Sunday 19th May 2013
A short circular walk up a 223m high hill on the edge of Perth
Distance: 4.5km; Ascent: 180m; Misty but quite warm; Solo
After an excellent evening in Braemar last night catching up with many TGO Challengers, it was now unfortunately time for me to head home. The weather wasn't overly inspiring this morning, with all the hills cloaked in mist down to quite low levels. But I was still keen to get out for a walk to break up the journey south, if only for an hour or so. Moncreiffe Hill near Perth seemed to fit the bill nicely and was only a short detour off route.
Therefore just before midday, I set off from the newish car park to the north of the hill and followed the good waymarked paths through the Woodland Trust's
Moncreiffe Hill Wood. There were a number of interesting sculptures and carvings alongside some of the paths.
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| Dragonfly sculpture in Moncreiffe Hill Wood |
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| Slug sculpture in Moncreiffe Hill Wood |
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| Misty Moncreiffe Hill Wood |
The majority of my walk was along the white trail, with a brief detour up to the summit of
Moncreiffe Hill (Marilyn), whose summit is marked by a cairn inside a hill-fort known as Moredun Top Fort.
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| Summit of Moncreiffe Hill in the Moredun Hill Fort |
I headed west from this hill-fort to visit the second hill-fort, which was called Moncreiffe Hill Fort and it also contained a somewhat more modern addition in the form of an OS
trig point! It was slightly eerie being here in the mist as I could hear the traffic roaring by on the M90 a short distance below but I couldn't see more than twenty or thirty metres!
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| Trig point on Moncreiffe Hill Fort |
I returned to the white trail and returned to the car past a number of other wooden carvings by the side of the path. At around 1pm I reached the car and set off to continue my journey back home.
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| Pill millipede sculpture in Moncreiffe Hill Wood |
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| Sculptures in Moncreiffe Hill Wood |
See
here for my Social Hiking map from the day's walk.
N.B. 04/07/13 - Post date updated to actual date of walk, i.e. 19/05/13
(from 02/06/13). Links to social hiking, trig points and hill-bagging also added.
Have just caught up with your exploits, Alistair. Seems that you maximised opportunities for hills and socialising in a 'not classic' TGOC year...
ReplyDeleteWell done!
Thanks Martin :-)
DeleteIt was a good week and I managed to climb at least one hill a day despite the weather, but I did have the luxury of being able to drive to where the weather was better each day.
Although it did feel slightly strange seeing Challengers in Aviemore and Braemar when I had spent the intervening three days in the NW Highlands whereas they had all been in the Cairngorms!
I'm looking forward to next year and I'm still thinking about a Glenelg start if I can work out how to get there.
Glenelg should be a good choice. It's still on my list of places not started from, and should be easy enough to get to, even by hitching.
ReplyDeleteNo time to think about that now though, as this time next week we'll be in the Pyrenees and there's quite a bit of prep and various jobs to do before we leave. I'll be there for two months so don't expect too many comments!
Have fun in the Pyrenees :-) I spent 6 excellent weeks there in the summer of 2001 doing a coast to coast walk (mainly following the HRP). I must get round to going back there sometime!
DeleteWe are looking forward to it - it's 9 years since our own HRP trip.
ReplyDeleteHave fun! I'm looking forward to reading all about it.
Delete