Storm Jorge Who?

[clararerso]

I've decided to walk the John Muir Way over the weekends this March, starting today with Helensburgh to Balloch. What a wonderful way to kick off my Year of Coasts and Waters (thank you to the team across the room at work for everything they're doing with that) - I dipped a toe in the Clyde at Helensburgh and intend to dip a toe when I get to Dunbar - and I picked up a little pebble to take from coast to coast with me.

Given the weather forecast for appalling rain, wind, visibility and temperatures I packed accordingly - lots of snacks, torches, batteries, layers and emergency ice grips. After taking enough photo's to bore even a professional photographer, I left Helensburgh at 12:08. I've done the walk before and didn't use my map at any point, confident in the signposting of the route and my memory. The path was fantastic underfoot for the majority of the walk, except for the decent into Stoneymollen when a months worth of storms had clearly made the path a muddy mess - to be expected!!

During my walk I experienced every season I could have. Storm Jorge seemed to remain at bay until I was half way up the forestry path towards Gouk Hill, when the rain came lashing down (very sideways) and the views across the Loch completely vanished. Despite this, visibility was still fairly good as I could see all the way up the hill and had no navigational issues. I came across snow on the ground just above 200m, but the path itself was largely clear.

By the time I was walking over Darleith Muir the rain had stopped but the wind had picked up significantly, and I was glad there were no trees around otherwise I'd have been eyeing them quite nervously! Still, the wind did wonders as within a few minutes the clouds had almost entirely cleared and there were gorgeous views across the Loch, rainbows, and sun! So much for a cloud base of 200m-400m, MWIS!!

I think the poor forecast played into my favour. I saw a total of 5 people on my walk, and 7 dogs. Which I think is an excellent people-to-dog ratio.

Tomorrow I'll be hiking from Balloch to Strathblane before heading back to work on Tuesday. If I have any energy, I'll write a report for that tomorrow night! But given today's walk was 25,000 steps, I'm not anticipating having much left in me!