Childhood adventures on The Braes
Young people today enjoy designer clothes, computers, video games, jewellery, foreign holidays, cars and motorbikes.
But there’s something which today’s youth never had and which money cannot buy – a childhood on Paisley’s Gleniffer Braes.
During recent years, much of our beautiful Braes have been buried beneath vast new housing estates.
But cherished memories of their unspoiled landscapes linger on.
Come with me past the former Glenpatrick Carpet Works at Elderslie – now built over with houses – into the Land of the Eternally Young.
It’s a place where recollections of childhood’s friendlier landscapes remain evergreen.
Climbing past the factory’s longdemolished ‘op end’, our dream voyage leads along a wooded roadside ravine.
Here, the Brandy Burn cascades through what was Paisley poet Robert Tannahill’s Dusky Glen.
Mine of information
Derek Parker knew many of Paisley’s secrets — the grimy and the good.
He wandered every corner in search of the clues that would unlock Renfrewshire’s rich history.
These tales were shared with readers in his hugely popular Parker’s Way column.
We’ve opened our vault to handpick our favourites for you.
Beyond Glenpatrick House, once a 19th century distillery, we round a road bend and experience our first glimpse of the bracken-mantled Braes a few fields away.
Passing the Stone Bridge across the burn, we travel on.
Up past the Iron Bridge – now long lost during road widening – till we reach the Range House.
It was once occupied by Peter Straiton, warden at Foxbar Rifle Range on the wooded hillside.
It’s all private houses where once were fields as we cross Paisley Burgh boundary at Old Foxbar.
But, in our memories, Murray’s lime-washed cottage on Boor’s Brae and Baillie’s Foxbar Farm still dapple buttercup-bespangled meadows.
The peaceful Dippings burnside path on the left still exists in our imagination.
It leads past what was Foxbar Dam and Foxbar Bleach Works with its towering chimney stack.
A demolished tenement row was known as the Women’s Houses because factory girls from Ireland lived there.
Along Brediland Road, previously a tree-lined track, we emerge on Foxbar Road and see the Bonnie Wee Well.
Passing Durrockstock Dam and Stanely Dam, with its historic medieval castle, we climb a steep path past hen houses and a piggery.
Over there, is Macdonald’s Rest tearoom – named after poet Hugh Macdonald – on the heathery hillside.
Here we regale ourselves on tea and buttered scones high above the vast panorama of Paisley.
Today, most of these hallowed landmarks are long gone.
Yet, in our imaginations, they will always be part of our lives, those of us who enjoyed a childhood on The Braes.