Of the many lochs in Scotland, a debate rages over which is the most beautiful. Some say that Loch Maree takes the palm, others Loch Morar; but for sheer variety none can match Loch Lomond. And I say that as unbiased as someone can be who grew up near her shores.

Loch Lomond is certainly the most popular of Scotland's lochs, for it is a mere 18 miles from Glasgow: and on sunny summer days it can seem like half the population of the city have decanted for a daytrip to her shores. Given that, it is remarkable how quickly one can find a secluded spot away from the crowds.

The loch is broad and shallow and dotted with picturesque wooded islands in its southern half. Around here and the villages of Luss and Balmaha, the crowds congregate. Indeed, there were so many visitors to Luss (a picturesque village, popular with foreign tourists too) that a car park was built which seems as large as the village itself. Loch Lomond was the most deserving case in Scotland for a national park - yet despite her natural beauty and popularity, it was only with the new Scottish Parliament that national parks were legislated for in Scotland. (Doubly remarkable as it was an emigrant Scot, John Muir, who invented the concept in Yosemite & Yellowstone in the USA in the 19thc.)

Nearby is a nuclear submarine base on the Clyde, and the prosperous town of Helensburgh - my home town, unique in Scotland for its mixed population of sailors from all over Britain and rich commuters who work or own businesses in Glasgow. The town was built with the coming of the railways for the use of well-to-do people, and abounds in large mansion houses. The most famous is the Hill House, designed by Charles Rennie Mackintosh, Glasgow's premier architect. Some large houses along the coastal road were designed by Greek Thompson. Helensburgh was also the birthplace of John Logie Baird, the inventor of television.

Away from the southern end of Loch Lomond, the hills crowd the narrowing shores and the scene becomes decidedly wilder, the loch fingering into the Trossachs toward Breadalbane. Here, the east side of the loch is roadless and a fine wild path - part of the West Highland Way between Glasgow and Fort William - clings to the shore. In the times before the Highlands were tamed this was bandit country, and was within easy striking distance of the rich farms of the Lowlands. The most notorious of all the Highland clans - the MacGregors - lived here, and were always up to something.

The whole area inhabited by the MacGregors, the Trossachs, is a fairly rugged stretch of country between Loch Lomond and Stirling, an area of lochs, forests and small glens, all built on a slightly smaller scale than the rest of the Highlands further north. In fact, the area was known as the Highlands in Miniature, and being so accessible from central Scotland was the first area in Scotland to experience the new phenomenon of the tourist. Prior to the 19thc., people rarely left their own districts except for trade or war, but the Industrial Age brought railways, burgeouning cities, and a new appreciation of the beauties of nature and aboriginal people. Now that the Highlander was no longer a threat, their old way of life was seen by the pan-European Romantic movement as picturesque, and the Trossachs were a favourite target for tourists, encouraged by Sir Walter Scott and his romantic novels about the MacGregors. It is still a picturesque area, especially around the foot of Loch Katrine, but the modern carbound tourist is liable to speed through the Trossachs - a fairly small area - in rather a short time. The outlook from the Trossachs is back to the Lowlands, and, from any hilltop, Stirling castle on its rock can be seen.