Falkland and East Lomond (Falkland Hill)
Climb from a Royal Burgh to a hilltop viewpoint
Google Maps Open Source Maps| Statistics and Files | ||
|---|---|---|
| Start: Falkland | Distance: 4.8 miles (7.7 km) | Climbing: 398 metres |
| Grid Ref: NO 25434 07455 | Time: 3 hours | Rating: Hard |
| GPX Route File | Google Earth File | About Falkland |
| Statistics | |
|---|---|
| Start: Falkland | Distance: 4.8 miles (7.7 km) |
| Climbing: 398 metres | Grid Ref: NO 25434 07455 |
| Time: 3 hours | Rating: Hard |
| GPX Route File | Google Earth File |
Ordnance Survey Explorer Map (1:25,000)
The Walk: Falkland, on the lower slopes of the Lomond Hills and the edge of the green and fertile Howe of Fife, has had a chequered history. It was a fortified site before the 12th century, and by the mid 15th century had become the playground of the Stuart kings, who rode out hawking with hooded falcons or hunted wild boar. By the end of the 1700's Falkland Palace, once a magnificent hunting lodge, was in ruins. Thomas Carlyle described it as "a black old bit of coffin or protrusion shin bone sticking through the soil of a dead past". It was restored by John Crichton Stuart, 3rd Marquess of Bute, who acquired the keepership in 1887.
Gate to Falkland Palace
Falkland Town Hall
The castle was first adopted as a royal residence by James II in 1458, and the settlement around it evolved into a small and elegant market town. From it, the walk heads through beech and conifer woods, to open heather moorland, managed for red grouse. Curlews, wheatears, meadow pipits, chaffinches and skylarks share the hills with the gamebirds.
The rock of the Lomond Hills, over 350 million years old, rise to twin volcanic peaks. The brow of East Lomond (Falkland Hill) at 1,424 feet (434 metres) above sea level, affords one of the finest views in Scotland.
The Grampian Hills fill the north-west horizon, and 54 miles to the west, Ben Lomond rises to a height of 3,194 feet (974 metres). To the east is the expanse of the North Sea, where the lighthouses on Bell Rock and the Isle of May are clearly visible. The Firth of Forth and the Lothian shore lie to the south.
You descend steeply through huge tracts of swaying red grass. To your left, just off the main track, are 19th century limekilns, relics of the Industrial Revolution. Stone was crushed in them and heated to make lime for mortar and for spreading on the land to increase its fertility.
East Lomond
View to Falkland from East Lomond
A lane leads back into the town. In Falkland Square, the tall building on your right is Cameron House, the birthplace of Richard Cameron, the 'Lion of the Covenant'. Born in 1648, he joined the Covenanter's, and was killed in 1680, fighting to overthrow Charles II.
The Gothic church was built in 1849-50 by the Keeper of the Palace at that time, Onesiphorus Tyndall Bruce, whose impressive bronze statue stands in the grounds. Another of his bequests, the handsome Bruce Fountain in front of the church, bears four heraldic lions displaying the Bruce coat of arms and the burgh crest.
Greatly enlarged during the reign of James IV, the palace was transformed by James V during the preparation for his marriages to Madeleine, daughter of Francis I of France, who survived a mere two months of the Scottish climate, and, within a year, to her successor, Marie de Guise.
The Kings Room is where James V died, shortly after hearing the news of the birth of his sole heir - Mary, Queen of Scots. He turned his face to the wall, uttering a poignant prophesy on the Stuart monarchy; "It cam wi a'lass, it will gang wi a'lass". The prophesy proved true, if a little premature; the line ended not with Mary but around 170 years later, in 1714 with the death of Queen Anne.
Acknowledgments: Text derived from the Out and Out Series; Discovering the Countryside on Foot. Pictures courtesy of Wikipedia.
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