North Queensferry to Dunfermline: Exploring the Alternative Start of the Fife Pilgrim Way
Join me as I hike from North Queensferry to Dunfermline along the Fife Pilgrim Way. This video covers the pros and cons of starting your pilgrimage in North Queensferry versus the traditional route, giving you insights to help you decide if this alternative start is for you. Discover what makes this lesser known path unique, from spectacular views of the Forth Bridges to hidden historical gems.
Whether you’re planning your own Fife Pilgrim Way adventure or just love Scottish walks and history, this video has something for you. Hit subscribe and join the journey!
Link to map :
Start point
Grid Reference: NT128804
Postcode: KY11 1HW
What three words ///distorts.speeding.saga
there is reasons why this path is not as popular but I believe it might be better and this is why and this is as promised the alternative starting route as we come out of North Queens Ferry with the iconic free bridges so today’s journey should take us to another iconic place where we’ve been before the Dun Firmland Abbey and roughly about 9.5 miles walk today and if it’s continues like this what another glorious walk it will be as you can see the coastal path and the five buildings way very much one route at a stage sort of meandered onto and off of as we’ve gone along this five pilgrims way think this certainly so far is the better starting point you very much get to see so much of the coast the Curus starting point there’s an additional starting point through the pretty village of Curus absolutely spectacular cannot deny that then you go through a couple of busy roads and we’re going to hit towns today there’s no no question about it but for a pretty spectacular start seeing a lot more of the coast lot more woodlands bird sounds before we even get going just sets you off in the right tone just have to stop at this point and just show you um the clouds are coming in a bit now so the day is not going to be as beautiful as I thought however talking about reasons why it might be a better start you can walk along bring a picnic with you or something to eat or even just stop and have a drink nice little seats laid out there’s a couple of little spots like this along the way as you can see as you look out glorious as you can see in the background there makes a little bit of a racket obviously not as beautiful as it was before and that could be a cross in one of their boxes but so far two ticks one cross not bad we can cope with this little bit of noise people are hard at work we like the sea on we go pilgrim as you can see as expected we’ve hit onto a road which is obviously going to go into more busier places but very much expected and that was a lovely beautiful start up until this point so since we put one cross in the box let’s go for another couple of potentially negatives but maybe explain a little bit why this is less popular so first reason being it’s not actually the official starting route hence go it’s going to be less popular for that reason there’s less history associated with this route not to say that it doesn’t have history but the Pilgrim’s Path from Curus up to St andrews is absolutely littered in history probably less marketed reason number three four it maybe gives a different vibe i think personally certainly the start a more positive vibe but each own I guess on that and point number five it’s not actually on the main maps what brings me on to a little something again about hiker app now what I did this might be a bit of technology overload for you when I was looking at the route how we do it I did that modern thing of going on to chat GBT and asked chat GBT can you find me a map and behold it went onto the internet and it found me the guys who do the five pilgrims way link I will put in the description for that from there there was a downloadable map open the said downloadable app and lo and behold it connected me with a map directly onto my Hiker app so for you guys who watched the last video and I said the importance of apps and GPS and I said how good Hiker app was so another reason although a cheat of a reason because up until the last video as we saw the signposts along this whole entire route have been absolutely fantastic but yeah another reason to do this route now we’re keeping it honest and we’re going to go for another negative again here and this one being if you’re not doing the Five Pilgrim’s Way in one go then potentially getting back to North Queens Fairy certainly where I’ve parked could be a bit of an issue there’s a train and D Firmland obviously to to North Queens Fair little bit of walk down to the start point down to probably where you park your car the bus as far as I can tell is only once a day ah bit of an issue taxi well that might be an option too another tick in the negative or cons box at times it can be a little bit hilly [Music] well actually turns out to be very quite hilly when you hit a summit it’s a cone but when you hit the top of your peak we’re back onto the positives beautiful countryside again with TTO signs that civilian life is here but glorious smile back in the face that was never left the face i should be honest it’s not been too dramatic even the busier bits have been okay and it’s an opportunity if you was running low on supplies few shops along the way get yourself in there nice little sound or piece as you call it in Scotland what do you call that in Scottish walking superb and talking of superb it’s actually this whole five pilgrims way has been nothing but superb outstanding beautiful challenging and in parts but mostly superb Scottish adventure neither really a pro or a con on this one more a similarity as you can see we’re coming up into builtup areas and a pigeon which is very similar to the walk from Curus and the reason for that is they very much keep the path the way it used to be the exact route you’re walking is the same walk the pilgrims back in the medieval days would have walked and again little bit of irony i’ve had to come slightly off the path cuz as you can see they’re building something right in the way of the five pilgrim’s way that’s Yeah so maybe for a slight period of time the route does change met one of the workers there you got to go right up and out so if we’re going on a negative Yeah okay i know things need to be built but they’ve literally blocked off a wall or maybe they haven’t found i don’t know if that’s new cuz that certainly doesn’t match up to that in fact it it’s miles off of where where the app is uh yeah I suppose least at least they we signposted it but yeah that was a little bit awkward nearly had an argument with a bloke and to be honest I I’ve had my head down looking at the the five pilgrims way probably not reading their signs that say it’s closed it said pedestrian foot paths and everything else so I was just following those through and then yeah met a dead end but what enough i said they’re building [Music] something and now onto a busy road which was always going to be the case but I think we would uh come in a little bit further up and this here is obviously our original route and that’s a bit of a shame you would have been a bit more countryside before you hit the busy road but it is what it is so what can you do you know I was thinking there just I was coming along the busy road uh now into a nice quiet road so I train for thought is a little bit clearer but anyway as I was walking along I was thinking might be moaning about very little because obviously I’m not saying for a second that you should be allowed to walk through a middle of a building site the guy was 100% correct um what I am wondering however is when the building is complete is the access still going to be there is it going to be slightly diverted or are you going to be sent the same route onto the main busy road now guys watching in England Wales possibly other places in the world might not fully understand what I’m going on about but certainly in Scotland we have a right to Rome okay so surely they need to put a route on close to it so it’s very similar to the path keep your way for the busy road because we have a right to be able to walk it it’s it’s a historic route it is still very much part of a pilgrim’s route so there’s a religious aspect of that so I mean say how many rights is that impeding you know like I say I might be moaning about absolutely nothing a few months down the line maybe a year down the line when it’s complete it it’s nothing it’s been resolved but as I say diverting you onto a busy road not ideal not ideal in the slightest but anyway yeah suppose there’s more important things isn’t there and pro we need a pro back into glorious countryside and the weather’s just about still on our side so this is going to sound like a con but it’s actually a pro where we coming on to next is a busy road again fast irony you watch any of my videos I hate busy roads however this is a very special vis busy road because this road with a few wines and a few bends takes us to our final destination of Dumb Firmland Abbey loads of pros and cons along the way but what was your favorite what would be your route your chosen route would you go from Curus the traditional way to St andrews or maybe start on the alternative beautiful route of North Queens [Music] Ferry so here we go that’s us completed literally virtually every step you possibly can on the five pilgrims way from Kaos to St andrews from North Queens Ferry to Dun Firmland and I’m going to take you on a tour of this amazing abbey and we’ve completed the guy who followed in St and Andrew I guess and our journey on the five pilgrims way from the man who forged a nation or certainly a flag and next time we’ll find out about a man who led a country in one of Scotland’s great kings