Читать книгу Walking in the Southern Uplands. 44 best hill days in southern Scotland онлайн

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Gaze down into hidden hollows such as Hen Hole or the Beef Tub, where cattle thieves and Covenanters lurked; walk steep-sided river valleys with grim castles; and come upon sudden views south into England or north to the Highlands along the horizon. And then descend by another old path, or by one of the stream-carved cleuchs or linns, to the Grey Mare’s Tail waterfalls, or a pretty village in red sandstone, or the banks of the wide, wandering River Tweed.

In winter, the snowfields stretch, hump beyond hump, to the misty blue of Edinburgh or of England. Just the tops of the fence posts stick out of the snow. Follow them along the ridge for an hour or two, and find yourself looking down into one of the Southern Upland glens. But even then, it’s just an icy river far below and a strip of empty roadway, with a silence as deep as when the Stewart kings cleared this ground for deer hunting, or the Armstrongs from over the hill drove away the cattle, burned the small thatched cottages and left a huddle of spear-slain corpses at the field corner.