Sketches of Stirling: Ten
After some months, our outings have resumed. This one has been planned for quite a while. Perhaps in winter, perhaps in spring? Not meant to be! And that’s because we had no idea just what natural treasures would present themselves on a trip we didn’t think had much potential.
No offence meant to Bannockburn itself, of course, famous for its tartan making. The old mill, a short peek, and a nice snack in the Bannockburn Coffee House, but not exactly a hearty walk. Wrong, so wrong!
We take a bus from Stirling and after all the very good reviews find that the cafe more than lives up to its reputation. It’s here that the first clue as to our adventure ahead manifests itself. Through the window, affixed to a cottage wall on the opposite side of Main Street, there’s a tree of life. It’s a sign that we’re on the right path, one we have yet to discover, but the nudge is there. Contrasted by the warm grey-brown brick, offset by hanging baskets of pale and darker pink petunias, three silhouetted birds fly from a corner of the black metalwork, away, away.
And so we three leave the cafe and walk along Main Street, alive with cottage window boxes, passing the Tartan Arms on our left, and turn into Coal Wynd, a reminder of another aspect of Bannockburn’s past. But far from feeling industrial, we ascend a steepish hill with fields on one side and semi-detached houses on the other where coal miners and their families once lived. Some may still remain there. What we immediately notice is the friendliness of the current inhabitants, outside working in their gardens or talking across a fence to neighbours.
We stop, for that view, their view, oh, so breathtaking! A wide curvaceous panoply of layers. Top down the warm blue sky, a mattress of marshmallowy white cloud, the distant deeper cornflower blue of the Troassachs and Ochils. Next the dark forested slopes surrounding the distant Wallace Monument, a slither of golden cornfield, the grey slate roofs of Bannockburn thinly sandwiched between these, and the immediate green pasture beyond a hedge of blackberries still to ripen. It’s been worth the climb for this alone.
We wander onwards until the tarmac peters out into a lane of shale chippings, reminding us of the presence of coal seams buried deep below. It’s a bit of a dip down and we think of turning back, retracing our steps to Main Street then viewing the mill. But no, a taxi draws up outside the last of the houses. We think we’re blocking its way so decide to continue down the path between high hedgerows until further on we turn to see that the driver is picking up a passenger.
By this time though, we’re hooked, unsure where the path might lead us. For at its base we’re greeted by dense bushes of Himalayan Balsam, resplendent in pinks and whites, summertime blooms the shape of snapdragon flowers. We have arrived in an overgrown wonderland where nature has taken over from rough manmade scars of machinery and the sound of military feet marching to battle.
A wooden signpost directs us right, deep into this splendid wilderness, alight with a special magic, unseen elementals ever present. We could be in any era in history and yet we aren’t in history at all, it’s a place ‘other than’
Through the high, dense foliage we hear the trickle of the burn and following its sound come to a wooden bridge. We stand on it and look down at the flowing brown-green water passing beneath, the same water that has flowed all the way from the Touchadam Moor in the Touch Hills through Tinkers Loan, accompanying us on previous journeys, which also took us to Ladywell Park on the other side of Bannockburn via the Balquhidderock Wood. The natural cycle of whispering nature, always present.
The water is dappled with sunlight seeping through overhead, tangled tree branches, like goldfish coming to the surface. A leaf floats below the bridge, swept along by the gentle current. Beyond the bridge is a shallow waterfall, the burn flowing over a uniform, underwater slope, a mesmeric swish of moving water.
We continue along the path, still overgrown with Himalayan Balsam, overcome by its beauty and flanked also by Cow Parsley, Smokewood and nettles, and an army of Hogweed with giant leaves like those of rhubarb but far more dangerous to the touch. Gnarled ivy-clad trunks of ancient trees, oak, ash and alder, weave their curling, intertwining branches upwards, battling for the light within this resplendent untouched sanctuary. Amid them, a scattered kaleidoscope of colour appears: tiny specks of pink, green, blue and white like fragmented shiny jewels or pieces of a stained glass window, swathing the greenery. A vibrant, living tree of life.
The area broadens out into an openness of tall grasses, Buttercup, Thistle, Yarrow, Feverfew, Ragwort and Rose Bay Willow herb, all accompanying the rough path to Burnside Cottage, built of the same warm grey-brown stone of the village. Opposite, hidden away in dense undergrowth is the base of the old mill, beside the onward-flowing burn, now a ruin at this level, although its upper floor, approached from Main Street, is habitable.
Thus ends our unexpected detour into untouched, virgin land, all thanks to a taxi driver! Who would have guessed that Bannockburn, the village and stream of the same name, on the south side of Stirling, possessed such well-hidden treasures?
