Gailes Marshes

After a failed attempt to find the cache hidden at the Fullerton Arches (aka the Bailey Bridge) in Irvine I headed down to the Gailes Marshes. There are two caches located there and I was one a mission to find them.

First up was Explore Gailes Marsh – Golfer’s Meadow and I parked next to a level crossing which leads to Western Gailes Golf Course clubhouse. The Gailes railway station used to be located here until 1967 but today there is little trace of it. The crossing made the headlines in 2007 when a Ford Transit van was hit by a commuter train killing the driver.

To get to the cache from here, involved crossing the golf course. Luckily there was no one around today so there  was no-one to annoy. I soon reached the cache location and when the GPS told me I was there I looked around and spotted the hiding place right way.

The second cache Explore Gailes Marsh – Not Expensive, it’s Deer is located at the other end of the marshes. My first attempt to get to it was thwarted by mud (well it is a marsh after all) so I took an alternative route and was soon back on track. Picking my way around muddy lagoons and frozen puddles I reached the place my GPS was showning and again after a quick look around I found the cache without difficulty.

At the turn off which leads down to the marshes, there is an old derelict farm house. It looks like this was once quite a prosperous farm and there are a large range of other farm buildings around it. Today it's totally empty and quite spooky.

Just across from the farmhouse I met some new friends. The marshes are currently home to some beautiful horses and when I went over to take some photos they all came over to say hello. I'm not the best with horses, in fact I'm usually terrified of them, but today I actually managed to give one of them a pat on the nose.

Drukken Steps

Robert Burns lived and worked in Irvine in 1781-1782. During this time he worked in a Heckling Shop on the Glasgow Vennel (in Irvine Town centre) dressing flax. This involved removing the straw from the fibres, with heckling being the final and most important stage in the process where the fibres would be pulled through heckle combs to split and polish them. Burns lived at number 4 on the Glasgow Vennel and in his time in Irvine formed a friendship with a Captain Richard Brown. Burns and Brown would go walking in Eglinton Woods and on one occasion, which is famously recorded in a letter from Burns to Brown, Brown suggested that Burns should send some of his work to a magazine. This was the spark of encouragement which led Burns to become a Poet and the rest as they say, is history.

The Drukken Steps were stepping stones across the Red Burn in the old Eglinton Woods (behind the Knadgerhill Cemetery in Irvine) where Burns and Brown once walked. The steps are no longer there but a modern bridge crossing the burn is close to the original location. Their name is said to come from the way those crossing appeared when negotiating the steps, drunken!

The cache aptly named Drukken Steps is close to the modern bridge and lies in the old woods just off the path. The clue given was really clear and the coordinates bang on target, however this still took me a while to find. In the end it was exactly where I'd been, I'd just not looked hard enough. Cache found, I stamped the log (yes stamped! I was given a Super Collectors stamp on my 40th birthday!) and left a Burns Geocoin which we've had for quite a while now. This cache seemed like an appropriate place to drop it off.

Sourlie Hill

At the South East end of Eglinton Park are some standing stones. On Thursday night I saw that a new cache had been published near them, however it wasn't until this morning that I had a chance to get over there despite the fact I can almost see them from my front door.

The standing stones are well known in the area and lie to the side of a path with (on a nice day) great views over The Park, Irvine and Arran. Today the view wasn't so good as it was wet, cold and overcast. It's a common belief in the area that this is a genuine prehistoric monument, however this couldn't be further from the truth. In fact the stones were placed as recently as the late 1980's as part of the reclamation of the area which had been an opencast mine.

To many the hill is known as Cairnmount which is understandable as Cairnmount Road runs past them to meet the Lochlibo Road. In fact Cairnmount is the hill which rises from the Eastern end of Cairnmount Road and on which the Cairnmount Plantation was/is situated (also where the View Over Holehouse Farm is located). The standing stones are actually located on an a hill which was artificially created to replace Sourlie Hill which was in the location of the mine. The stones themselves were found during the reclamation works and were placed as a folly on the top.

This cache Cairnmount Stones is just off the top of Sourlie Hill and was an easy find despite the poor conditions.

The Big 200

Today marked our 200th cache. We only discovered Geocaching in August 2011 and headed out one weekend to entertain the kids by finding a few of our local caches. Our first cache turned out to be just a stones throw away from our house and by the end of that day we were hooked.

Reaching 200 caches has involved a lot of effort, a lot of time and a lot of mud but I can honestly say it has been worth it. It's quite difficult explaining Geocaching, as going out and hunting for tupperware in the woods sounds a bit odd, but at the end of the day it's simply a brilliant excuse for getting out of the house. The very nature of the sport also means you're constantly going to new places and we've discovered dozens of really great things along the way, some of which were really near to us but which we just never knew were there.

We've also recently placed our first two caches for which we've had lots of good comments and encouragement from other cachers. We've got quite a number of other caches planned for the near future so watch this space!

