Lousie Wood Law

6.75 miles 3h 30m 580m ascent

This walk started at the Glenochar Bastle House car park. Mine was the only car there, and I didn’t see another soul all day.

The Bastle House and Fermtoun Trail is marked out by ageing wooden posts and the wetter sections crossed on wooden bridges. You can see the civil engineering in the photograph above. Walking towards the ruins I was circled by two oystercatchers.

A bastle house is a single storey defensive farmhouse, dating from the times of the border reivers. The signs around the trail have seen better days and all the benches have fallen apart, but that is I suppose in keeping with the ruins of the house and fermtoun.

At the bastle house I left the fermtoun trail and headed directly up the slopes of Coupland Gair. At this point is was so warm I had to stop to take off my fleece. As I did this I noticed a vole scurrying across my path, the first of several I was to see throughout the day.

The trek up Coupland Gair was a little steep and grass soon gave way to tussocks and moss just to make the going a little harder. As usual I miscalculated my progress and when I saw a fence ahead of me I thought I had reached Lousie wood Law. Sadly it the fence on top of Coupland Gair, with anothe half mile still to go. The fence led to LWL showing the way but the ground became a little more soggy requiring some care in choosing footfalls. A couple of grouse ran along ahead of me for a while before flying to the other side of the fence. There were more grouse later in the walk especially when walking over heather.

Lousie Wood Law summit has a trig pillar and a small cairn. The weather remained good (dry with some blue in the sky) but on the summit the wind had picked up and the fleece was need as well as hat and gloves. The views were good with Tinto and the Culter hills visible across the M74, and the Daer hills and Lowthers to the south. It was good to have such good views after the poor visibility of the last few weeks.

A fence runs all the way from LWL to Dun Law, so even in bad weather the route would have been easy. The ground near the fence was mostly heather or areas of boggy moss so I followed a faint quad bike track which though it meandered a little, did offer slightly firmer ground (most of the time. Unfortunately it eventually meandered off to the north so I left it to follow the fence down the steep side of Black Law to Little Windgate Hass. This mouthful is the col between Black Law and White Law. I can’t find any definition of a hass other than the flesh of a dogfish, which doesn’t really fit the context.

This hill is very similar to the path we followed down Durisdeer hill, and the climb ahead looked the same as Well Hill (ie very steep). I decided to follow yet another quad bike track which took a less steep but longer route up the hill but there was no escaping the climb once the quad bike track went the wrong way. It was then just another mile in the cold wind to the top of Dun Law.

Near the top of Dun Law is a lump of sandstone with a metal post mounted in it. A remnant of a fence by the looks of it. I only mention it because it puts Dun Law’s summit furniture, a small white stone and half a dozen grey stones, to shame. The views here were much the same as on LWL but Leadhills was now bathed in sunlight.

The ground here was dry enough to sit down for lunch, which probably means it’s summer.

And after lunch it was downhill all the way back to the car. I headed off down towards Kneesend following another fence which isn’t on the OS. I found this took me a liitle off course. I was heading towards the Peden Reservoir and found myself on yet another faint quad bike track. Should I follow it and walk back down the A702 to the car or make my way across country to the Glenochar Valley. After consulting the map I headed for Glenochar. Initially down the slope but it bot steeper and wetter. I spotted a track on the far side of the valley which seemed to be heading down from the Hass to Glenochar. Getting to it required a burn crossing but I managed it with just one splash.

The track was waterlogged in places but overall was much easier than the wilder ground with its heather, tussocks and bog.

The good thing about coming back this way was that it took me back to the Fermtoun trail just where I left it. So I was able to complete the trail. Otherwise I would have missed my visit to the iron age platform. I would have missed it but the information poster.

A good walk in nice weather and that’s the Lowther and Daer Donalds completed. Driving home I looked longingly at Steygail and thought that I must climb it sometime.

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