Fife Out and About is putting on a Come and Try session as part of Mountaineering Scotland's Club Month promotion. 

Circuit of the Lomond Hills - Sunday 15th August
A complete circuit of all four of the Lomond Hills (West Lomond, Bishop Hill, Munduff Hill and East Lomond). Full details are available on our walk programme page.
​Hope you can join us.

Our "The Binn: Sea to Summit" walk for the Kirkcaldy Walking Festival was a great success and even the weather was incredibly kind to us. On the run up to the day there were some heavy downpours and even thunder. However, on the day of the walk, despite a heavy downpour in some parts of south Fife in the morning, by the time we started the walk in Kinghorn it was pleasantly dry.
We started out the walk along the beach to Burntisland. Although we were 3 - 4 hours away from high tide, the tide line was quite high so we clambered up on to the old wall for the final couple of hundred metres into Burntisland. A lunch stop on the grass at Burntisland Links followed during which time we watched the shows starting up for the afternoon. Leaving the busy links behind we headed up to the Burntisland view point and then a bit of road walking to the top end of the town.
From here we were on to woodland paths for the ascent of the Binn. By now the sun was well and truly out and the temperature had risen. Once out of the woodland we were in for a short hot slog to the main ridge line where a welcome breeze awaited us. After the obligatory photo stop at the summit we headed back down the other side to the site of Binn Village. Dark clouds were now starting to gather so our leaders, Alison and Maureen, stepped up the pace for the easy walk to Kinghorn Loch. The walk around the loch was delightful even though there were a few muddy bits after all the rain. 
Our return to Kinghorn was in the dry, but about 10 - 15 mins later the heavens opened. How's that for timing?

This was our first year participating in the Kirkcaldy Walking Festival and we were delighted to have 14 people on the walk with someone even having travelled from Perth to join the walk.

​Kirkcaldy Walking Festival is an annual event organised by Greener Kirkcaldy. 

Fife Out and About are going to be participating in the Kirkcaldy Walking Festival this year. Members will be leading a free circular walk from Kinghorn to the summit of Burntisland Binn. The walk will take place on the 8th August. Full  information is available on our walk programme page https://fifeoutandabout.weebly.com/walk-programme.html or from the festival organisers Greener Kirkcaldy https://www.greenerkirkcaldy.org.uk/project/walking/. Great opportunity to come along and meet group members and find out more about us. 

Financial report for the year April 2020 to March 2021. 

Fife Out and About Walking Group was invited to send guests to a reception at Holyrood on Tuesday 28th January. The reception was organised by Scottish Mountain Rescue with assistance from Mountaineering Scotland and was titled "Delivering World Class Mountain Safety and Rescue". It was hosted by Liz Smith MSP.
​Four of our members were able to attend, although some of us were representing other organisations. We were entertained with a number  of speeches including one by the Chair of Scottish Mountain Rescue on what could only be described as an unusual rescue! After the speeches was the all important networking time and Dave T did us proud distributing our advertising cards to MSPs and other guests.

Members of the group were invited to review a copy of this new publication "Scotland's Mountain Landscapes : A Geomorphological Perspective" by Collin K Ballantyne, published by Dunedin Academic Press November 2019.

Chapters of the book then focus on

• The geological origins of the rocks and landmasses that form today’s Scotland
• The formation of Scotland’s pre-glacial landscape
• Effects of the ice age and glaciers
• Effects of frost and freezing on mountain summit areas
• Landslips / rockfalls
• River and water erosion and the impact of human activity on landforms

The final chapter is a tour though the landforms of some of the key areas in Scotland including Torridon, Trotternish Peninsula, Cullin Mountains. Glen Roy, Glencoe, the Cairngorms and even Tinto Hill.
The book makes understanding the shaping of the landscape accessible to the non-geologist with good explanations of concepts and processes. It is illustrated throughout with diagrams and a multitude of colour photographs. Frequent references are made to real life features and areas that will be familiar to the regular hill-goer thus bringing the subject to life.
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For more information and ordering see the Dunedin website.

 The group's Spring getaway was to the Isle of Harris this year (having been to the Uists and Barra over the past two years). What a trip it was!!!! It worked out cheaper to take a self catering property for a full week than to stay in a bunkhouse for a long weekend, so that's what we did. Our accommodation was the wonderful Bayhead property near Rodel. Although there were 8 of us staying in it, it was very spacious for us all (a big improvement on club huts!!).

We had a full week of walks which went something like this:
Saturday - short walk at the Fairy Glen, Uig on Skye whilst waiting for the ferry
Sunday - Part of the Hebridean Way at Scarista. The return was meant to be on a path marked on the core path map but the path didn't actually exist!
Monday - Isle of Scalpay for moorland and coastal walking out to the Eilean Glas Lighthouse
Tuesday - Fantastic day weather-wise so it was off to the sea-side at Luskentyre Beach for a walk out on the sands.
Wednesday - A bit wet with low cloud so we opted to head up An Cliseam the highest hill in the Outer Hebrides. You expect a hill to be wet and cold with no views, so it was a good use of the day!!!
Thursday - 4 of us had a day trip out to St Kilda with Sea Harris. Absolutely amazing experience! Bit of a rough crossing though.
Friday - Short walk to the Eagle Observatory but didn't spot any eagles. Some of the group had to leave on the afternoon ferry.
Saturday - ferry home for the remainder of the group

​Isle of Lewis next year?
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Well it was 3rd time lucky with the Pentlands Two Cairns walk. We turned back on our 1st attempt due to high winds and our 2nd attempt never even saw us cross to the south of the Forth (we ended up at Blairadam the weather was so bad). Fortunately this time we were blessed with a cold, dry, breezy day, though recent snow melt meant that the underfoot conditions were soggy to say the least. 
We started from Harperrigg Reservoir and headed round the reservoir and then up the Thief's Road (now called the Cross Borders Drove Route) to East Cairn the highest summit in Edinburgh. At 567m its is also one of the highest of the Pentland tops. Amazing cairn structure at the "not quite the summit" which gave us some shelter from the cold north wind. The actual summit of East Cairn was exceptionally unremarkable with not so much as a pile of stones! We then headed across to West Cairn, the highest summit in West Lothian. It's summit was crowned with a cairn and a trig point. Off path descent off the hill and across tussocky moorland back to Harperrigg.