Lowther Hills

View looking north into the Dalveen Pass from Capel Hill in the Durisdeer Hills with Steygail on the left, Lowther Hill left of centre and Cold Moss right of centre, Upper Dalveen House in the valley catching sunlight, Southern Uplands of Scotland.

Lowther Hills

The Lowther hills is a general name for an extensive area of hill country in the Southern Uplands of Scotland, though some sub ranges of hills in this area go under their own local names - see "Hill Walking" below. They form a roughly rhomboidal or lozenge shape on the map with the acute angles being to north and south. It has river valleys along it's boundaries to north east (Clydesdale) and south west (Nithsdale) which carry the two largest arterial routes northwards into the west side of the Central Belt of Scotland. A string of small towns have long since developed along these routes. Most of the Lowther Hills lie in the Administrative Region of Dumfries and Galloway, though part of South Lanarkshire (in the Administrative Region of Strathclyde) eats into them around the village of Leadhills and the Daer Reservoir.

North East and South West Boundaries

It is some 30 kilometers across the rhomboid as the crow flies from the town of Sanquhar just to the west of the Lowthers to the towns of Beattock and Moffat on the east and some 28 kilometers from the town of Thornhill near the southern apex to Abington near the northern one. Sanquhar and Thornhill lie on the River Nith, Moffat on the River Annan and Abington on the River Clyde. Annandale and Clydesdale taken together, form a corridor between the Lowther Hills and the Moffat Hills (which lie to the east.). This corridor between the hills carries the main route running northwards into Scotland on it's west side. It carries both the west coast railway line and the M74 motorway and has been the main route north over centuries. Nithsdale carries the A76 road and the rail line from Dumfries to Kilmarnock.

View into the Dalveen Pass (looking South) from Cold Moss in the Lowther Hills, Upper Dalveen House right foreground, Southern Uplands of Scotland.

North West and South East Boundaries

The north west boundary of the hills runs up the Crawick Water in a north easterly direction from where the Crawick Water runs into the River Nith. This boundary follows the B740 road through Crawfordjohn and connects to the old trunk road north which was used before the M74 was built on it's present route. North of the B740 the hills gradually fizzle out into the Central Lowlands of Scotland though Tinto Hill (707 meters high) is an outlier 11 kilometers north of Abington. The south east boundary of the hills is formed by the Forest of Ae which is one of the largest forests , in Britain at 10,000 hectares. A continuous band of trees runs, again in an north easterly direction, from Auldgirth on the River Nith (9 kilometers south of Thornhill), for some 26 kilometers till it meets the M74 motorway 10 kilometers north of Beattock. South of the Forest you are into the plain that surrounds the town of Dumfries.

Hill Passes

Heading north on the ancient bridle path to the Enterkin Pass with Lowther Hill on left edge, Pettylung (Durisdeer Hills) on right and the Dalveen Pass between them. Southern Uplands of Scotland.

Today, three passes run in a north easterly direction diagonally through this hill area linking the A76 trunk road to the M74 motorway. The most southerly and longest is the Dalveen Pass which runs from Carronbridge on the A76 just north of Thornhill to Elvanfoot near the M74. This carries the A702 trunk road and passes near the historic village of Durisdeer en route. It reaches a height of 350 meters at the top of the pass.

Roman Fortlet from Durisdeer Rig - Southern Uplands of Scotland.

Next we have the Mennock Pass (B797 road) which runs from the small village of Mennock on the A76 to Abington near the M74. It passes through the villages of Wanlockhead and Leadhills. From Leadhills you can pick up the B7040 which will take you to Elvanfoot. The B797 gets to a height of 468 meters as it leaves Wanlockhead - which is the highest village in Scotland.

The most northerly of the three passes is the Crawick Pass (B797) from Crawick to Crawfordjohn and thence to the M74. The Crawick is the shortest and least spectacular of the three passes without the steep ascents and overarching hills that you expect in a mountain pass and which are characteristic of the other two passes. It is nevertheless a very pleasant road to travel and it reaches a height of 288 meters.

There was another pass from Durisdeer through to Wanlockhead called the Enterkin Pass which was an old pack horse route through the hills from Dumfries to Glasgow. There is no road through there now though there now but it offers the walker an easy track into the centre of the hills. The Enterkin Pass was also the scene where in 1684 Covenanters ambushed a party of Dragoons during the Killing Time

The Romans also built a road through from their fortlet near Durisdeer on a route which (as you would expect of the Romans) takes a more direct route to the head of the pass than is offered by the A702. Again this route is a useful access to the hills for the walker.

Durisdeer and it's church

Durisdeer Hills from the A702. Durisdeer Village nestles into the foot of the glen in the middle of the picture and the Roman fortlet is at the foot of the glen just beyond the village. The hill catching the sunlight is Penbane with Well Hill beyond it also in sunlight, Black Hill is to the left and Durisdeer Hill to the right with it's shoulder Durisdeer Rig running towards us. Durisdeer Hills Southern Uplands of Scotland.

