This long but easy circular follows tracks and minor roads through oakwoods and open countryside to visit the sandy beach at Sandgreen and back to near Gatehouse of Fleet.
Bog Factor
Minor roads, tracks and woodland paths.
Cally Woods car park.
None to start.
NX605560
The walk is described from the Cally Woods car park. This point can be easily reached from Gatehouse of Fleet using the Garries Wood walk. Begin the walk by returning to the minor road from the car park and turning left along it. Ignore a turn on the right to a cricket field and after 0.75km keep straight on at the fork, ignoring a branch off to Cally Gardens. Pass some houses and continue on the road through the golf course to pass the front of the immensely grand building which is now the Cally Palace Hotel. It was built in 1763 as the home of James Murray, sometime MP for Wigtownshire.
Cross the front of the hotel and follow the road as it heads into the woods. It passes underneath the A75 and past Laundry Cottage - once the laundry for the grand house. Keep straight on when the National Cycle Route goes off to the left, and then fork onto the right hand track to avoid the buildings at Cally Mains Farm. Beyond the agricultural buildings regain the tarred track and keep to the left of the farmhouse. The track becomes unsurfaced as it heads back into the oakwoods.
Ignore minor tracks heading off to the left and right, but when the main track goes left keep straight ahead on a track (signed Sandgreen) which keeps just inside the edge of the woodland, giving good views across the Fleet Estuary to the right. The woods are left behind at a gate; go through this and continue along an oak-lined avenue to reach the Caravan Park at Sandgreen. Continue straight ahead and at a fork amongst the caravans keep right. A the next five-way junction bear slightly right on a track towards the sea. Go past the metal vehicle barrier as the track bends right to gain access to the sandy beach, and turn left to cross the sand.
At the far end of the beach, turn left at sign board to take the lane up past a vehicle barrier to reach the public road with the caravan park entrance on the left. Keep straight ahead to follow the road. The road heads through pleasant dairy countryside; keep following it for 3km, ignoring a turning on the right (signed Cartick), to eventually reach the hamlet of Girthon. Around 600m after Girthon look out for where the National Cycle Route 7 turns left over a bridge (don't go through the gate at the first cycle route sign). Head across the field and another bridge to enter the woods.
The path narrows in the trees, at a fork keep right aiming for a telegraph pole. Continue straight ahead crossing a slightly wide path where pylons cut through the wood and soon a gothic folly known as the Temple is reached. Built in 1779 by the Cally Estate, well before the area became wooded as part of a Forestry Commission tree nursery in the 1930's, it has always been roofless but is said to have once been lived in by William Todd who looked after the Estate's drove cattle. Pass to the right of the tower on the gravel path and continue through the trees.
At a path junction in the woods bear left soon passing under the A75 by a tunnel beside a burn. On the far side ignore a path on the right. Our route continues directly ahead, passing a gate and a run down attractive cottage. Keep straight ahead at the entrance to Cally Gardens and eventually the track rejoins the tarred lane from early in the walk. Turn right along this to retrace your steps back to the start.
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