Morvern

Craigievar Castle

Craigievar Toadstools for G&G

Into the cloud 

Morvern summit in rain and low cloud

Tuesday, 16 August 2011

Ascent:       670 metres 
Distance:    8 kilometres
Time:          2hours 45 minutes

Morvern     871m      1 hr 50 mins

With 15 members of the extended family still holidaying in Deeside, it was decided to visit Craigievar Castle in the morning whilst the weather held.  Any prospect of a walk was postponed into the afternoon by which time a front had moved in and the clouds were down to about 500 metres and rain was imminent.

Morvern was the nearest Corbett so Alan and I decided to take an afternoon stroll starting from Balhennie at the foot of its eastern slopes.  Despite spotting what looked like a well carved path to the south of the hill, Alan decided that we should cut through a plantation and then ascend the steep heather and rock strewn eastern slopes.  It was a rough ascent and the only diversion from the slog was the occasional beating of Grouse with their familiar squawks and whirring flight.  The blaeberries provided some sustenance for the ultimate challenge of Scottish hills, not the wind or the wet rock but the calf deep heather.

We eventually emerged on a shelf below the final slopes and found the path that we should have ascended.  It was into the cloud and the rain began to test our waterproofs. The walk to the summit was easy going and the summit itself was typical of so many days out on the Scottish hills.  A pile of rocks with a grey wet backcloth.  I was reminded that during a second round of munros over half of all the summits had been in similar circumstances. The cold clammy wet atmosphere provided a baseline against which any summit with a view or even better a touch of blue were regarded as privileged outings. It was with this in mind that I rescued the camera and Alan took a photograph of the raindrop on the lens.

The descent was a lot quicker as we charged down the path and reached the old farm steadings of Balhennie.  Rabbits were manically racing about and the pink granite of the old buildings were in stark contrast to the rich green pastures. We arrived back at the road end and as we removed our wet waterproofs, Aileen arrived to give us a lift back to our respective holiday lets. It was not a classic walk but it sure was typical of so many days in the Scottish hills and it felt good that this had been restricted to less than 3 hours. Craigievar Castle was the undoubted highlight of today.