Scottish Spring

April 2009

When Michael and I go on a bike ride we often go via Bridge of Allan, through the mine woods to Dunblane. If we are feeling particularly energetic we extend the route to go through the university campus, around the lochs and also explore a bit more of Dunblane, as we did on this occasion in April. Having spent all day on Good Friday writing a grant application for a future job I was ready to exert myself and get some fresh air. We must have clocked up 20 miles on the round trip, a lot of that being on rough ground off-road.

Dunblane Cathedral Doorway

The cathedral in Dunblane really dominates the skyline and is more or less at the heart of the town. The architecture looks like a bit of a mix of styles and stones with some very ancient looking doorways.

Dunblane Cathedral - another ancient doorway

Dunblane Cathedral Tower

On Easter Sunday I went over to visit my parents in Glasgow and stayed for lunch, we had Easter cake and sat outside in the sun for our lunch - a rare opportunity for outdoor dining! My day off on Easter Monday involved a straight 13 hours of work on my research proposal. I am looking at it as an investment in our future but it's a sad fact of academic life that you need to use your holidays and spare time to secure future funding!

The following weekend (18-19 April) was another glorious sunny weekend so Michael and I had a look in our local walks guide book, selected a hill in the nearby Ochils, and set off wearing more clothes than we needed given how hot it became. This necessitated Michael removing his trousers at one point, much to my amusement and enjoyment! I was not allowed to post the photo on my blog....!

Larch tree growing sideways along the ground on Wood Hill above Alva, Clackmannanshire

The approach to Wood Hill is through a lovely sycamore wood and then there's a fairly steep ascent to get to the summit. Once at the top there are no trees, just grasses and you can see for miles. You could easily walk across the top of various hills in many different directions without dropping down much in altitude. It was so peaceful , sunny and beautiful I had the feeling I wanted to stay up there all day.

Ancient Scots pines on Wood Hill

Top of Wood Hill looking down on Alva village

Inevitably, we got a bit lost on the way down as we were trying to macro-navigate and some of the landmarks in the guide book had changed since it was written! We ended up in a maze of gorse on a vertiginously steep hillside and finally came into a field of sheep including what looked like a large ram. Gulp! We stuck close to the barbed wire fence and hoped to god we didn't have to fling ourselves over it into more spikey gorse bushes- they have BIG thorns!

Beautiful gorse flowers- they smell sweet like peaches. Tillicoultry in background

Spring lamb with Mum on descent of Wood Hill. There was a big ram in the field too.....

The blossoming gorse covered a lot of the lower slopes of the hills and from a distance looks really impressive. In the towns all the cherry tres are in blossom with their big fluffy flower pompoms in pink or white. The petals regularly drop off and carpet the ground until around 2 weeks after they flower when the trees are bare of flowers again. Later in spring, in May, it's the turn of the Scottish bluebells to carpet hills and woodland floors - a really lovely natural 'wonder'.

Gorgeous pink cherry blossom in Riverside, only lasts 2 weeks