free to be able to rate and comment on reports (as well as access 1:25000 mapping).
As seems often the case this year, I was again following in the footsteps of
WWK's excellent report. There are only a few comments to add to that report especially since it was a pretty dreich day I did it on. There had been quite a bit of rain over the last couple of weeks, so when I pulled up to the small off-road packing spot at Craskie house mentioned by WWK, I didn't fancy leaving my car there as it didn't look too firm on the grass. Sadly parking is one of those things that keeps me awake before a hike!
Instead I carried on along Glen Cannich for about 1 km and there was a large, clearly unused entrance to the forest which looked like a much better alternative for me! I then walked briskly along the very quiet road to start the walk.
- A "comfortable" parking space!
Walking along the road you could see the first top of the day with its prominent big cairn.
- If you strain your eyes you can see "the big cairn" a feature on this walk on the top of the hill on the right.
Crossing the bridge over the river and you had a good view of Craskie and the start of the route around the lodge and forest.
- Crossing the River Cannich at the start of the walk looking at Craskie lodge
Once you get to the lodge there is a very clear path around it and up through the bracken at the start of the hill. Sadly at about 250m as you come out of the bracken and into the heather the path seemed to disappear (it was much more obvious on the way down). On my route you can see that I made the mistake here of going to the right, into the heather heading towards the river which made it a much tougher section, especially for Dill as the heather was quite high. On the way back down it was easier to see that there was a faint path (which was really continuing straight on) which bypassed the worst of the heather.
- Photo taken looking back on the way down, you want to be heading in the direction of the white speckled rock just to right of centre.
We struggled through the heather and finally got to the deer fence, unfortunately we were a bit off target so we had to walk further up along the deer fence to get to the gap, which involved a couple of extra crossings of the river but they were all simple. Somehow on the way back we managed to end up at the deer fence at exactly the same spot as the way up, so we had another journey around it, getting a close up of the fence from the other side!
- From the deer fence looking up towards "the big cairn" in the middle of the photo
There was a small path from the hole in the deer fence in the direction we wanted to travel but that quickly disappeared. We didn't really find any animal tracks to follow for the rest of the way up but it wasn't too hard walking as most of the heather here was short and interspersed with lots of grassy areas. We made our way up the not very steep slopes to the Big Cairn.
- The Big Cairn at around 550m, Dill not looking convinced that we shouldn't call it a day!
We stopped at the Big Cairn and had Lunch#1 before setting off into the cloud. It was very simple walking despite not being able to see very far. We took the most direct route heading straight from the Big Cairn to the top (probably about 1.5km to the top). It has to be said the ground was pretty wet so I certainly had to watch were I trod and my gaiters were very beneficial!
- At the top, with extensive views of cloud!
On the way down after Lunch#2, I decided to try going via Loch Coire an Uillt Ghiuthais to see if the ground was any drier and it was a bit, but not much.
- On the way down we took in Loch Coire an Uillt Ghiuthais
Next stop on the walk was a return visit to The Big Cairn and at that point we came out of the cloud.
- At the big cairn on the way down, the cloud had lifted a bit so looking out to Loch Mullardoch
After that it was just a return journey back to the start, once across the deer fence it certainly was much easier to spot the way to go that avoided the heather hopping we had to do on the way up. Then it was back over the bridge and along the road to the car. Certainly not the most exciting hill in the world but a very enjoyable day out and the first time I have had such poor visibility for quite a while which always makes a walk more interesting
