Monday, we packed our coffees and headed out, from the Orchard House campsite, to walk part of the River Ayr walk. Which was made slightly trickier as part of it was closed due to a landslip. However, we did manage to walk to the Failford Gorge. Luckily, we had checked to see if the local pub was open, and because it was a Monday it was closed, no consideration given to the fact it was bank holiday Monday. This is now the third pub in Scotland we have tried to frequent that has been closed.
Also, Amazon prime came through and delivered the new water filler cap!
Tuesday morning, we packed up and left Orchard House campsite, heading back into Ayr then up the coast, via an Aldi. To an open pub! Lunch at the Boarding House in Howwood (no typo it does have two ‘W’s in the middle of Howwood – which is a bit weird).
We then drove over the Erskine bridge up the side of loch Lomond, had a very close shave with a very large lorry on a sharp bend of a very small road, before arriving at our next campsite in Killin. Maragowan campsite is a Caravan and Motorhome Club site, on the bank of the Lochay river, very near Loch Tay. Got a nice pitch for the motorhome in a quiet corner of the site.
Wednesday, we walked along the side of Loch Tay, via the ruins of Finlarig Castle then the old railway line back in to Killin and the Dochart Falls.
Thursday, as Rog is doing the Parish Walk in about 6 weeks, he decided he should do a “training” walk, a quiet road up and down Boreland Valley, or was Rog avoiding the Laundry that Nic was doing?!
Then we did head out for a walk after lunch near the loch and around Killin.
Decided to try put out the sun canopy out for the first time, partly to give some space to dry towels in the drizzly weather! The canopy came out OK, then we looked at the weather forecast for the next couple of days and, after a few hours, decided to take it down again – possible high winds.
Friday, we both walked the Boreland Valley route that Rog had discovered, before heading out for lunch at the Falls of Dochart inn, a ‘few’ drinks and lovely meal, Rog had Venison burger and Nic had hot smoked salmon sandwich, from their own smoke house. We bought more smoked salmon supplies to take away as it was so good. In conversation with the shop staff, it became apparent that everyone is struggling to recruit and keep staff, making running a business a challenge, maybe this explains all the other closed pubs we have encountered.
Saturday, be broke camp again and headed to Pitlochry, up the side of Loch Tay, google maps were convinced that the road was closed, but after talking to a local in Kenmore at a coffee stop, they confirmed the road had been closed, “for patching”, but had to be reopened because of the polling day 2 days before, and they were not convinced whether or not it would be closed again the following Monday! Thankfully it was open that day allowing us to avoid what would have been either, very small roads or a long detour. Unfortunately on the road which should have been closed we passed an accident (a car & a tree), which had only just happened, thankfully there were already a lot of people involved, and the best thing we could do was keep driving and not block the road for the approaching emergency services, who passed us a couple of minutes further up the road.
Once we got to Pitlochry, we located our pitch, it was booked online, we had an email with a pitch number, so turned up and parked on the pitch, not having spoken to anyone at the site. Easy! We then went for a walk in to Pitlochry village, after visiting various outdoor clothing shops and handing over a credit card a few times, we took our purchases (a jacket, two pair of trousers and two fleeces) back to the motorhome., via the Pitochry dam and fish ladder.
Sunday, we headed out reasonably early (for us) as the weather forecast later in the day had been a bit gloomy. We walked to Faskally forest and Dunmore loch, a good walk on a mix of woodland uneven paths and some which has been designed for better access. Visited the Dam visitors centre on the way back to the site, to read about the construction of Hydroelectric plants around Scotland, mainly in the 1950’s. Renewable energy – a very current topic. The forecasted gloomy weather never arrived.
Travurple 