Hillfoot Trails...

There is a signed motoring road route in East Lothian from Dunbar to Musselburgh called the Hillfoots trail that skirts the lower villages of the Lammermuir Hills. Easy to follow it`s quite a contrast to East Lothians Coastal roads.  Less known but often featured on here is the now little used old roads between the villages of Stenton, Garvald, Gifford and Pencaitland.  Some of these old roads are still tarmac and in use, some have long stopped being listed on modern day maps and have reverted to green roads, some were never tarmac surfaced to begin with. All can be found on old pre 1950`s OS maps,  usually marked as white roads.  Other tell tail signs today are `No Through Road` signs, like on the northern end of Becky`s Strip Byway at Whitekirk. Click on the  Old Roads label to read more posts on old roads...

Sunday i rode some of these old roads around Garvald to Gifford joining them with old Rights of Way and some recently created paths which would total just under a 50 mile loop...

From East Fortune it was south and up over Pencraig Hill to descend to cross the Tyne and another two `White roads`  south past Traprain Law...

The start was handlebar height and why i was riding the IGH Alfine hub KramPug today after recent experiances of the lack of mowing on trails, so no worries with mechs being clogged today!...
From the Standing stone down to the road it was strimmed!...

Climbers at Traprain...

Standing stone...

Down hill from Luggate and Whitingname and minor roads with grass centres in places along to Stoneypath Tower where the trail to Three bridges led to Garvald village...

Big load of bull...

Looks Dodgey on those bricks!..

Drove a yellow one of these with wide turf tyres at Gullane Golf Course when i was 16...

Garvald Church; Sundial dated 1633...

The `Jougs` were where wrong doers were clamped by their hands and mocked by the public...

Hobbit door...

From the village it was west and the old road up over Sled Hill to stop by the Royal Observer Corps Cold War Monitoring Post...

The bunker was trashed several years ago by Neds-hatch had been left open by last visitors...

Needs another bildge pump to be fitted to pump it dry...

Back track and riding west and a stop at the WW2 Home Guard `Flame Fourgasse` anti invasion defense tank at Carfrae...

There is another smaller one nearby at Danskine Brae...


Scary looking rain cloud over Redstone Rig, thankfully it stayed dry as i dropped down to Danskine and the trail down through Yester woods...

Was real muddy with recent rain here, but nice and cool in the woods...

Big old trees in Yester woods...

From Gifford Village it was down the old right of way to Bolton village, then minor roads and  the old right of way from Letham Holdings to Haddington...

Riverside  trail through Haddington and Aimsfield and a short climb up to Barney Mains and the descent on the Ridge Road to Athelstaneford via the old kirk road...

Last trail of the day where i met Tommy walking his dogs...

And a last pic, roadside mirror pics are more fun to try and get than selfies!...

Here is some film from some of today's ride, edited down from over 30 minutes film!, so skipped a lot of trails,
Song is `Never Never` by Korn...


Surly KramPug 29+; Hillfoot trails July 16 from coastkid71 on Vimeo.


More soon...