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My parents were spending a week on the Isle
of Bute and I decided to join them for the best part of a week. There
being no mountains on Bute, I came up with the idea of climb all the 30m
prominence tops - a list of which there are 27. I didn't have to trawl
the Cowal & Bute map to find my Tops, a database of all British 30m
prominence Tops is available on the rbh Marilyn-baggers Yahoo group -
there are over 16,000 of them! Although impractical to climb the lot, it
is nice to pick out an area and work through the list.
The highest point on Bute is Windy Hill at 278m. It's not much more than
moorland but the costal setting makes the views worth mentioning.
Kilbride Hill to Cnocanallt
I started from Ettrick Bay on a warm and sunny afternoon; the beach was heaving with Weegies.
Some old dear commented "It's just like the old days." I cycled up Glen More,
leaving the bike at Kilbride Bridge. My first destination was Kilbride
Hill (imaginative names here, you see...), perhaps the 'second hill' of Bute behind Windy Hill. A guy parked up by me
at the farm and I asked him about access to the hill. He couldn't give me
information beyond what I could work out from the map, so I just struck
a line up through the fields.
I trotted on to the top with Arran to the south looking damn
impressive. Kilbride, along with Windy Hill and three other tops, were
some of the first hills I climbed at the age of nine. By the time I'd
walked to
Kilbride Hill with a view of the rest, I was impressed I'd managed these at that
age. The hills were
low, but growth was so heavy it was like constantly walking through
knee-deep soft snow. I'd hoped to stop at the top of Kilbride Hill but
the moor was so thick it was hard to keep out the grass. Insects swarmed
in the hot sun and I moved on quickly, over
The Lyeing and onto Cnocanallt - the only top of the day I hadn't
climbed eleven years previously.
The walk along the moors were at best uncomfortable, and sadly quite
uninteresting. Among the thick grasses were holes and swamps, the
insects were here to stay. It all got
quite frustrating. I was glad to stop for a rest atop some boulders near
Cnocanallt. You really notice the brief rock exposures when walking on moorland.
Cnocanallt is marginally
higher than two tops to the north - the North and South Hills of
Bullochreg. (I wonder where a name like that comes from?) I doubt I
would have walked further north had Cnocanallt not been highest. These
are only 30m Tops after all. I noticed how once I'd come up with the
idea of the 30m Tops, they suddenly had an importance attached that was
not there before. Much like climbing the Munros, some may say!
Windy Hill
Windy Hill followed next - the highest of the
day. A trig point stood at the top. Flashes of my first ascent came
back although most memories have faded into oblivion. I remember the
never-ending toil from Shalunt up to Windy Hill (It must have seemed a
lot for 9-year-old legs). Dad, Steve and I crossed form Muirton Hill to
Kilbride Hill, and the little glen in between was one of my first ever
responses to natural scenery. I'd been struck at the beauty of the
forest, the greenery and dappled sunlight through the trees. And the
sadness that a track had been bulldozed right through all the beauty. My
one other prominent memory was the buzz of flies filling the air atop of The Lyeing. Dad had his new GPS out that day and I
continued to use it until
about 2008.
Enough of that talk. I'm starting to sound like an old guy. ;-)
Last Tops and back to Ardbeg
It was nice to stand on the trig point and get out of the long grass,
but I went onto do two more Tops - Kames and Muirton. They both passed
without particular interest, but long, energy-sapping grasses was a
common theme. I was glad to descend back into the fields and back to my
bike. I patched a route through fields and trees, dropping into Ettrick
Burn. It was still quite beautiful, maybe not with the same vibrant
beauty
that memory adds. I walked along the bank, and as the bike came into
view, a felled tree straddled the burn - a perfect way to get across the
water. It was wide, and
grippy and firm enough to walk across. I
climbed the opposite bank to the bike.
I was a pretty tired on the cycle back to Ardbeg where we were staying.
This was to become a common theme during the Bute holiday, but I was
glad to make a start on the Tops. It was nice to climb Windy Hill again,
as underwhelming as the actual hills had been.
360° panorama
from Windy Hill
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