A walk that’s hard to beat -

The B&B was a short walk from Milngavie station and the walk itself starts from the centre of the village.

We dropped our back packs off at the van which we had a little trouble finding as the directions we received were not particularly clear. That was a minor negative for Easyways , who were very good on the whole, with the only other one being that they failed to provide the waterproof trail map that was supposed to be waiting for us at the B&B.

Thankfully we had bought one at the Glasgow tourist office the day before. I would not have wanted to have been without it. While the path is fairly well marked (we got lost only once) there are no distance markers along the way and the map also points out places of interest.

The first day ( 19km) the WHW wandered through farmland and past the Glencoigne distillery. Despite the relatively early hour I decided a visit and a tasting was essential and

I also tucked a little bottle into my daypack to take back to my father who was unwell but always enjoyed a good whisky.

We passed through a couple of little villages before ending the day at the Drymen Inn where we met up with some family for a fine meal.

These family members joined us for the first half of the next day as we set off through forest (that was where we got lost briefly as there was some logging taking place and the path was not very obvious) and then wound our way up the 360m high Conic Hill.

From the top there was a stunning view to the south across Loch Lomond. After heading down the far side we had lunch at Balmaha and farewelled our friends.

From here we enjoyed a 15km leg along well formed paths by the sparkling loch passing many families out soaking up the brilliant Easter weather with picnics and, believe it or not, sunbathing!

The Rowarden Hotel (built in 1696), where we stayed that night, has no road access with only walkers and boaties able to get there. It was charming place to stop, eating dinner in their beer garden gazing out over the Loch as the sun set.

When we left the next morning we encountered a couple of Americans who had been at the Milngavie B&B a couple of nights earlier and they asked us if we were looking forward to the toughest day of the WHW.

We weren’t sure whether they were serious or not as the map told us that we would spend 18km continuing along the shore of Loch Lomond before a final few kms heading up a valley to our accommodation at Beinglas Farm. Well, it turned out they were correct.

This was not a gentle stroll along the lake shore like the previous day but a scramble over rocks and tree root up and down a series of hills and valley.

We were rewarded with wonderful scenery and some quaint isolated little farms along with lunch and a drink next to a pretty waterfall at the Inversnaid Hotel.

We also stopped at Rob Roy’s cave, the one where he saw a spider continue to spin its web again and again each time it was destroyed, with this inspiring him to persist with his efforts to free Scotland from the dastardly English. Or at least, we think stopped at his cave; there were quite a few and it wasn’t entirely clear which was the famous one .....

Day four was an easier 20km which was fortunate as we had our few wet hours. It was very scenic again with the path at one point joining the old cobbled military road built in the 1750s to help the English control the rebellious highlands.

The Tyndrum Inn was our stop for the night and we were definitely back in civilization as the train line and the main road to the highlands passes through here.

In contrast to day four, day five was long, 35km through to the old Kingshouse Hotel, also built in the 1750s as accommodation for the road builders and as a way point on the journey to Fort William.

We were truly in the highlands by then passing through several valleys and by a few lochs with skifields off to our west. We stopped at a cairn built in honour of Ian Fleming, the author of the James Bond books, who had a family estate nearby and