Tuesday 30 April - Turner Cleuch Law, The Wiss and Law Kneis

There was uncertainty in my plan as to the logistics for Turner Cleuch Law and The Wiss. They sit within a short distance of each other, either side of a B-road, but without any Bertie-sized parking nearby. It was only last night that the obvious solution, that somehow I had overlooked, came to me: to use my bike.

The bike route started 3 miles out of shot. 

Turner Cleuch Law (NT287204; 551m)
Cycling on roads, particularly those of a friendly gradient, is so much easier than cycling forest tracks, so it didn't take much effort to get me from the parking area to the south of Cacra Hill to the cattle grid to the south of Turner Cleuch Law. There I left my wheels and attacked the hill head-on. It was a touch on the steep side, but height was quickly gained and, thanks to a vague ATV track, not too much heather-bashing and tussock-hopping was required.

A whole world of green and beige lumps and bumps as seen from the top of Turner Cleuch Law. Lovely!

I clung to the fence (not literally!) on the way down, rather than following the ATV line. That was steeper still, but it got me back to my bike efficiently.
(1.3 miles, 230m)

The Wiss (NT264206; 589m)
Another mile and a half on the bike took me up to the top of the road and along a forest track to a point, at a junction of tracks, where the 1:25k map suggested that a fire break would lead me up and out of the forest.

Easy going at the bottom of the fire break

There were some 'interesting' bits further up, but I didn't snap them

I didn't quite follow the break to its conclusion, as I could see a blow-down that looked to be blocking the way ahead, whereas I had found two rows of trees that looked to be sufficiently free of low branches to allow me through the remaining short distance of forest. It proved to be an easy way out, and going by the footprints at the point where I had to detour around a blow-down, I'm not the first to go that way. The only slight concern as I pushed past the one branch blocking the exit was being able to find the exact right point to re-enter the trees.

Based on past experience of bashing through commercial plantations in a state of panic that I'll never locate the break I used on my way up, I knew that it was important that I re-entered the trees at this exact point on my way back. I spent a few moments memorising everything that looked like a significant detail in this scene. And, as a fall-back, I took this snap.

The going once out of the forest was a tussock-fest with some heather thrown in for good measure, but it wasn't too big a yomp before I was standing beside the battered trig point:

Even though on my return approach to the forest I had before me what looked like an identical line of trees, I managed to hit the exact right re-entry point. Phew!

Back at my bike, it was a speedy ride back down to Bertie (well, by my non-cyclist standards).

(1.3 miles walked with 200m up; the total bike ride for both hills came in at 8.8 miles)

(Cacra Hill
Whilst I was off up those hills, Mick needed something to entertain himself, and with the limited options available from where Bertie was parked, he took the same route as I did yesterday, up Cacra Hill. No summit selfie to share - he forgot to take any photos.)

Law Kneis (NT292130; 498m)

This afternoon Bertie was relocated to the car park on the west side of Law Kneis. At some point in the past a series of marked forest trails was installed here, along with this car park with 10 spaces. It's now a sorry place; the car park has an abandoned look, the footbridge is decaying, there is no information as to the nature/length/location of the trails, and the waymarks on the other side of the bridge have faded to illegibility. Meanwhile (and quite probably unrelated), a series of new tracks has been constructed through the forest, involving a vehicle bridge only about 30m away.

At 3pm I declared that if this hill was going to take us a couple of hours, and if we were going to do it before tea, we ought to get on with it. Mick initially looked unconvinced that he wanted to set off up a hill at this time of day, or indeed that he wanted to go up this hill at all, but he soon had his walking gear back on.

The directions I'd gleaned from logs on hill-bagging.co.uk worked a treat. The track takes a lengthy route through the forest, but by leaving it at White Sike, we were able to cut that loop and yomp our way alongside the burn, to the upper track. As with this morning's first hill, we couldn't help but think we had timed this one right: the bracken (and other greenery) is sprouting and soon the going will be much harder than the 'bit rough' we had today.

We popped out on a track that looked so new that I could have believed that it had been laid today (I forecast some harvesting about to happen), but that only lasted for another 100m or so, where it abruptly became an old semi-grassed-over track.

It led us gently downhill (always unfortunate when you're trying to ascend something) until, just after Gatescleuch Sike, we located the break in the trees where an old (now partially rotted away, the rest on its way there) fence can be followed out of the trees and up to the summit.

Nice and open at the bottom of the break

Not quite so open further up, but still easy enough, even if it was a lot steeper than it looks in this snap.

Mick surveys the surroundings whilst I investigate various tussocks in an attempt to find the highest point.

Getting down was a retracing of our steps and as we made the final approach to Bertie, Mick (who ordinarily wouldn't join me on a hill like this one - he's not a hill-bagger and only usually goes up those that he thinks have some merit) opined that it was an interesting walk up and down but that the top was pointless. I don't think he meant that it was flat and lacking an apex...

(3.3 miles, 315m)