Expedition 349, to Drynie Hill, 20/2/16

 

Not a good day for a long walk but Alexander and Mairi, and Isabella and Adam were waiting for me at the Triangle, with Cody in the back, keen to get out on his first expedition of the year. When we got to the Drynie Hill car park, there were the Macaulay team of Ruaraidh, Duncan, Anna and Angus, with Izzy of course.
The rain held off while we were getting ready and we soon set off up the eastern end of the Silver Walk. Before we started I showed the explorers the place where a big recovery vehicle had left the road in 1973 and gone charging down the hill through the trees; when it stopped at the bottom, the driver winched himself back onto the road and drove away and we might never have known if it hadn't been for the tyre tracks.
In the woods there were a lot of fallen trees, maybe the lack of shelter from the forestry north of the road had left them vulnerable. The power line looked particularly risky, but clearing the trees around it would be a very big job.
We carried on along the track, with the sharp-eyed explorers spotting some primroses in bloom. After a fairly flat part, we came to a very steep hill and stopped for a breather on a recessed platform (conveniently marked by a ribbon) and I explained how they had once made charcoal there. We had a quick look but didn't find any charcoal fragments. From here on the track became rather steep and difficult and Angus was clearly having difficulty, but then he is still quite young.
Eventually we reached the seat under the trees and stopped for our Tunnock's wafers, conveniently avoiding a nasty shower. There was a deer path nearby which crossed the track and plunged straight down the hill towards the sea. Also nearby was a bridge over a burn with a strange name which implies it sounds like the voice of the poet Emerson, but I'm sure that is not its original meaning.
After our rest we carried on for a way and the track started to go downhill and Angus was away in a rush all the way to the bottom. This implied a slight problem since he was not in a fit condition to climb the big hill back again, but at this point Mairi, who had worked on this ground years ago, suggested we go back along the shore and avoid the steepest hills.
We negotiated a gate and an awkward stretch along a burn and then we reached the shore. The cows had chopped up the ground and the edge of the shore was treacherous soft mud, but we all managed fairly well, at least nobody got soaked or stuck. There was one really tricky bit where most of the explorers got across a burn by climbing along the forestry fence, but I found an alternative, which was also used by Izzy and Angus, although Angus was far from confident about the crossing. We saw a place where the deer got through the fence and we could see their tracks across the shore, possibly the bottom end of the track we saw near the seat.
Finally we crossed clambered back to the edge of the road, and followed the path behind the Armco back to the car park. A few bits of litter were collected along this stretch and there was a pile of rubbish, including an ironing board, which had been thrown into the wood; I wish people would take stuff to the recycling unit.
The explorers produced some nice drawings at the Tearoom (the heavy rain started after we arrived there) and I have picked out Ruaraidh's picture of the breakdown truck crashing through the wood.

John Dye

Apology I have an apology to make to the owners of the gardens of Shielbridge House. This is private property and I was in error in leading an expedition to that area last December. I had completely forgotten an early assurance of mine that I would keep out of the gardens. No more expeditions will visit that place.
John Dye











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