We set off fairly sharp after breakfast and followed the road up and out of Drymen. It was a pleasure to leave the road behind and head onto the trails. There weren't many views at the start of the day; this one was pretty consistent throughout as I'm usually bringing up the rear.
We saw our first Scottish thistles and also caught our first glimpse of Loch Lomond.
There was more up and down than I remembered over the course of the day. Before long we had views of Conic Hill, the only real climb of the day. It was a stunning day for it, the sun was out, the skies were clear, just beautiful!
Reaching the top it appeared that a significant proportion of Glasgow had the same idea. I've never seen it so busy, although admittedly we've never been here in summer before!
Having stopped to admire the views we headed on towards Balmaha. The path builders have done a power of work! While the bags of boulders at the top lay in waiting, a wee bit further down they've been laid to form the impressive beginnings of a very durable path. Whatever your views on paths, this will certainly prevent further the erosion that this hill has been subject to over time.
It felt tougher going down towards Balmaha than it had coming up the other side. There were so many people slogging it out on the path up as we headed down. It was great to see so many families, kids with playing with sticks, their chat providing entertainment.
Lunch at Balmaha
We stopped at the coffee shop at Balmaha for lunch. This was a decent shout, hoaching with people and slower in service accordingly, but with decent prices and good coffee.
Suitably refreshed we set off on our way once more, stopping off at the statue of Tom Weir for a photo.
The shores of Loch Lomond were incredibly busy with lots of folks enjoying the sunshine on the water or on the sand. A paddle was almost tempting, but not quite tempting enough for the faff of taking off my trainers and socks.
Next Stop: Rowardennan
When you think about walking along the side of a loch you generally imagine it being flat. Think again. Initially it's pretty sedate but as you progress there are a lot more ups and downs to navigate.
Given the heat of the day this made it fun. We leapfrogged people we'd met over the course of the day, chatting with others as we passed our they passed us. One of these was a solo walker on a journey from Lands End to John O'Groats. His walk had started in May!
A highlight of this section was a swing hanging from a tree. While Bruce headed off to take a cracking picture of the jetty, I played on the swing hanging from a tree.
Onwards, we had a few more short, sharp ups and downs before finally reaching the down that led to the road. A few hundred metres along the road and we reached the Rowardennan Hotel. Not quite what it used to be in some regards (in need of some upgrading), the location is still stunning.
View from our bedroom window - if the window opened it would have been even better!
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