Our first travel bug also started his journey just last weekend. Thomas the Turkey set off on his travels under the title Run Thomas Run. We look forward to following his adventures and we've got a heap of other TBs waiting to be set free soon.

So 200 down 1500000 to go I think it might be time to go Premium!!

Collennan Reservoir

This cache is located on the Smugglers Trail which leads from Troon to Dundonald via the Collennan Reservoir. The trail was used in the 18th Century and contrary to the idea of a small group of pirates or smugglers sneaking goods ashore it was actually a highly organised business. The Loans Smuggling Company was based in Troon and kept around 16 small boats on the beach at the start of the trail. These were used by the locals to secretly unload illicit goods from ships thereby avoiding customs and excise officers. Once ashore the goods would be distributed with as many as 500 horses being used to carry goods along the trail.

Goods such as brandy, wine, tea, tobacco and rum, would be purchased on the Isle of Man and brought to Scotland. These carried a high rate of taxation here so by avoiding paying tax there was a significant profit to be made.

Leaving Troon the trail first passes the disused Collennan Quarry before climbing the hill to the reservoir, from here it follows the Aught Woods and passes Hallyards Quarry, Dundonald Woods, Merkland Loch and ends at Dundonald Castle.

The Collennan Reservoir was built around 1890 by the 6th Duke of Portland. The Duke (William John Aurthur Charles James Cavendish Bentinck) was the owner of the Fullarton Estates in Troon after buying them from the Fullarton family in 1805.

The Duke was to have a huge effect on Troon not only by building the reservoir but by developing Troon harbour, constructing the Kilmarnock to Troon railway line (the first railway in Scotland) and by drawing up an ambitious 'master plan' for extending Troon. Much of this plan was actually completed and resulted in almost all the properties in the Southern end of the Town from Portland Road down to Craigend Road.

His legacy has not been forgotten in Troon with many roads in this area bearing his name or title. For instance, Portland Street and Terrace, Bentinck Drive, Crescent and Close, Cavendish Lane, Place and Court. His wife Winifred Alice Dallas-Yorke has also been remembered in this way with Dallas Place, Court and Lane and Yorke Road as have his children.

The Collennan Reservoir was located on the Aught Burn next to the Aught Woods and was built to supply the expanding town of Troon with a fresh water supply. Today the reservoir is no longer in operation but has been kept for historical and recreational purposes. It is currently under lease to the Troon Angling Club but can be accessed on foot with a pleasant path leading the whole way around.

The Smugglers Trail passes around the Southern side of the reservoir and runs between it and the Aught Woods. It is in these woods that the Reserve-A-View (Candy Cache) is to be found. The clue suggests that the cache is hidden near a dead tree, however being January it proved very difficult to determine which trees were dead and which simply didn't have any leaves at this time of the year.

After a bit of scrambling about Mrs SC finally found the cache hidden in a dog poo bag. Not the nicest of hiding places especially as there were other such bags around filled with the real thing. The bag was all ripped and tattered so we replaced it with a nice fresh zip-lock bag from IKEA and re-hid the cache, covering it with a pile of debris.

It was then time for dinner but on the way we stopped to grab one last cache at Kerrix Road. This was a simple park and grab made slightly more difficult by my GPS playing up. After following the GPS to roughly the right spot I then looked for anything on the satellite images which I could use to work out the correct position. 30 seconds later I had the cache.

Harbour Point - Part 3

We headed back to Irvine Beach Park again today to try to finally find the Harbour Point cache. I've already tried to find this twice, the first time on my own and the second with the full Super Collector clan but on both occasions we failed to find it. Today, armed with some pretty clear hints from the CO we all headed back for another go.

This cache is a puzzle where you have to collect information then apply it to a formula in order to work out the final coordinates of the cache container. Luckily all the information for this one is in the same place and we already knew where GZ was and had had it confirmed by two different people (including Chenks the CO).

Back at the GZ we headed straight for the location where we knew the cache to be hidden. But where was it? We'd been told by the CO that it was "well hidden" and he wasn't kidding. Despite knowing pretty much exactly where it was it still took us a few minutes to find.

University of Glasgow

What a great crisp January day it was today. The sun was shining and it was dry, so off I trotted in my lunch hour to have another look for the elusive Lord Kelvin Monument : Kelvingrove Park cache. This is located at an impressive statue remembering William Thomson who is better known as Lord Kelvin. He was a mathematical physicist and an engineer and in his time at the University of Glasgow made significant contributions to science. Most notable of these are his work on the mathematical analysis of electricity and thermodynamics (for which he wrote the first and second laws). Kelvin helped to define the discipline we know today as physics and even gave his name to the Kelvin temperature scale.

This is a cache I've looked for on several occasions and have resorted to extreme (but unsuccessful) measures in the past to find. Today I had a quick search an yet again couldn't locate the small nano container, however after taking a seat and having a think I went back to the GZ and had a look outside the area suggested by the clue given in the cache description. Sure enough there was the cache, at last. A quick initials and date were added to the log and the shoelace trick employed to return it back to the correct location and I was off towards my second cache of the day.

