With the weather forecast predicting 100% chance of rain in Stirling, Sue and I set off to Stirling University with the wipers on and waterproofs at the ready. The route is two laps of the small lake pictured above, plus an up and down dogleg to get the distance up to 5km.
Just as we parked up, the rain stopped and all we had for the rest of the day was a bit of drizzle.
Sue took 26:08 and came in 80th out of 286 finishers. I was in position 210 in a time of 34:04. Here's a picture of the finish.
After that we drove to the other side of Stirling to meet with Richard, Jenny and Julie for a 10km walk over Lewis Hill. The path soon became narrow and steep. Quite thrutchy in places.
There were initially some views over the nearby countryside but we were soon cloaked in cloud and only just able to make out the waterline of the nearby reservoir.
Sue found a giant mushroom - a Birch Polypore weighing in at over a kilometre.
Other items of interest seen during the course of our walk are shown below.
Conifers (lots)
Scarlet Elf Cups
Despite the low light that we endured all day, the green moss on the trees, rocks and path added a little colour on the gloomy day.
After a few more thrutchy climbs we eventually came upon the trig point at 266 metres signifying that we had conquered Lewis Hill. We celebrated with coffee and snacks.
Continuing along the escarpment we eventually reached a road that in a short distance we left in favour of a path that led to a nice lunch spot.
Just beyond the lunch spot, a small weir was accompanied by the remains of a fish ladder.
The attractively named 'North Third Reservoir' was arrived at via a few duck boards and a lot of mud. Binoculars came out to confirm the identity of a flock of greylag geese. An oyster catcher objected to our invasion of its privacy, but the great black-backed gulls, mallards, Canada geese, various gulls, and other laid back residents didn't seem bothered by our presence.
There were more board walks.
The reservoir was last enhanced in 1934. It is 49 feet deep at the tower.
Beyond the reservoir a muddy path led in a couple of kilometres back to the cars.
This was a lovely walk from which there are alleged to be fine mountain views. We'll need to visit it again to benefit from those...
Here's the route - 10km with 250 metres ascent, taking us 4 hours.
A few folk were seen today - dog walkers, and mountain bikers enjoying some tricky singletrack routes.
No comments:
Post a Comment