The plan for today was a recce for Mike’s upcoming Tullich Hill walk, but doubts as to driving up and along the Glen Douglas road given the overnight temperatures meant a plan B instead, a look to see how the forestry work on Cruach Tairbeirt was progressing. Leaving the Slanj car-park our change of plan was somewhat prudent as one side of the short section of road up to the station was covered in heavy ice where some lying water had obviously frozen solid, and Glen Douglas can be a bit of a wet road with water running off of the hillside at the best of times.

Anyway, we were off on the track up through the felled forest area and soon across the two main forest roads and into the remaining forest area, which now has a few more trees blocking some parts of the track, but easy enough to by-pass. Breaking out of the forest the winter colours of the dormant bracken and grasses were quite beautiful. A wet track in the best of conditions, the freezing temperatures had frozen the ground, but care was needed on two fronts, in some cases the water was frozen solid, and therefore slippery, and in others it looked solid but one false step and it gave way and plunged the boot into a pool of water. Interesting!

As we gained height we crossed the snow line with a rough covering now lying atop the heather and grasses, and with height came some wonderful views, especially over to the Arrochar Alps where the higher hills had an early winter covering of snow that looked considerably deeper than that which we were currently walking through. Cruach Tairbeirt is a beautiful little hill with an interesting approach as the narrow track winds and climbs up and around some rocky knolls, before a final flatter approach to the summit trig point. On our ascent we had been sheltered from the northwest wind that was blowing, but the moment we popped our heads onto the summit area the bitterly cold wind made it’s presence known with a vengeance, and so once the summit photos were taken, we skuttled back down below the wind blown summit and contemplated how we would make our return.

We would liked to have made a circular route, however after a short survey to the east of the summit, it became obvious that no direct route was available, and the lower forestry work may well have proven difficult to traverse, and so after a very leisurely break we returned to the summit area and simply retraced our steps back down the snowy hillside, through the forest and back to the car park, where we were grateful to see that the Slanj, or rather Kirk o’ the Lochs as it is now known was open just beckoning us for a coffee and a comfortable seat on their leather sofas.

A very leisurely day on a fine wee hill, thanks Ian and Mike.