It was overcast and gloomy through the night but no wind. This is my last day walking and I only had a few miles back to the car. I was packed up and on my way shortly after 7am and set off north over the summit of Crachan. It wasn’t much higher than my camp. The summit has a small cairn and very dilapidated fence that was going to be replaced judging by the new fence posts and coils of wire stockpiled nearby. I could see Loch Arklet below and my planned route was to descend to below the dam and cross by the bridge.

Lochan Cruachan

The best way down wasn’t clear from my viewpoint as it isn’t possible to see steep drop offs from above. At one point I had to make a detour to avoid a rocky drop off but the rest of the time I was trying to avoid putting my boot into a bog lower down were canes stuck in the ground with coloured tapes on the top end. I soon saw excavator tracks along the line of them and realised they were markers for a proposed road. Below the reservoir dam I crossed the bridge where the track crosses the river.

Loch Arklet

Loch Arklet dam

Up at the road to Inversnaid I crossed over and took the stoned path across the hillside towards the garrison site. The path wasn’t finished and near the farm I had to hop over a fence and a couple of gates. I took some photos of the garrison ruins and continued down the road to the car. I arrived at 09:30am.

Highland cattle in Glen Arklet

I drove back up to the dam area and stopped to try and take a photo of the garrison and hills based on the old illustration on the information board. The farmer was there in his land rover and said the path wasn’t unfinished because of running out of money but due to a legal dispute between the employer and contractor. I drove to Aberfoyle and called in the shop then drove on to Linlithgow and Linlithgow Palace. It’s a place I’d wanted to visit because it was the birthplace of Mary Stuart. It cost £4.40 to get access and so many parts of the ruin were accessible. After that I walked just over 2 miles round the loch to get views of the building across the water. Then I drove via Peebles and Innerleithen to St Mary’s Loch and the Tibbie Shiels Inn. I was hoping to park the car near the loch and sleep in the car but they had no overnight stay signs up. I continued along the A708 to the Grey Mare’s Tail waterfall but the car parks were pay & display so I parked on the opposite verge to sleep.