Energise yourself at Scotland’s answer to Niagara Falls with a wander along the mighty River Clyde, says
Fergal MacErlean
The falls include two breathtaking cataracts – the largest in Britain by volume. This legacy of glacial drainage has created the three-stepped falls of 25m-high Corra Linn and the 10m-high Bonnington Linn. In spate, the roar and churned peaty colour of the river as it thunders over these falls is humbling. There are two more waterfalls, or ‘linns’, at the Falls of Clyde: Dundaff Linn and Stonebyres Linn.
MILL MOVEMENTS
In late summer, dense foliage forms a captivating scene on the steep descent from the car park (easily reached from Glasgow and Edinburgh) into the valley, where you will find the World Heritage Site of New Lanark – a marvellously restored 18th-century cottonmill village. In 1799, Robert Owen became the mill manager. He abolished child labour and beatings, and provided decent homes, free healthcare and affordable food for the inhabitants – changes that sparked the co-operative and trade unionist movements.
WILD WOODS
Upstream from the mill by Dundaff Linn is the Falls visitor centre, where an observation window looks out on dippers, goosanders and kingfishers.
A riverside path leads into the reserve – part of the Clyde Valley Woodlands National Nature Reserve – where woods of oak, ash, rowan and hazel form the oldest and most wildlife-rich forest in Scotland.
At Corra Linn, a viewing platform, dating to 1708, would have been visited by the great landscape painter JMW Turner, who captured the falls imbued with swirling mist and diffused light. William Wordsworth also paid homage to “the Clyde’s most majestic daughter”.
After an absence of 200 years, peregrines returned to the reserve in 1997 to breed and remained until 2016, when it’s believed they succumbed to old age. These swiftest of birds may still be sighted here and it is hoped they’ll return to nest soon. Cuckoos and jays call through the woods, and you may see grasshopper warblers, tree pipits and sparrowhawks.
If you continue climbing on the path for 1.5 miles, you’ll reach a weir upstream of the mesmerising Bonnington Linn, where you can stand directly above the surging Clyde.
Falls of Clyde Wildlife Reserve