandoned / boarded up cottage featured in inca's report

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Water feature, not quite a raging torrent

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Aforementioned cottage

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Looking back

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On reaching this gate it was time to really head uphill

Leaving the track is a bit of a shock to the system, not only is the ground much steeper, stumps of tussocky grass are added to the equation.

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I followed the fence line uphill

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Looking back down towards the track

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Looking west

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On reaching the fence junction with this gate on the right, I climbed over the gate and headed west for a couple of hundred yards to the insignificant summit

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Looking east

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The summit, I rearranged the bits of wood to assist future explorers

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Not the best of views from the summit

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Low level shot of the tussocky grass taken from the summit, although the angle makes it look higher - it isn't

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Heading downhill now

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It wouldn't be the Borders without these things popping up somewhere

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Arty shot through a firebreak to the west

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Looking north


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Calkin Rig route

Scaw'd Fell, 12km, 2hrs 45mins, 530m of ascent

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Parking spot by the bridge for Scaw'd Fell

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The bridge over Moffat Water

The majority of the walk is along the Southern Upland Way on a good track that weaves it's way gradually uphill round forestry plantations.

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In case you didn't believe me, Moffat Water in the background

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The way ahead, Moffat Water on the left

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Looking back towards Moffat

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Trees offering a bit of shelter from the sun, not often we say that

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Go straight on here, the track can be seen ascending in the distance

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Serious bit of kit to assist pruning trees

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Rather remote place to live

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Now the fun begins, left the track and initially ascended uphill over the tree felling debris

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A few stops before the ridge ahead is reached

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Looking back downhill

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Looking back down NW

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The ascent becomes even harder - knee deep heather to battle through

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Looking back

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The exciting summit of Scaw'd Fell

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Plenty of trees still to be harvested

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Large cairn south of the true summit

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Looking up to the summit from the cairn

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On my way down now


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Scaw'd Fell route

Turned out to be a really enjoyable day, naturally helped by the 'unusual' weather, out of the two hills personally I preferred Calkin Rig. My next Marilyn wherever that may be, will actually take me over the hard earned 10% mark.
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Fife Flyer
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Re: Couple of Borders hills in the sun

Postby inca » Mon Apr 23, 2018 9:35 am

Thanks for the name check 👍 Nice to see to some pics of Calkin again. It's a good little hill. Had a quick look back at my notes for Swaw'd Fell. My planned route was similar to yours. But there was felling going on that day (got the impression there's few days when there isn't) so I stayed on the SUW for about 1.5k past Craigbeck. Turned sharp right and went up over Coombe Cairn. Worked out okay. Looks warm from your photos so imagine it must have been tiring work going over that tree-fell. You made good time on both hills regardless.
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inca
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