Forest bathing at Cleghorn Glen and Cartland Craigs

Cleghorn Glen and Cartland Craigs are two sites in the same gorge of the Mouse Water, just outside Lanark, and both are part of the Clyde Valley Woodlands National Nature Reserve. The woods are oak and ash, some of the trees on the cliffs never cut because the slopes were too steep to clear. Cartland Craigs was coppiced until the 1930s and still is in places, and on the more acid ground Scots pine grows over heather and blaeberry. In spring look for primroses and herb Paris in the Cleghorn woods.

The small car park by Cartland Bridge is the usual start. From there one path climbs steeply above the gorge, while the riverside path runs on into Cleghorn Glen; you can walk the whole reserve out and back to Cleghorn Bridge. That path is mostly level but narrow and muddy in places, with unfenced drops. Parking near Cleghorn and Mouse bridges is difficult. Food and toilets are in Lanark.