The Cycle Path
Cycle Log
Day 10 - Monday 28th June 2004
Tushielaw
Started later than expected at Tushielaw: suffered an almost immediate puncture and split tyre from embedded bottle glass. Patched it up surrounded by twittering wheatears, a small upland bird. Didn't take the Wiss, not a route for these with dodgy tyres, but wheeled through the splendid hills to St Mary's Loch. Next Talla Reservoir set in a majestic valley thence to the John Buchan Museum but he was not in until 2pm, and his 39 steps had been replaced by a disabled ramp access. The Tweed cycle way now led past the Broughton Brewery to Biggar - a place full of interest and crammed with museums of all types. Stopped in front of a full size stainless steel snowplough - invented by a local man and, in a land of snow and ice, given pride of place. Also stopped by the smell of honey coming from a field of sheep - until I realised that the clover was in full-on bloom all around, another olfactory delight . A tasty delight was the local creamy white Lanark cheese with Scottish fresh bread rolls. After Carnwath the distant hill topped with a communication tower announced Cairnpapple Hill and beyond it Linlithgow. Lanarkshire landscapes were dominated here by poor soils, marshy levels and conifer belts with scattered spoil heaps being bulldozed away for cheap fill. In West Lothian the 'Bings' were the biggest surprise - red shale heaps - remnants of a 200 year old shale industry that produced such entrepreneurs as James 'Paraffin' Young and James Ross of Philpstoun who produced 'Ross Petrol' until the works closed in 1931. There is one cluster of conical heaps called the 'Five Sisters of Westwood' that are beginning to mottle green as nature overcomes the oils and toxic salts of the shales. Two 'Bings' are now historic monuments and the word 'Bing' has entered the local dialect to mean a big spread i.e. a large meal. Not far away is the House of the Binns occupied by the Dalyells (?) family with a flag (Scotland) flying folly in full view for miles around. The biggest surprise however was the view from Cairnpapple Hill - a massive sweep of 360 degrees panorama taking in the Firth of Forth, Bass Rock, Arthur's Seat, Pentland Hills, Southern Uplands, Stirling, Ochill's and Dunfermline. At the centre of this is the prehistoric stone circle and henge of Cairnpapple. In use 3000 to 1400 BC and still an awesome place today even with dark storm clouds shrouding all the hills like a Lord of the Rings film.
