A Summer's Day in Scotland.. in March

The weather in Scotland is fickle, most of the time not to the benefit of outdoor pursuits. But on rare occasions you get lucky, everything falls into place and you have an amazing time that you will remember for a very long time, if not forever.
I had such a time a few years back on Skye, when I climbed all 14 Cuillin munros on unprecedented five consecutive days with blue skies and 20+ degrees. I just had another one this past weekend.

Spent the weekend in Crieff to get my induction for the tour guiding I'm doing this year, learning about all the procedures and go through a number of scenarios with my friend who I'll be working for. Took the very early flight to Edinburgh on Saturday, got picked up by him and spent the whole day sitting in the sun outside his house talking things through.
Normally I would've craved to be on a hill and be spoilt for choice since all routes were in prime condition, hardly any wind and sun, sun, sun. But I really enjoyed just basking in the sun, having a cuppa tea or a wee bite in between going through all the tour guiding stuff.

Had brought my running shoes with the intention of going for a 10k early Sunday morning. Got up at 6:30am, had a cuppa tea and a protein bar and off I went towards The Knock of Crieff, a small hill with great views over Crieff and the surrounding countryside.
If I needed to shake off the last bit of sleepiness, the crisp 1C outside certainly did the job! I felt great and started my uphill journey out of the deserted town.
Soon the road turned into a broad path with a mix of gravel, hard soil and some small rocks as I passed through a golf course. Off-road baby! Views were already stunning. Passed an old ruin and then made my way up further around the back of the hill before going straight for the summit through dense and dark wood. Running on soft brown needles, hopping over roots was great fun!

Running along the golf course

Some sights along the way

Short breather on the steady uphill run

Into the wood for the last push to the summit

Most unusual Scottish summit so far with all those trees around.

The summit came a bit as a surprise as it was in the middle of the wood. Passed it, ran back and took a quick summit selfie, then raced down and over a short flat bit up to the next summit with superb views all around.

Proper trail running between summits

Amazing views into the highlands

Ran further down and took a loop around an adventure park and lots of paddocks. Again lovely views as the path skirted the forest.

Headed back to the golf course to finish my loop and back into town from there. Had to fight with stitches for the last couple of kilometres which was a shame since it was all downhill and I could've raced it otherwise.

Start/end in Crieff, over and around The Knock

Arrived just in time for a protein shake, a shower and a lovely breakfast after such a blissful start of the day.
It was all about the bus driving on Sunday and I took the 16 seater out for a spin around Loch Earn and Loch Tay later with the sun still blazing from the sky. Despite still getting to grips with the bus driving I was utterly relaxed and didn't feel like I was missing out on a superb mountain day at all.

I'm not a runner at all and only do it for the sake of doing something different than Krav Maga or lifting. But outdoor running is totally awesome!!! I really have to do this again and look for some good trails around or near Bristol, now that the days are getting longer!

Short Dartmoor Walk

Busy as we are most weekends in the warmer months we found ourselves suddenly a free weekend mid March and decided to head down to Rich's parents cottage near Slapton to just spend 2 days away from home.

Weather forecast was awful, but funny enough it turned out allright. Saturday a shuffle around Torquay, watching the rugby and a nice dinner at The Tower Inn in Slapton was all we did.

Sunday I had planned a nice walk in Dartmoor passing quite a few of the famous tors but Rich was feeling too unwell for anything longer than 2 hours. Had caught a stupid bug, Boo. He was still up for stretching his legs though.

Left the car at one of the many car parks near Hay Tor with a thick carpet of dark clouds hanging over us, threatening with rain. 

Dartmoor is a funny place. One moment you're in the crowds that head towards Hay Tor, you cross the road next to it and all of a sudden you're all by yourselves. I had come up with this circular walk thinking of shelter from the wind and rain and this is pretty much what we got. A hill to our right to take the biting wind from the West and quite a bit of moss clad oak to let only some of the light rain through.

Had to backtrack twice to get onto the correct path but I had realised my errors early enough to only cost us 10mins each. Walked past an old shooting range and decided to take a shortcut on tarmac back to the car as Rich was getting too exhausted to do more.

Made it back into the biting wind where the cat was parked just as proper rain started to pour down on us.

Some photos from our wee walk: