GGTBod
Bod



Registered: 11/19/10
Posts: 2,191
Loc: 55 degrees north England
Last seen: 1 day, 16 hours
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Wilderness Wild Camping, 2 Brothers, 3 days Torrential Rain and Totally Amazing! [This is Scotland]
#26870802 - 08/08/20 11:37 PM (3 years, 5 months ago) |
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Wild camping in Scotland, the river next to camp had risen every-time we looked and the rain just kept on pouring, we knew at some point the rising water would cut off our only route out of the valley.
On this trip we are just using tarps, bivvi bags and bug nets for shelter, we spoil ourselves rotten with some serious good cooking, take in some stunning Scottish scenery and get very, very wet as the local insects enjoy our tender southern flesh, we even get to do a bit of hobo bushcrafting (my favourite kind) where you re-purpose trash into something useful, in this case to help transform one of our tarp shelters for better weather defence.


We are in the Galloway Dark Sky Park on the Shores of Loch Trool in South Western Scotland, near to where King Robert the Bruce and his men defeated the English knights with sticks and stones before chasing them on foot back to Carlisle Castle some 100+ mile away, known to history as The Battle of Glen Trool in the year 1307.
After his defeat at the Battle of Methven and subsequently, at the Battle of Dalrigh in the summer of 1306 the recently crowned King Robert was little better than a fugitive, disappearing altogether from the historical record for a number of months. It wasn't until the spring of 1307 that he made a reappearance, landing in the south-west of Scotland with soldiers recruited, for the most part, from the Western Isles, the countryside itself was well known to Bruce, and there were plenty of remote and difficult areas to allow cover and protection for his band of guerillas.
This was a difficult position to approach, for the loch takes up much of the glen, with only a narrow track bordered by a steep slope. Near the middle, the hill pushes forward in a precipitous abutment. The English sent a raiding party ahead, of unknown size, perhaps hoping to catch the enemy off-guard in much the same fashion as at Methven. This time, however, King Robert made effective use of the terrain. King Robert sent some of his men up the slope with orders to loosen with levers and crow-bars as many of the detached blocks of granite as they could.
As the English approached up the "Steps of Trool", they were forced to proceed single file. King Robert observed their progress from across the loch and, at a given signal, his men pushed the wall of boulders down the slope. The narrowness of the path prevented support from either the front or the rear. Without room to manoeuvre, many of the English below were killed, and the rest withdrew. King Robert not only survived but went on the following month to win his first important engagement at the Battle of Loudoun Hill.
We are camped right at the bottom of the Steps of Trool, an amazing place.
How did all that water make you feel?
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