West Highland Way - Day 1 - Milngavie to Drymen

April 6 2026·2286 words·11 mins

Hiking Geocaching Scotland West Highland Way

West Highland Way - 2026 - This article is part of a series.

Part 1: This Article

Part 2: West Highland Way - Day 2 - Drymen to Rowardennan

Part 3: West Highland Way - Day 3 - Rowardennan to Ardlui

Part 4: West Highland Way - Day 4 - Ardlui to Tyndrum

Part 5: West Highland Way - Day 5 - Tyndrum to Kingshouse Hotel

Part 6: West Highland Way - Day 6 - Kingshouse Hotel to Kinlochleven

Part 7: West Highland Way - Day 7 - Kinlochleven to Fort William

Not the Best Start to the Big First Day
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WHW officially starts in Milngavie (pronounced “Mull-Guy”), a northern suburb of Glasgow, but my day started at what had been my accommodation in Edinburgh for the three days prior.

Early morning light at Edinburgh's Haymarket Station

I hadn’t slept well at all the night before. Something had upset my stomach, causing me to get up a few times in the night to deal with that. The logistics were weighing on my mind too: an early start at 5:15 a.m. and then the necessary chain of events that had to happen: catching an Edinburgh tram to get to Haymarket train station, catching a train there to get to Glasgow Queen Street station, and then another train north to Milngavie.

But it’s amazing how with a minimum of sleep, one is still able to function. In the end, that entire chain worked out as planned and without too much stress, partly because trains arrived exactly on schedule, and partly because I’d built in time in the plan for things to go wrong.

I arrived in Milngavie just after 8 a.m., found the luggage carrier company van that would transport my luggage to Drymen, my end goal for the day, and after a nice chat with the friendly luggage guy, made my way just a couple of blocks from the train station to Douglas Street, where the West Highland Way starts.

After stopping in to get a 6" Subway sub that would be my lunch for the day, I quickly checked out a few nearby monuments on Douglas Street. These were part of an epic multi-cache which asked questions about objects and features along the entire West Highland Way route, and although I was pretty sure I’d determined the answers already by doing internet research, I wanted to double-check a few of them. They all checked out perfectly.

And that meant I could be on my way!

Milngavie
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The stylized thistle is the symbol of the West Highland Way

My Route Today
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Starting Out
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The Fool - Embarking on a new adventure into the unknown

The first steps of the West Highland Way involve walking under a large sign, down a short ramp, and then quickly onto walking paths that take you through the suburbs of Milngavie.

I’m going to try to convey at least a part of what I was feeling as I took those first steps. I’m convinced it’s a universal human feeling when starting out into the unknown.

That said, in one sense, quite a lot was known: I had thoroughly researched the path I’d take today, and I had a GPS track log of exactly where I should be walking. Yet it was the feeling of walking into an unknown endeavour that supplied some support for the doubt lodged at the back of my brain. I love to hike, but I’d never undertaken a long-distance hike like this one where substantial hikes are necessary day after day after day. Accommodation was already booked all the way down the line for days, so I subtly felt the pressure of having to do whatever it took to stay that would take me to my destination each and every day.

In my 20s, I was interested in the symbols that made up tarot cards, and the card that matched this moment was The Fool, card 0. The Fool card shows a man walking toward a precipice on a new adventure with his modest pack. The standard meaning of the white rose he holds is “purity and innocence”, which I’d translate into meaning, “He really doesn’t know what the hell he’s getting himself into.” The mountains in the distance are said to symbolize the challenges yet to come. They are forever present, but The Fool doesn’t care about them right now; he’s more focused on starting his expedition.

That describes very well what I was feeling as I took the first steps this morning.

First Experiences Along the Way
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The trails leading out of Milngavie are public walking paths on the edge of the suburb, and as you’d expect, there are a few people jogging and a few others walking their dogs.

What struck me first about the surroundings was the sheer mossiness of, well, everything. I took pictures of scenes that any local wouldn’t give a second glance; for me, this moss seemed to be strayed onto every living and inanimate thing in sight. I liked it!

My Initial Fascination with the Mossiness of Everything
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I couldnt get over all these mossy trees!

