Day 9 – Beattock to Scabcleuch (16.8 miles)

Today was the rainy day, the kind of rain that gets you wet, not the other stuff you may have heard about, this was ‘proper’ Scottish rain.
Leaving Beattock and trying to cross the busy A74(M) was probably the biggest challenge of the day a combination of bad signage and impatience to crack on meant we may have used an ‘alternative’ route.
Having followed ‘Moffat Water’ for a short while, soon we were back into Forestry lands. We followed the Forestry road through the trees, using an optional route today, the ‘Low Level’ route, mainly because of the driving rain (had it been sunny maybe I’d have convinced Adele the high level route would be worth it).
The highlight of the day today was definitely walking on the high paths around ‘Ettrick Head’ (coincidentally where we found our 7th hidden coin) the views back down the valley we walked up were stunning… Adele would probably argue our visit to ‘Over Phawhope’ bothy, a little later, where we ate our lunch was my highlight as there’s a log burner there.
After that there was about 6 miles of road walking to our pickup point today. We’d be staying at the, highly recommended, Tushielaw Inn. We’re already thinking about our next stay here Xx
Stats: Total Mileage: 144.3 Pint count: 22