Finding the hill is the toughest part!
The Big Climb • Published 4 Jan 2011 09:30
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Watch out for the hard core deer as they don’t like to move out the way.
Alloa hillwalker Kenny Wilson's latest blog covers finding, and then climbing, Meall Buidhe (Glen Lyon) in Perthshire.
As I have written before sometimes finding the start of a walk is harder than doing it as I found with this one.
After looking at the map and consulting the AA route planner there were two routes for me to choose from and once I set out on a very very cold early morning I decided that the Callander/Killin road was bound to be slippy so I carried on up the A9 via Aberfeldy which is much longer but worked out the best as I found out later the road from Killin to Glen Lyon was only passable in a 4x4.
So get to Aberfeldy and head out by Weem and then Fortingall until you get to the small village of Bridge of Balgie, now the fun starts as the Dam you're looking for isn't signed posted at all.
Once through the village you come to a fork in the road, follow the signs for Loch Lyon 11 miles (no through road) not Killin, drive til you reach a sign for the estate and turn right and follow this road up to the Dam where you can park your car opposite an information sign and a gate marked private road (please don't block the road or gate).
Watch out for the hard core deer as they don't like to move out the way of cars!
Walk along the private road and once your level with the dam you should see a very small cairn marking a faint path, this is your starting point of a very wet path which luckily for me was frozen but you can see it can be very boggy.
Follow the path north passing through some stony out crops picking up some wooden poles along the way till you reach the southern arm of Meall a'Phuill, the path heads north again till you reach Meall Buidhe's summit with its well defined cairn and nice view to be had on a clear day. Return by the route you came up.
As this is a fairly easy walk most people take in Stuchd an Lochain as well but due to a recent car crash (not my fault) my back and shoulder were hurting so I decided to call it a day and come back another day but all you need to do is cross the face of the dam over a locked gate and follow the road on the other side of the dam which leads to the boat house.
Just after the dam wall a faint path on your left hand side marked with a cairn marks your path once again a wet path waits to greet you.
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