We have a good breakfast at The Moorings, then it’s off down the hill to the Clyde, stopping on the way to buy rolls and ham for lunch. We rejoin the Clyde Walkway at Strathclyde Loch.
The loch was artificially created in 1975, diverting the river and flooding the derelict mining village of Bothwellhaugh. It forms the centrepiece of the Strathclyde Country park, with extensive rowing facilities as well as dinghies and small pleasure boats. There are juvenile black headed gulls, swans, mallards and a rather dishevelled looking grey heron. There is also a memorial to victims of the Piper Alpha disaster who lived locally.
The path threads between some disused service buildings and then negotiates the complicated M74 junction with a series of bridges and paths through roundabouts. It feels counterintuitive but it works. We then decide to bypass part of the walkway by climbing up to Bothwell. This is an attractive suburb, currently preparing for its annual scarecrow festival, so there are several themed scarecrows around the town. I’m not a fan.
We rejoin the Walkway although there are no way marks and haven’t been any since before Motherwell. The topography has changed since it was last mapped, so we are reassured to discover a Clyde Walkway information board as we pass along a road by a housing estate. The EU was sponsoring path improvements here, so maybe they hadn’t completed the signs before Brexit. We also walk past Bothwell Castle, another fenced off, ruined building. This one has scaffolding and looks as if it is being restored. The Victorian and Georgian buildings were built for show, this was built for battle and has walls several feet thick, so is more robust in any case.
The Walkway leaves the riverbank soon after this and, together with a national cycle route, follows an unclassified road. This road passes between fields and is narrow, uphill and very twisting. It is also extraordinarily busy. We cannot move in because there are hawthorn bushes directly adjacent to the carriageway and the discarded Strongbow cans and gin bottles suggest not all the drivers are necessarily sober. We cross a bridge with a couple of old memorial bouquets attached to complete our discomfort.
Fortunately, we turn off after about a mile and head back towards the river. As we pass between a science park and a copse, a red deer appears. She watches us then crosses the path and enters the copse. She stops to look at me, but I fumble with my phone and she canters into the trees before I can photograph her. The rain has now set in for the day, so we have lunch under a railway bridge. It’s not very attractive, but it could be worse. The Walkway then continues, together with the cycle way, along the now tidal Clyde, to Glasgow. It’s all surprisingly wooded and well kept.
We leave the Walkway and cross Glasgow Green, which feels very much like a London park. We stop for a final break then continue into the city centre and the Doubletree by Hilton hotel. Two days’ rest is just what we need.
Total distance so far: 562 miles
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