North Berwick Law

5 August 2011

Where - North Berwick Law, 187m/613', Sub-2,000' Marilyn, Map 66, NT 556842
Participants - Neil and Ben

The sub-2,000' Marilyns include some small, but really distinctive, hills and North Berwick Law is one of these. It makes a good trip by train for me on a short winter day but I quite fancied doing it in summer for a change and combining the walk with a visit to Tantallon castle which is only a couple of miles further on. Although one of the smallest of the Marilyns, on a clear day the Law can be seen from miles around; this is the view from closer at hand, near to Tantallon.....

There's a car park at the foot so this is a really short walk. There was a good path all of the way that weaved between the rocky outcrops. Being an isolated hill, it was no surprise to find that the slopes of the hill had been used both as a settlement and for military purposes down the ages. There is evidence of hut circles and a stone settlement on the south slopes. It was a bit cluttered near and on the top. There was a concrete building that was used as an observation post during both world wars.....

a stone building that was erected in 1803 as a watch house during the Napoleonic wars.....

and of course the whale jawbone- a fibreglass replica nowadays but previously the genuine article. Apparently the first jawbone was placed at the summit of the Law in 1709.....

On a clear day like today, it is a great viewpoint. This is looking west across the Lothians towards Edinburgh.....

through the watch house to North Berwick with the island of Craigleith in the background......

to the Bass rock.....

a zoomed shot of the Rock which shows clearly the amount of white gannet droppings.....

I have never been on the Rock although I have done the sail round it. Even from a distance the smell from the gannet droppings was overpowering; you must need a clothes peg on your nose when actually on the Rock! I would like to go to the top of it though.

There was a regatta on and the town was crowded so I didn't bother with a harbour visit and just drove down the coast a couple of miles to Tantallon castle.....

Tantallon was a stronghold of the Douglases and was built in the 14th century. There's not much remaining now of the interior but enough to show that it must have been a massive structure in its day. There was an even better view of the Bass Rock from its grounds.....