Another very icy walk yesterday (2 January) through Mugdock Country Park. We stayed “off-piste” as much as possible.

Pretty much next to Milngavie, and just 5 or 6 miles from our home, this country park spans East Dunbartonshire and Stirlingshire. The start of the West Highland Way runs through the park.

Very popular with families, hikers and dog walkers, the park has a visitor centre, toilets, a couple of shops, a tearoom and a restaurant, but due to Covid restrictions only the tearoom was open, and only for take-aways (not so great in winter!)

There are miles of walking trails, a couple of ruined castles, and a few small lochs.

Craigend Castle is the least well-preserved of the two, and fenced off as it’s unsafe to go into, but Mugdock Castle is in a better state of repair and you can wander about the ruins and grounds.

There are several carparks (I think six in total) from where you can access different areas of the park, although it’s small enough to cover the whole park from just one base. Yesterday we opted for the car park at the visitor centre, which, although very busy, was not full. For any new visitors to the park, this would be the best option to explore from.

It was a treacherously icy path up to the Whangie today. We went only about halfway, avoiding the icy main path, before deciding not to risk going any further. Still got great views even though we didn’t make it all the way to the Whangie. Hope those who went all the way were ok!

We certainly didn’t fancy spending New Year’s Day at A&E! Glad to say that we got home safe and sound for our first 2021 family dinner.

Here’s a few pics, the actual path was a river of solid ice!

Well we’re pretty sure that 2020 wasn’t what any of us expected. So let’s raise a wee dram and hope that things can only get better in 2021 – all the best folks!

We are really missing Loch Lomond, especially canoeing there, so today we decided to take a drive up to Balloch just to have a short walk and look round.

It was very quiet. No-one was out on the loch there. We really wanted to head to Balmaha, but thought best stick to the Glasgow postcode area since that’s the “rules”. So we just took a very short walk into the grounds of Cameron House Hotel & Lodges, from where we got good views over the loch to both Ben Lomond and Balloch Castle.

After our short walk around there, we decided to head up to Greenside reservoir and then the Slacks mountain in the Kilpatrick hills closer to home.

Once again we used the car park at Edinbarnet, but this time instead of heading up to Jaw reservoir we took the path through Cochno Farm and headed up to the Greenside reservoir. The Greenside is not as pretty as Jaw, but the views looking back down to the city are great.

The walk up to Greenside got better the closer we got. The further up we walked, the more snow appeared, and we could see in the distance people heading up the Slacks mountain.

As we headed up to the top of the Slacks mountain on the initially steep path, the views got better and better…

By the time we reached the top, I was panting! With my fitness classes being off for almost the duration of Covid, I haven’t kept my fitness up, so this one was tough! The views were worth it, though, even though it was dark by the time we got back to the car park. It was also very cold, so we didn’t stop to drink our tea or eat our sandwiches at the top as planned, instead we had them at 4.30pm when we got back to the car and could put the heated seats on!

Needless to say, a nice luxuriating dip in our hot tub when we got home, with a wee dram of Drambuie, finished the day nicely!

So yesterday my back was giving me quite a bit of pain, so we kept the walk low level and fairly short (just over 2 miles).

Loch Ardinning is a popular nature reserve, only about 7 miles away from home. It’s on the right hand side, just past the Mugdock country park turnoff, on the main A81 to Aberfoyle.

The walk doesn’t spend much time on the loch-side, but rather climbs a gentle slope away from the loch, which gives great views over to Dumgoyne hill, and further afield to Ben Lomond and the mountains beyond. As you can see, we hit some light snow cover during the walk (as well as a very boggy stretch!)

As you follow the loop round, you come out looking down on the loch, which was partially frozen, and then eventually drop down to follow part of the loch shore back to the parking lay-by.

The Kilpatrick hills can be accessed as close as 6 miles from our home, from the car park in Edinbarnet.

The relatively easy, but initially very muddy (laterally snowy) walk takes you up to Jaw Reservoir.

From there we headed up Cochno Hill, from where you can look down on both Cochno Loch and Jaw Reservoir .

There were also stunning views across the Kilpatrick hills, with snow as far as the eye could see.

With the snow underfoot, the route was easy to follow, so we managed to make a loop from the top of the hill, the only downside was that part of the route back was along the roadside (it didn’t have to be, we just missed the path that went through Cochno farm!)

Unlike our walk along the Kelvin walkway yesterday, the people we met on today’s walk were friendly and smiling (on yesterday’s walk most avoided eye contact, let alone returned a smile).

A stunning walk, really nice to see the difference between summer (we last went in June) and winter. Loved it!

In our blog about our Top 10 places we have stayed, our number one was a beautiful lodge on the fjord at the very end of the small town of Seydisfjordur in Iceland.

We were shocked to see in the news today that the town was pretty much destroyed by a huge mudslide. Our thoughts go out to the residents and we hope that no-one has been too badly hurt. It looks like it will take a long time to rebuild the town. Very sad news…

The Mugdock and Craigmaddie reservoirs in Milngavie, Glasgow, supply drinking water to close on 3/4 million people in Greater Glasgow. To take a walk around one or both is a popular activity for the locals, and for us it’s a good way to get some exercise and fresh air without travelling far.

Since we are pretty much still locked down as far as travelling goes, this made a nice walk during the week while Paul had some annual leave to use up.

When I was a kid, it was a tradition to throw coins (1 and 2 pence coins, this was the early to mid 1970’s after all) in the water and make a wish. I read in an old newspaper from 2005 that approximately £290 of coins were removed from the reservoir! I don’t recall any of my wishes coming true, but the tradition still continues to this day…

Today has been a crisp but lovely winter’s day when temperature didn’t go over 3 degrees. With still being in lockdown, and not allowed to leave our council area without risking a fine, our options were limited. So we decided to head over to Pollok Country Park.

However, we made an error with the satnav and therefore ended up reprogramming it to take us to Hogganfield Loch, part of the Seven Lochs wetlands reserve (which you can read about here). The loch is in the east end of Glasgow near Stepps and is popular with families and dog walkers. It is paved all the way and takes about 40 minutes to stroll round. Below are a couple of photos…

As this was a short walk, we were wondering where else we could go, when we remembered that the Glasgow Necropolis, just behind the Royal Infirmary, was on our TO DO list and also on our way home (just off the motorway). I have lived in Glasgow for the majority of my life, and Paul has lived here for about 20 years, and yet neither of us have ever visited this fantastic place.

We found parking on the street outside, free on Sundays, and went in to explore. I would say that this is a “must see” if you come to Glasgow. It’s set on a small hill with great views over the city and the cathedral…

After having a wander round the Necropolis, we headed to Cathedral Square where we could only view the cathedral from outside as it was closed…

We then took a short stroll down the road towards the Trongate, passing the Provan’s Lordship, one of the oldest houses in Glasgow dating from medieval times, and now a museum. Just a little further down the road we saw this fantastic mural on the side of a row of houses…

There is even a website you can use if you want to explore Glasgow city centre’s mural trail.

So even during lockdown, we are still managing to find new places to explore. To be honest is pretty shocking that it took a lockdown for us to get round to visiting these places, so I guess all clouds have a silver lining as they say!