We stocked up with bottles of water and tablet and began our walk from Rob Roys Grave at Balquhidder Kirk. The first part of the walk was a fairly gentle but steady climb into the foot hills along an easy well defined forest road, but a few drinks for TB the night before and a pathetic 3 hours sleep for me had us both looking alarmingly knackered - luckily the dogs dragged us up the hill, strong wee beasts that they are. The road levelled out and were able to enjoy the scenery as we strolled along the glen, while TB tried to teach me how to control her
boisterous terriers - I was finding that more physically demanding than the walk by this stage. After about an hour we had covered the first 2 miles or so of the walk and, about to part company with the road, we were at the bottom of a scramble up through the heather (blooming purple and looking decidely photogenic, although I just didn't do it justice with the S3).A handy bench allowed us to stop and let the dogs rest (ahem). We had a drink and the tablet while they "rested" by running around and begging sweets off us. Off we set again up the steep rocky path through the heather,
stopping to put the dogs on leashes when we got to sheep territory. Hangovers and sleepiness were behind us now (isn't fresh air wonderous) but the path was hard going and called for regular rests. Eventually we came to a rickity wee stile and had the pleasure of lifting 2 three stone english bull terriers over the fence - hefty! Just beyond the style the ground became open and we had the choice of various sheep paths up around a rocky knoll. This was easily the toughest part and at one point I was hoping TB would consider it too tough and say that she had had enough. Not a chance - unfortunately she was looking a bit too fresh and I had to just soldier on. But it was worth it. Cresting the hill I was looking back at where we had come from when I noticed TB had gone quiet - she was waiting for me to notice Irishmans Loch, right in front of me - "Wow" was about all I could rasp out as I tried to avoid the coronory. The most placid looking sizable tarn stood on front of me, the reflection of an enormous rocky stack mirroring off it. Looking up at the stack we both saw an incredibly huge bird wheeling round - my suspicion is that it was a sea eagle, and the wind dropped to nothing as we stood in the lea of the stack. Fish rose to ripple the surface 
and the dogs decided it was swimming time. What an idyllic spot! We sat and rested by the bank of the lochan, and snapped some pics of the dogs playing in the water. What fun they had, wading about, coming over and shaking themselves next to us or trying to sit on us with their wet fur.We had a stroll about the summit and all the way around the lochan spotting various great angles for photography and I wished I had my tripod. An HDR of the cliff face would have been superb. 3 hours since we had left Rob Roy, we headed back down, past a boulder the size of a house that had fallen out of the stack - we could see the gap where it had once hung and eventually joined up with the path we had taken up.
This was a superb walk, about 5 miles and it took us 5 hours of ambling, togging and picnicking. Beautiful. To make it even better we discovered a fantastic pub - the Rob Roy Inn, where we had an interesting chat with a couple of shepherds over some surprisingly sophisticated but cheap food. That was it, I had the walking bug again!
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