Hill of Clais nan Earb & Garbet Hill - Dufftown

[Gordon Ballantyne]

The primary objective of the day was the hill above Glenfiddich lodge -

HILL OF CLAIS NAN EARB

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Parkup was pretty easy as there was ample "laydown" area from the civils of a Wind turbine farm and a recently installed shiny Comms mast.
There's an locked gate festooned by padlocks across the road up into the forest, but an open wicket gate at the side. First thing we passed was some lumber stacked at the side of the track, presumably from the route of the new electricity pylons.

New electricity pylons leading up Carn Chrom

A bit further on, we left the track to followed the pylon route up on to near the top of Carn Chrom, then picked up the firebreak leading across to the top of Clais nan Earb.and stumbled along the bridle path, with the overgrowing heather at about knee height for most of the way.

The heathery path from Carn Chrom across to Clais an Earb

Once on the top of C nan Earb, the going was easy to the far cairn. At the cairn there was a headstone paying tribute to Charles Henry - Duke of Richmond and Gordon. The full inscription is -
"This cairn is erected to the memory of Charles Henry Duke of Richmond and Gordon Died 18th Jan 1928
Seems his full title was :-
CHARLES HENRY GORDON-LENNOX, 7TH DUKE OF RICHMOND, LENNOX AND AUBIGNY, 2ND DUKE OF GORDON, K.G., G.C.V.O., C.B., LL.D., 1845-1928 . He died at Goodwood on 18th Jan 1928. Unfortunately, the stone is flaking apart, so this may be the last viewing of it in legible form.

Charles Henry's memorial stone

The summit memorial cairn - mit iron post

GordonC and Harvey at the summit cairn

I'm guessing he was the laird of Glenfiddich too - anyway the cairn is in his memory and is built around what looks like an old metal fence post.
It was 16DegC when we left the car and we had to doff our ganzies it was so warm. Never done that before in February !
The views across to Ben Rinnes was braw and also down to the Buck o the Cabrach. Once more the ubiquitous fans were stationary, unable to provide enough power for a cup o tea ! We didn't tarry too long as we had another hill to have a look at, so set off to find the path down to the track. It had once been a reasonable track, but was now overgrown with heather. OK for descending, but probably a chore to come up it.

Descending the path from Clais nan Earb

GordnC and H coming down the heathery path.

At the bottom a deer fence had to be negotiated. Harvey had to be assisted over as there was no badger-flap. He needs to get some weight off - nae mair pigs lugs for you ma boy !

On the track at the bottom of the heathery path

There was a fair maintenance shed with a sub-station behind it to transmitt the non-existing power from the fans.

The Fannery workshop and sub-station

We strolled back along the road to the car.

GARBET HILL

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We could've left the car at the Earb road end, but being a lazy git, I drove down to the end of the track up Garbet. There was a convenient pull-off at the side of the road a few metres from the track end.

Roadside parkup

The gate across the track was unlocked, so we headed off up towards the bealach trying to work out the easiest path up the hill.

Unlocked gate at the track end

By the side of the track we spotted this granite phallus with "L" chiselled on one side and "G" on the other. This kept us speculating for ages with no viable outcome !

The Garbet stane - L side

The Garbet stane - G side

Further on, we put up a couple of red deer hinds, who hopped off up the hill, so at the end of the track, we followed a path cleared by a "heather mower" along a line of shooting pegs. This took us to a grassy rake which then led us up to the first cairn. The second cairn was just across the way, so we headed on up to where there was another cairn. The actual highest point was in an area of micro - lochans, so someone had built a cairn on the first bit of firm ground to the east, probably a metre or so lower.

Cairn near the summit

We luxuriated on the top for ages, looking across to the Buck and Tap o Noth, trying to avoid looking at the fannery's
We decided to just take the straight route home, but as we breasted the edge of the hill, we noticed a faint shooting track near the route we had taken on the way up, so just followed it down to where it joined up with the "mown" track and so back down to the car.

Looking back up the shooting track

Home down the track

An altogether pleasurable day in summer conditions. Whilst we were able to doff our jersy's, Harvey was unable to follow suit, so he just splashed in every but of water we passed, ejoying a cooling dook. Fit a day !

[larry groo]

Fit rare min.