A wet, early spring path leading out of Milngavie

A First Geocache Find and a Lesson Learned
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After an hour on the trail, I was coming close to my first possible geocache find. I left the trail to follow a very soggy game trail up a hill, eventually making my way through a mini-swamp and found the geocache quickly. After signing the log and rehiding the cache, I made my way back down the soggy hill, suddenly slipped and found myself on my back in the mud. Oh, great. At least I hadn’t hurt anything but my pride.

It was then I decided that expending energy to find off-trail caches wasn’t going to be worth it, especially when I still didn’t understand what kind of long-term effort was being faced with. Finding geocaches wasn’t my main aim on the trip - it was a side hustle at best, so for then on, the norm was to ignore off-trail caches.

The Annoying Puddle Puzzles
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One isolated example of the many puddle puzzles

There had been occasional puddles of water to navigate around along the way. Of course, one expects this kind of thing on a trail in a country where it rains a lot.

There was a long, narrow - a former railway line - near the Glengoyne Distillery, where the puddles weren’t a feature on the trail; they were the trail. Each adjoining puddle presented you with a puzzle of how to around it, and I have to say it gradually became annoying and tedious to have to solve a new puzzle every 20 meters or so. At times, the oozing black muck rimming the puddle was the only way around the standing water. But it had been churned up by so many multiple walkers that it was unpredictable and slippery. The natural reaction was to slow down and carefully navigate the black muck or find a way around it.

I grew tired of having to slow down to puzzle my way around the next puddle, so after a while, since I had what were supposed to be waterproof boots, I sometimes quickly judged that the standing water wasn’t going to be more than ankle-high and walked straight through it.

Learning about Red Squirrels
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Red Squirrels!

Closer to Drymen, the end goal for today’s walk, I happened to start walking with a Scottish couple. Early on, the husband said something made it clear he thought I was from the US. I said “I’m from Canada,” at which point he held up his arms in jest as if to shield the blows that were going to give me. I apologized in jest if my statement was made with too much gusto. They were great people to walk with.

While we walked, we saw a sign cautioning drivers about red squirrels. I said we have these kinds of signs in Canada, but they are about moose, not squirrels. But they explained to me that red squirrels were an endangered species, hence the signs. That made a lot more sense then.

Reaching Drymen
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Once I reached Drymen, the people I’d been walking with and I scattered, heading towards our booked accommodations. The problem was I found I was about 2 hours early to get into mine.

To pass some time, I sat on a picnic table in town “square”, drank some water, had a Cliff bar, and just watched a bit of small-town life play out. Older people greeted each other and sat and chatted. It was a familiar sight: this is the Scottish version of “coffee row” in small-town Canada.

My Accommodation in Drymen - the Breaside Guest House

I got into my accommodation at the Braeside Guest House early with an energetic and personable woman showing me to my room, where luggage was stored, giving me a sheet to order an optional lunch for the next day, and telling me where breakfast was in the morning.

I’d finished the first leg of the West Highland Way! My right knee was a little achy, but other than that, I was alive, not crawling on all fours, and not completely exhausted. And remember, this was after a very lousy sleep the night before, a very early start to the day, and after having walked just over 21 km.

Maybe I could actually do this!

Gallery
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Finally we're far enough away from Milngavie to experience a feeling of wilderness.

A short stint along a road leads to the next section of the Way

A typical gate with a typical white Scottish house in the background.

The details are different, but this scene is not that different from rural Alberta

I was mesmerized by old rock walls covered by moss

More old moss-covered walls - now crumbling

An expansive view of the trail with hills in the distance

A cute little house along the way - with a giraffe on the roof no less

Signpost - were closer to our destination than we are from where we started!

There is so much "Horse Manure" available on social media these days that farmers have to give theirs away for free!

My first encounter with a field of sheep. Theyd become a common sight in later days.

My boots at the end of day one. This day and every day they served me well.

Author

Grant S Wilson

West Highland Way - 2026 - This article is part of a series.

Part 1: This Article

Part 2: West Highland Way - Day 2 - Drymen to Rowardennan

Part 3: West Highland Way - Day 3 - Rowardennan to Ardlui

Part 4: West Highland Way - Day 4 - Ardlui to Tyndrum

Part 5: West Highland Way - Day 5 - Tyndrum to Kingshouse Hotel

Part 6: West Highland Way - Day 6 - Kingshouse Hotel to Kinlochleven

Part 7: West Highland Way - Day 7 - Kinlochleven to Fort William

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