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If Van Morrison had taken the walk with me today from Inverernan to Crainlarich, he’d surely want to write a song about it. He’s not a Scot, sure, but I think he’d get it in his Celtic heart. Titles like “A Sense of Wonder,” “Into the Mystic,” “In the Garden,” and even “Cyprus Avenue” were in rotation in my head as I walked beside the River Falloch.

This was a gentle one — thank God, after yesterday — no rock piles to climb, few inclines to surmount, no risk to life and limb.

What we had was a fertile green valley with the thriving and tumbling cascade of the Falloch, its own music supplemented by the sound of scores of streams rushing down from the mountains to feed its gaping maw.

The pathway was country roads and sheep trails. For the first time in five days, the sun shone on my face. Briefly. It worked wonderfully with a gentle breeze.

In no time, I was down to a T-shirt and hiking shorts, reveling in the freedom of an undemanding day. All around us is the evidence of Scotland’s wettest summer ever but we have yet to feel a full rain upon our faces.

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Walking through Glen Falloch beside the River Falloch. The mist slowly burned off the hilltops and the clouds were lightly scattered all day. The river was vigorous and well-fed by hillside streams. We crossed a half-dozen by rickety wooden bridges and tiptoed through dozens more:

Yesterday, in the final throes of the eight-hour gymnastics class called “hiking to Inverarnan,” I told myself that no future hike would be undertaken that required more than a relaxed tweed jacket, Oxford shirt, khakis, and comfortable shoes. Today sort of fit that bill.

We left after 9 a.m. and were contemplating lunch in Crainlarich by 1 p.m. Several of us enjoyed afternoon naps!

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Eventually, the path takes you under the train tracks and highway which run parallel through the glen and curves upward across the face of several hills, widening the vistas before a steep descent to Crainlarich and its train station:

I walked through Glen Falloch especially slowly today, for a number of reasons. One, I didn’t want this day to end. Two, thanks to a damaged muscle in my right leg, I couldn’t walk any faster if I’d wanted to. Three, never hasten along one of the most beautiful days of your life.

Me, and Van Morrison in my head, in the garden.

And finally, much wisdom can be gleaned from a good bottle of wine. Tonight over dinner, the wisdom was right there on the label of an Italian red called “The Rambler”:

“With the first step, the number of shapes the walk might take is infinite.”

— A.R. Ammons.

Today’s walk was indeed filled with infinite possibilities.

Tomorrow’s hike is a similarly short and rigour-less one along the Old Military Road — about eight miles — to Tyndrum where I’m told, there is an extremely popular laundromat.