Gateway

My last venture along the route of the Fife Pilgrim Way was in early September 2020 when I finished just short of the village of Kinglassie. I had been doing bits of this 64-mile long distance trail on and off (though mostly off) for about a year by then, and Saturday was when I decided to pick up the trail again.

My start-point for the day was about an hour's drive from home, so off I went and, having parked near to my earlier end-point, set out to see how the day would unfold.

On reaching Kinglassie village itself after about 30 minutes walking, I saw this 'gateway' marker (main photo) - there are several of them along the route - which explains that Kinglassie was a popular rest route for pilgrims 'back in the day' and that the current 18th century church sits on the site of an earlier 12th century one.

As I had not long started my walk, I thought that taking a rest was maybe a bit premature. That delight awaited me in the village of Leslie, about three miles away, when I abandoned the waymarked route for a while and found an excellent wee coffee shop. Suitably refreshed, a further two miles or so took me to Glenrothes, where I decided enough was enough for one day. The fact that there was only an hourly bus service to where I had left my car was another factor.

It was a good day out, and I have now covered more than half of the length of the trail. There's about 30 miles still to go, but it now becomes a little more of a logistical challenge and I am strongly tempted just to book into a hotel or B&B some weekend and use that as a base, rather than drive there and back every time.

Kinglassie, and indeed Glenrothes for that matter, is actually the furthest I have been from home in about eight months. Strange days indeed!