View from Glasgow University was just around the corner in front (or is that the back?) of the main University building. The University of Glasgow, which is more commonly called Glasgow Uni was founded in 1451 by a papal bull of Pope Nicholas V, at the suggestion of King James II. This was one of the major centres in the Scottish Enlightenment during the 18th century and became a pioneer in higher education from the 19th century onward. Since 1870 the main campus has been located on Gilmore Hill in the West End of the City next to the River Kelvin.


It's here that the cache is hidden, and it's in quite an awkward spot to reach without drawing too much attention. To give me an excuse for scrambling up to the GZ I got out my phone and started taking photos. This seemed to work and no one seemed to pay me any notice whatsoever. Thankfully when I got close I spotted the container right way.

I didn't have time to have a better look around this area as it had taken all my time to get this far from my work and I had just enough time to get back. I did have a lovely walk however and there are plenty more caches around that area so I'll be back soon.

2 out of 2

Harbour Point - Part 2

After failing to find this one on Wednesday night we headed back to the GZ today. This time I had the whole Super Collector clan with me for back up.

Arriving at the coordinates we checked and rechecked two different mobile phone GPS readings. After an extensive search we were getting nowhere so I sent Chenks the CO a message hoping for a clue. After confirming we were in the correct place he gave us some tips but with dying phone batteries, fading light and two hungry wee girls we eventually admitted defeat and headed home to extract the thorns and needles from our hands.

After a further email from Chenks we now know we were searching in the exact spot where the cache is but must have missed it somehow. It'll have to wait until next weekend though... I'm not going back there in the dark again!!

Spier's School

Today we were up at the Phoenix business park looking at cars and on the way home we decided to pick up a few caches.

First of all we took a drive up past Beith golf club to try to figure out a puzzle cache called Bigholm's Chilli ! View. We'd been trying to figure the puzzle out with only partial success - something to do with Chilli's and how to measure how hot they are. The cache description also suggests that you figure it out whilst at the given coordinates so after parking at the side of the road I jumped out and headed up the hill. At the top I reached a bench, on the top of a rocky hilltop. There was a great view here, but I couldn't see anything that might help me, so after discovering why this one is called Chilli View (it was freezing!) I headed back to the car.

Moving on we drove to Beith and the ground of the Old Spier's School. These are now a park with lot's of short trails and walks. Within the ground are a couple of traditional caches and the starting point for a multicache. We decided to leave the multi for another day so that left the other two. Unfortunately my phone was acting up so Mrs SC was on map duty and she failed to notice that there were two caches so we only went looking for one of them. This was a simple find and the kids did the honours.

Spier's School was opened in 1888 and taught both boys and girls. The school role grew from 140 to around 350 by the time that the local authorities took over administration of the school in 1937. The school remained in use until 1972 when it was replaced by the new a new school called Garnock Academy in Kilbirnie. The school and all the other buildings on the site were eventually demolished in 1984 after years of neglect and vandalism.

Across the road from the school grounds is another area of land. This was once where Marshalland Farmhouse use to be located. The "Marsh" in this name is actually a derivation of "March" and is shown on older maps as Marchland. This indicates that this was on a boundary between two estates. The farm buildings were demolished in the early 1960's. Today little remains aside from the stone gate posts which provide easy access. The cache itself is easy to find and like the one we found over in the school grounds was a decent sized container.

We decided that this would be a good place to release a TB which I was given for Christmas. So after a wee kiss from the girls Thomas the Turkey was placed in the cache to begin his journey.

Our first two caches

On Saturday we finally got around to placing our first two caches. I tried placing a cache a couple of weeks ago, but after some advice from a Reviewer and a chat with the relevant park ranger service I chose not to place that cache. These ones are both closer to home.

Lawthorn Mount : This is thought to be an ancient barrow although various digs have revealed no finds. Others think it may be a court or moot hill, which is what local tradition also suggests as well as the name Lawthorn. Myself and SuperGirlie placed this cache and after a look around we decided to keep it off the mound itself. This is a scheduled monument and has already been abused by local kids. Instead we chose a location in the surrounding band of trees. Congratulations go to HC67 for the FTF at around 8am on the morning before we placed it (he got the date wrong!). Respectable runners up were the Sweeney Toddlers and then Chenks.

Stanecastle Keep : This is a location which I was surprised didn't already have a cache however I've now learned there used to be one here. Stanecastle Keep is a stone tower which was built around 1417 by the Mongomeries but was later converted into a folly within the Eglinton Castle estate. Today the keep has been surrounded by housing estates but lies within a fenced off area which is heavily overgrown. Again it was myself and SuperGirlie who placed this cache. It's not in the Keep ground but a short distance away. I spotted this hide a few months ago and thought it would be an ideal spot. FTF once again goes to HC67 with the Swoddlers and Chenks close runners up, well done guys!