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Meall Dubh - are windfarm access roads a blessing or a curse

Meall Dubh - are windfarm access roads a blessing or a curse


Postby Strathlassie » Mon Mar 01, 2021 1:35 pm

Route description: Meall Dubh, from Glen Moriston

Corbetts included on this walk: Meall Dubh

Fionas included on this walk: Beinn Bhreac (Meall Dubh)

Date walked: 28/02/2021

Time taken: 4.75 hours

Distance: 19.5 km

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1.jpg
Start of the walk from the A887
1.jpg
Start of the walk from the A887
We've been walking along windfarm access roads during the snowy and icy weather and not venturing up anything you could call a hill just in case.... SO we were quite excited for the first proper walk of the year. The weather was warmer and spring was in the air.
2.jpg
The access road goes on and on

This is the last hill that we've never ventured up along Glen Morriston so we set off with great enthusiasm. We parked in the lay-by as suggested in other walk reports and headed up along the Millenium Windfarm access road. We met a local lady walking her dog as we started out - she told us about all the wildlife she'd spotted on her daily jaunt. As we were walking along the path and heading well away from the top of the hill, my husband began to get annoyed and grumpy.." Are you sure you've got this right?" was asked several times! YES!!! And so we plodded on and on and on up the access road to turbine number 1.
3.jpg
The windfarm
All the turbines were in full pelt. I breathed a sigh of relief when we reached turbine 1 and we were then able to move across the hillside aiming for the cairn of Meall Dubh, about 800 metres away. Glorious views so far. Sadly as we reached the cairn, the weather closed in and a light drizzle began. This didn't put us off having our cheese sandwiches, flapjacks and flask of coffee.
4.jpg
The summit cairn


As the mist lifted we plotted our direct route down the side of the hill - this must have knocked off an hour at least. Surprisingly the heather had new greenery on it - it's amazing what a bit of warmth does. (If you want to do this route -take the worn out looking track on the right hand side just after the end of Aonach Woods. At first the path goes up to readh a carin on either side of teh road and then down to the bridge shown in the photograph). Back on the path we debated about the merits of windfarm access roads and concluded they're great if you want to use them to cycle along to get to the hill but we prefer going cross country and up the natural hillside if at all possible.
6.jpg
The direct route back
Strathlassie
Munro compleatist
 
Posts: 28
Munros:282   Corbetts:116
Fionas:108   Donalds:8
Joined: Dec 31, 2017
Location: Inverness

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