As you can see in the picture on the right, the village of Durisdeer sits at some distance from the A702 in a spectacular setting nestling tightly into the foot of Durisdeer Hill at the bottom of the pass through the hills that the Romans used. The Duke of Buccleuch, the largest private landowner in Britain owns much of the land for many miles around this area and has a castle at Drumlanrig on the west bank of the River Nith some 5 kilometers north of Thornhill. In the church at Durisdeer there is a mausoleum to the first Duke of Buccleuch complete with marble statues of him and his wife Mary dating from 1713 though there has been a church on this site since medieval times. A good time to visit is on a Sunday afternoon when the ladies do excellent traditional home made "teas" in the church hall - plates of sandwiches and home made cakes sold in aid of church funds.

Source of the Clyde

Source of the River Clyde (on the left of the picture) where the Daer Water (coming in from the top right) meets the Potrail Water (coming in from the midlle of the right side), The A702 and Glenochar Farmhouse are in the foreground. Glenochar Bastle and Fermtoun are just out of the picture on the bottom right. Southern Uplands of Scotland.

As you approach Elvanfoot on the A702 you come to what seems like an insignificant farmhouse by the roadside called Glenochar. But there are actually two things of interest close by here. Just to the north, there is Glenochar Bastle and Fermtoun a 17th century settlement and fortified house. The archaeological dig which revealed this was the winner of the 1997 Pitt Rivers Award for amateur Archaeologists. Also, just to the south is the source of the River Clyde which flows north through Lanarkshire and passes through the City of Glasgow. There is a saying that "The Clyde made Glasgow and Glasgow made the Clyde" - they had to deepen the bed of the river to allow Glasgow to become the great ship building centre and industrial centre it was in the early 20th century. Where the Daer and Potrail Waters meet the River Clyde is born. The Daer Water has it's head waters near Queensberry Hill and it flows through Daer Reservoir before it meets the Potrail. The head waters of the Potrail are on the north east side of Durisdeer Hill.

God's Treasure House in Scotland

You might wonder why anyone in their right mind would build two villages nearly 500 meters up in a desolate hillside in the Southern Uplands of Scotland. However this area became known as "God's Treasure House in Scotland" because of the rich variety of minerals to be found here - especially some of the world's gold purest gold (22.8 carats) which was used in the manufacture of the Scottish Crown Jewels - dating from the 15th and 16th centuries. The name "Leadhills" testifies to the fact that this was also a lead mining area and there is a Lead Mining Museum in Wanlockhead. Leadhills had the oldest subscription library in the UK and was the birth place of the 18th century poet Allan Ramsay whose son, also Allan Ramsay was the leading portrait painter in Britain in the mid 18th century. There is also the Leadhills & Wanlockhead Railway that you can have a run on here in the summertime.

Hill Walking

Although we have so far here followed the Ordnance Survey's naming of this whole range of hills as the Lowther Hills, in fact for the hill walker the Lowther Hills would be taken to mean the string of tops lying between the Dalveen Pass and the Mennock Pass and running south eastward from near Elvanfoot over Lousie Wood Hill (618 Mts), White Law (596 Mts), Dun Law (677 Mts), Dungrain Law (669 Mts), Peden Head, Green Lowther (732 Mts), Lowther Hill (725 Mts), East Mount Lowther (631 Mts), Thirstane Hill (583 Mts) and the shapely Steygail (573 Mts) which dominates the steepest part of the Dalveen Pass on it's northern side. Green Lowther is the highest hill in the whole Lowther Hills area, described earlier, and like Lowther Hill it has the weird and wonderful architecture of a Civil Aviation Authority's aircraft tracking station on top of it. The huge white ball on the top of Lowther Hill can be seen from many miles away in all directions. The Southern Upland Way passes over the top of Lowther Hill. and there many fine walks around these hills. The Durisdeer Hills lie to the south east of the Dalveen Pass, they offer splendid views into the Dalveen Pass and to the Lowther Hills beyond and for hill walkers they merge into the Queensberry Hills which lie between them and the Forest of Ae. Mitchellslacks, on the northern edge of the Forest Ae, and from where you would access Queensberry Hill, along with nearby Locherben, were the homes of the Harknesses involved in the Covenanter ambush.

Lowther Hills from Scaw'd Law in the Durisdeer Hills. Lowther Hill (with ball on top) left of the ridge and Cold Moss in front of it, Green Lowther middle of the picture (also with masts on top), Dun Law one third in from right and Lousie Wood Law on right. Well Hill is the very prominent hill running across the picture much nearer to us and the Roman road also runs across the picture below Well Hill. The Roman road meets the A702 beyond Well Hill on the right of the picture. Potrail Water (one of the principal sources of the River Clyde) rises from little burns running out of the glen leading down from Scaw'd Law in the immediate foreground. The Southern Uplands of Scotland.

Further Reading

• Andrew K.M. and Thrippleton A.A. (1972) The Southern Uplands. The Scottish Mountaineering Trust sbn 901516 57 0
• Turnbull, Ronald (1999) Walking the Lowther Hills. Cicerone Press Cumbria ISBN 1 85284 275 X
• Marsh, Terry (1988) On Foot in Southern Scotland. Devon: A David and Charles Book ISBN 0 7153 0161 8
• Williams, David (1989) A Guide to the Southern Upland Way. London: A Constable Guide ISBN 0 09 467910 X
• Prentice, Tom (1995) 25 Walks - Dumfries and Galloway Edinburgh HMSO ISBN 0 11 495217 5

External Links

• Walking routes in the Lowther Hills