Glen Rosa

We had a late start today - late with a great breakfast and a bit of a sense of overdoing it again - and it was midday before we pulled ourselves together and headed out. With only a short stay here, I was determined to be in places that feel part of me, and Glen Rosa is one of the closest.

In the past 50 years or so I’ve done various epic hikes involving this Glen - twice on day trips from home going right up the Saddle, several times traversing the Glen Sannox- Glen Rosa route; other occasions when it has been our access to the surrounding peaks - Beinn Nuis, Beinn a’Cliabhain, Cir Mhor. Not today.

Today reminded me of more casual family walks from the cottage my parents rented every summer - for two months till I was 14, then for August - when we’d do ordinary stuff in the morning and then take a wee picnic to the Garbh Allt bridge, which is what, in our various stages of decrepitude, we did today. It was beautiful, warm, dry - underfoot and overhead - filled with the song of skylarks and hoaching with clegs. Happily I had not yielded to the temptation to wear shorts. I killed several…

On the way down we met a sizeable frog/toad, yellow and brown, who hopped off the path into some bog myrtle - another favourite feature of my childhood memories. (The plant, not the frog).

At the time of writing, dinner is still a couple of hours off - and I’m not cooking it!