Melrose to Edinburgh Day Two (Traquair-West Linton)

Early rise on Friday 01st March after a cold night in the tents and interesting body odour from under the arms although I can't blame the wife as we had seperate tents.  She, as always smells of roses due to her odourless merino top.  A quick brew, pack up and on the road walk towards Cardrona which looks big enough on the map to have more than the 3 houses and a phone box in the beautiful village of Traquair.  Not a huge fan of walking on the road, especially the type where people fly round blind bends however we cover the 3 miles to Cardrona and are greeted by houses and a small play park but no sign of any shops however just when we thought the nearest pit stop was going to be Peebles we turn right at a sign post for Cardrona Village and just on the left, at the roundabout is a lovely village store.

If you go into the store, apart from being able to get plenty of supplies and a lovely bacon/sausage roll and a cup of tea/coffee you will be able to meet Linda the owner who was a lovely lady that looked after us well.  Linda also gave us a bit of info about the local area.  She told us the path and bridge were just about complete and she was expecting the path to get a bit busy with cyclist and walkers in the future.  We set off from Cardrona along the freshly laid path making one little detour onto the golf course to avoid the workmen laying the tarmac.  The next 7 to 8 miles is mainly flat and follows the banks of the Tweed but be careful just after the odourless, merino sewage works there is a path leading up to the road and if you don't take it you are met by someone's garden gate which is triple padlocked with a sign saying no walkers.  If you jump it and run really quick the chap is not fast enough to catch you.  On the other side of his garden is a field which leads you into the start of Peebles where you are greeted by rugby pitches and sports fields.  We stopped in Peebles for a short time and were lucky enough to see the golden postbox in honour of Olympic showjumping winner Scott Brash.

We left Peebles, heading out past the Rosetta camp site and follow the old drove road signs for West Linton.  This takes you along the east side of Hamilton hill.  We took a bit of a detour at this point to save a little time and dropped down west to the kidston burn and followed the path next to the wall to the east of white meldon, rounding the hill before dropping down to the car park at harehope forest.  The was plenty of wildlife on the walk with loads on white meldon.  Hares, birds and I got a bit peckish so ate a sheep and all that was left is shown below.

For fear of a law suit I'd like to point out I was only joking and in fact found the skull laying on the hill.  From the car park follow the forest track to upper stewarton farm and then back into the forest which is clearly marked with posts as the drove road to West Linton. 

We stopped for lunch when we came out of the forest onto a landrover track overlooking an old farmhouse that was only housing sheep now. The path falls down to a river and again it is well sign posted to work your way up the side of the hill before snaking your way through the hills with some stunning scenery.

 

 

A long stretch through the hills before dropping down to Romanno Bridge.  At this point it should be a short road walk to a track leading into West Linton however we were unable to find the track however hard we tried.  The traffic hurtles along this road as well so take care.  Disappointingly we had to take the last two and a half miles by road into West Linton which played havoc with the aching feet.  We arrived in West Linton where we booked into the Gordon Arms Hotel for a well earned meal, shower and bed for the night.

The hotel charges for B and B and a twin room cost us £75.  The food was outstanding and very reasonably priced.  The only misfortune we had was that a stag night was on which we heard in our room until at least midnight.  Again the food in the morning was excellent and the path for the start of the next day is directly opposite the hotel.