The Southern Upland Way: Scotland's Coast to Coast

Travelling through Longformacus to Abbey st Bathans we spot a mountain hare and red grouse.

Monday 16th April
Our campsite in the Lammermuir Hills to Abbey St Bathans


We spot a hare	which shoots off at high speed

We wake up feeling a lot more refreshed than yesterday morning and are able to start walking in the am. We find the Lammermuirs to be rather pancake flat on the top, though you still have to climb a wee bit to get up them. We get great haze free views, with lovely colours in the dales below.

We spot a Mountain Hare, recently reintroduced into the area. We find it very easy to spot due to its winter white coat still showing even though the snow is long gone. Alan creeps closer to get a photo, and the hare appears to be undisturbed by the human stalking it. As Alan gets closer, we see why as it streaks off over the moors at incredible speeds - obviously confident in its ability to outrun us.


The view back to the Three Eildons.	After a couple of miles the three Eildons look even more distant

We've got a good day for it, with glorious views, with patchwork of colour all around due to the various fields.

We find our way up onto Twin Law, which has two massive immaculately built cairns with seating in them. The larger of the two has a staircase recessed into it, leading up to a stone bench with a bothy like visitors book. It's a lovely point. We can see back to the distant forms of the 3 Eildons on the horizon, which we passed near two days.The Lammermuir moors spread vastly around us.

On finishing taking a panarama, Jo packs away the kit in Alans bag for him as she is keen to keep moving. When Alan picks up his rucksack he is shocked to find how much lighter it is. Only Jo apparently has the sense to pack heavier items closer to the back - Alans been storing the relatively heavy panarama making equipment furtherest from his back making the rucksack seem heavier. It makes such a difference that Alan worries he's left something behind.

Twin cairns


The patchwork of heather which covers the grouse moors.	We cross a bridge.

The path continues down the other side of Twin Law carin, descending off the moors of the Lammermuir Hills towards a reservoir. The path soon joins a poorly marked track - its more of a path then a track, and we continue our descent to the valley bottom. A wooden footbridge takes us across the river leading to the Watch Water Reservior, and we take the opportunity to fill up on water. If this is the river which fills the reserviour its got to be clean!

The track becomes better defined as it approaches some farmhouse buildings at Scarlaw. A segregated off area beside the farmhouse provides a place for sheep with difficult pregnancies to be kept near by and helped as needed. One of the sheep in this area has unfortunately given birth to a very small stillborne. A second has recently given birth to a rather large lamb, and helps it up onto its feet for its first steps. The lamb is still very shaky, and has damp fur. We notice that lambs don't seem to care about human presence and when alone will even approach us and look at us with interest. The mother sheep always run away, and can sometimes be seen to be torn between their lamb which refuses to budge and running away from our presense.

Approaching a cattle grid we hear a little lamb baaing and see it pocking its head out the cattle grid. There's a car coming towards the cattle grid, so Jo takes immediate action in stopping the car and going to the rescue of the young lamb. The car owner happens to be a farmer, though it is not his heard of sheep, he did help the segregated sheep we saw earlier give birth.

Jo fishes the lamb out from the cattle grid, while the farmer tells us a bit about lambing. Seems the pregnant sheep are scanned with ultrasound around the 28th Feb and are separated into fields according to whether they are expecting twins or single sheep. The mothers with single sheep are put up onto a heather moor where they can adequately look after one sheep. The ones with twins or more than two are kept down close to the farm where they can be fed concentrate, and get the better feeding ground of meadows. We find out about the sheep in the segregated pens, the first which went into labour too early and was not producing milk, and the second had a difficult birth as the lamb was very big.

We reach the road over the dam, just before which is a tourist area with a cafe (not open) and picnic tables. We decide to stop here for a spot of lunch before continuing across the dam.


cafe at the resevoir	The Resevoir


The road takes us through farmland including several sheep fields.	Longformacus

Its on road all the way from the reservoir to Longformacus, a road covered in a lot of dead animals. We pass dead hares, dead rabbits a dead pheasant - Jo stands on one by mistake as she is looking at a butterfly. The road takes us past Rawburn farm with its massive bulls.
Nearing Longformacus there's a wee park you can take lunch in, and we rest for an hour and a half while the heat of the midday passes.
We pass through Longformacus with its lovely houses, past a large estate with a peacock with a vivid blue neck in the woods of the estate. On asking someone if there is a public toilet in Longformacus we get the response, there's nothing in Longformacus!


A picture in the information shelter depicts the elevation of the SUW throughout its length.	A red grouse in a field of green.

There is however a SUW information shelter with some information about reintroducing mountain hares back into the Lammermuir Hills. The routes been diverted probably to make way for a new looking wind turbine developement. We climb up a hill towards the wind turbines, with cows grazing in the foreground. The way avoids the top of Black Hill due to the wind turbines on the top of the hill, however a side route pointing 50m to a viewpoint takes us closer. We get a good close up look at the windturbines. You could continue walking for 200m if you wanted to as there doesn't seem to be a set viewing point. To the East we can see an unnamed town, and we get our first view of the sea and the East Coast.


Black cows surround the wind turbines.	You can see a long way from Black Hill


The locals don't seem to like the wind turbines in the area.	Up side of hill, we wish we had the farm buggies to take us up.

We join a track as we head down the hill through the Lodge Woods, and notice a protest banner on one of the houses asking that no more wind turbines be built on the Lammermuirs. Clearly not everyone thinks of them as majestic and cool like Alan does. We climb up a farmland hill, while being passed by several farm buggies. Up the top of the hill we catch up with one of the lads in a farm buggy who is worryingly trying to freak out the cows. He separates one of the cows from their calf and they bellow loudly in distress, freaking Alan out who is convinced that its a bull getting ready to charge. Giving the cows a wide birth we reach the other side of the field without incidence and climb steeply down by a river onto a forest track. The track takes us through lovely smelling fresh larch woodland, high above a river below for the last 3km towards Abbey St Bathans.


In farm buggy land.	The evening sun shines through the trees creating a blanket of green light.


By the Whiteadder Water near Abbey St Bathans.	The track continues on towards Abbey St Bathans in the fading light.

On approaching the small village of Abbey St Bathans we keep our eyes peeled for a suitalbe camping spot. The is difficult as the track passes through steep forested hillside, with farmland closer to the river. In the failing light we manage to find a relatively flat location on the opposite bank next to the river. Though technically part of a cow field, we stay separated from the cows by a thick wall of gorse.

The kist

Unlike the last three kists, this kist is loaded with treasure, and a new kind of badge advertising Scotlands coast to coast. The waymerk is appropriately embelished with the picture of a wind turbine.The kist is a large structure found in the Lammermuirs before Longformacus.

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The Southern Upland Way: Scotland's Coast to Coast

Travelling through Longformacus to Abbey st Bathans we spot a mountain hare and red grouse.

Monday 16th April Our campsite in the Lammermuir Hills to Abbey St Bathans

Monday 16th April
Our campsite in the Lammermuir Hills to Abbey St Bathans