Buckingham and Sandyhills Park, with bonus content

Run time: 32:34

Distance covered: 3.56 miles (5.73km)

Soundtrack: Red Desert, by Paddy Magrane

Conditions: cool with some sun

I ran the (rather uninspiring) Carmyle New Park early on in this project, before I had assembled a full list of Glasgow parks, so unbeknownst to me, I had run within yards of Buckingham Park without noticing. I had to pick up a prescription today, so decided to get my weekly longer run in in that neck of the woods.

Buckingham is much nicer than Carmyle Park. It's just at the entrance to Carmyle, which is an oddly secluded little neighbourhood, cut off from everywhere else by the Clyde on one side and the M74 on the other. It's small, but it has some really beautiful trees, and a playpark and a basketball court. 

I've noticed that loads of parks in the city now have basketball courts. I would have loved if that had been the case back in the 90s, when I was playing basketball every day. As it is, binge-watching of The Last Dance has made me determined to lace up my Jordans and hit the court again once lockdown is over. Doubtless to get my ass comprehensively kicked by people half my age.

I left Buckingham and ran north, underneath the M74, and across London Road, heading for Shettleston. I passed my driving test in Shettleston, so it's interesting to come back to streets I've barely ever been in except for an intense period of a few weeks when I was practicing.

Because of that familiarity, I was convinced there was another park not on the map on my route, and I was right. Just off Killin Street, there's quite a large green area with a woodland trail and a big open green farther ahead. It's definitely some kind of park, but it's not marked on the map, wasn't on the Glasgow City Council list of parks, and doesn't have a sign. So I took a detour and ran it anyway.

Back around to Killin Street and along Strowan Street toward some menacing 1960s towers, and the next park. 

Sandyhills Park was kind of an anticlimax, because there wasn't much of it to run. It seems to be under development right now, so all of the paths terminated in fencing with ripped up ground and diggers beyond.

Looks like a nice enough park under normal circumstances, will be interesting to come back in a year and see what changes they've made. I did get to see a rare sight when I turned back and ran past the tower blocks that loom over the south of the park.

First air traffic I've seen in weeks.

I headed back the way I had come, under the motorway again and back to Carmyle.

Bonus Content!

A while ago, I plotted all of the parks I had identified on a Google Map. 

The red pins are parks I've run, the blue pins are parks I've yet to run. As you can see, I've been focusing on the south and east so far. The black pins? Those are parks where there's a park on the list, but I've not been able to locate it on the map. One of these black pins was Broomhouse Park, which doesn't appear when you Google it. My route home from today's run took me past the neck of the woods it ought to be, so I decided to go hunting, since it was the only park in this area I hadn't covered yet.

I found a mention that Broomhouse Community Centre was in the park. I looked for that instead, and via the community centre, managed to find the elusive Broomhouse Park.

It feels pretty recent, and judging by where it is, I think it must have been part of the grounds of the old Glasgow Zoo, which I dimly remember from my early childhood. Anyway, I decided to park around the corner and add a quick half mile to my day's run to tick one more park off the list.