Sparkle

December 30, 2023, 8:31 am , by Richard Lutz

Richard Lutz circles a winter lochan

This little hidden spot of water is Lochan Spling. It’s a funny old name. Say it fast and it sounds like a security system for bolting a door.

Say it slow and it just sounds comic.

But Lochan Spling it is, lying uncluttered north of Glasgow tucked into a system of quiet hills called The Trossachs. After days of sharp Christmas rain, the mountains break clear and Ben Lomond, the most southerly of the peaks known as The Munros, is sheathed in snow and sun.

And, of course, it lords itself over Lochan Spling. Brochures, pamphlets, guide books all shrug their pages over the derivation of the name. Well, ‘Lochan’ is a small lake. A baby loch, you might say. And despite those who say Spling’s origin is not known, a local historian, Louis Strutt, says authoritively:

‘On old maps it appears, in 1817, as ‘Loch a Spank’ and, in 1828, as ‘Lochan Splank’. Spank or spang means a thin piece of metal, a buckle or anything that sparkles; splang is a sparkle. It is clear to me that Lochan Spling is the sparkling loch.’

And so you go. A sparkling loch, it is. And on a cold but clear afternoon, indeed it sparkles helped no doubt by a wire sculpture:

The waters are cloaked by deep fir woods:

In more open terrain, many lie felled by gales:

But underneath, lichens and moss remain a vibrant green:

And minute rivulets bubble down from the December hills:

The paths around the lochan connect with an endless web of Trossachs trails including the long distance Rob Roy Way which winds 79 miles north to the eastern Highlands. They also connect a chain of lochs- Katrine, Ard, Achray and Drunkie which, I assume, was named after a long night out a long time ago over a long round of booze.

+ credits: Richard Webb (Ben Lomond); Iain Thompson (lochan/ wire fish)