OK. So it’s a little steep. And it’s 800 feet that feel more like 8000 by the time you’ve climbed every one of them. But it’s worth it, because you’re now standing on top of Knockdolian Hill, gazing out over the quite outstanding beauty of Ayrshire’s Stinchar Valley.

 

Celebrated as one of the most beautiful and unspoilt valleys in the south west of Scotland, astride Knockdolian in the sunshine of the early morning, there are few would disagree.

 

Barr. Pinwhinny. Colmonell. Lying below you, the small villages that chart the course of the valley as it ushers the waters of its eponymous river toward Ballantrae and its meeting with the sea.  Names that seem to conjure up the very spirit of Ayrshire’s most famous son, the ubiquitous if occasionally incomprehensible, Robbie Burns.

 

“We’ve been here for over twenty years and the family itself has been farming Glengennet since the early ‘50’s.”

 

Vera Dunlop. A thoroughly pleasant and extraordinarily lucky woman whose lifestyle includes waking up to one of the best views in the world every morning, looking after over 500 black-faced sheep and hosting one of the most comfortable B & B farmhouses you’ll ever fall asleep in.

 

“There’s a magic about the place that you just can’t put a name to.”

 

Well, ‘peaceful’ might be a useful starting-point, as it is rapidly becoming a prized commodity as the 21st century grows older.

 

“And it’s very convenient?”

 

“For what?”

 

“Well, people come to somewhere like Ayrshire to get away from it all. They go cycling. Rambling.  Bird-watching. It’s all on the doorstep. And there’s the golf.”

 

Turnberry. Troon. Prestwick. To say nothing of the dozens of other golf courses that dot the Ayrshire landscape. There is indeed golf.

 

“The cottage is probably better for the golfers. It can sleep up to six.”

 

Glengennet Cottage sits alongside the farm and, at £210 a week out of season, it is remarkably competitive. The more especially when you walk out of the front door in the morning and find yourself confronted by the very splendid Galloway Forest Park. All this and eighteen holes at Turnberry. God is indeed in His Heaven.

 

“I suppose it’s all about meeting people.”

 

“Is that always a good thing?”

 

“Oh yes. You get the occasional one who’s forever knocking their coffee over. Or banging on the door at two in the morning because they’ve lost their keys. But that’s life. And if that’s the worst that can happen, well, I’ll settle for it.”

 

“Do they come back?”

 

“All the time, so I think we must be doing something right.”

 

The farmhouse itself closes each October, which is bad news, since the reputation of the Dunlop breakfast goes very much before it. But the good news is that the cottage is open all year round and, since rumour has it that an Indian summer is just around the corner, then Glengennet has to be a tempting weekend choice.

 

“There’s a film of one of our barns on U-Tube. And it’s raining. You know, I really can’t remember when it was taken.”

 

U-Tube at its best. When it’s showing something that is seldom seen.

 

William Wallace, Robert the Bruce, Robbie Burns. Kennedy. Campbell. Hamilton and Montgomery. Ailsa Craig. Troon and Galloway. Names and places that have come down through a celebrated Ayrshire history and which have played their part on the world stage. And when you’ve finally taken your fill of the view from Knockdolian Hill and you’ve started for home, be grateful that you’ve just added two more to the list. The Dunlops of Glengennet, where comfort is the by-word and where they serve a very good cup of tea.

 

(NC.)

 

Mrs V Dunlop

Glengennet Farm

Barr

Girvan

Ayrshire.  KA26 9TY

 

01465 861220 or 07771 781236

 

 

 

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