Grey Mares Tail, Glen Falloch

Tuesday 2nd June 2015

A little later than usual I returned to Scotland for my annual trip to the hillwalker's playground of the Highlands, but before starting the main purpose for my coming to Scotland this year I had planned a day up a Munro, that is a mountain in Scotland more than three thousand feet high. I had intended on climbing one of the Crianlarich hills before moving on, but as is often the case in Britain bad weather intervened. Instead I decided to do a walk along the West Highland Way, the ninety-six mile trail from the outskirts of Glasgow to the centre of Fort William, which is a walk that I did myself in 2004 on my first walking holiday in Scotland. Despite the wet weather I was looking forward to retracing my steps from all those years ago and to see whether anything had changed. The biggest change, however, was in Crianlarich and happened in only the last year when a bypass was built to avoid the low railway bridge in the village. Soon after crossing the road beside the railway station the link between Crianlarich and the West Highland Way crosses underneath the bypass and climbs steeply into the pre-existing conifer wood.

Once the hillside has recovered I suppose the road won’t look so bad, but as I climbed out of village I was more interested in the views of the Crianlarich hills or what I could see of them below the clouds. There was a smattering of recently fallen snow on the hills that further convinced me of the wisdom to stay at the bottom of the valley on this walk rather than venturing up high. I was finally reassured by the strong winds that greeted me once I had passed through delightful woodland to the junction on the West Highland Way where the Crianlarich link joins. The rain had eased at this point so when I finally set off south along the West Highland Way I had pleasant views towards the Munros on the western side of Glen Falloch with intermittent bursts of sunshine that promised better weather to come but ultimately failed to deliver.

This section of the Way, near Keilator, was particularly muddy and I had a suspicion that it had been this bad eleven years ago, which a check back to my blog from that time confirmed when I made this comment: “I don’t know if it is a deliberate gesture by the Scots against a symbol of English domination, but the (old military) road was covered with animal mess. This made it one of the trickiest sections of the day, trying to avoid the muck, occasionally it was unavoidable.” I walked along this section of the Way again a year later, in 2005, and on that occasion dryer conditions made for a much more pleasant walk. That was not the case now as bands of rain passed over while I made my way along the trail down the valley. The surface of the Way at this point is very rough indicating that it is a very old track and that a lot of feet have passed along it since any maintenance was done on it. To be honest, I think the track was more interesting to walk upon in this state than a smooth, recently manufactured trail and so I gladly made my way down to the bottom of the valley eventually crossing the road and the railway line.

The tunnel under the railway on the West Highland Way amuses me as it is only chest height requiring an awkward stoop especially for those carrying a large rucksack (not uncommon on the West Highland Way!). Since I was heading against the usual flow of traffic on the Way I had already passed many, many people on this highly popular trail though as I continued beside the River Falloch the flow of traffic eased giving me a quieter walk beside the noisy river. After passing the construction area for a hydroelectric scheme in Glen Falloch the weather improved and I was able to get fantastic views of the waterfalls and cascades on the river while the footpath widened into an estate track that took me all the way to Beinglas Farm. Just as I was beginning to think the weather was going to be good for the rest of the day, it started raining as I was approaching the campsite and didn’t stop for the rest of the day.

Undaunted I turned left onto a heavily eroded path that snakes steeply up the hillside beside the Ben Glas Burn heading towards the waterfall Grey Mares Tail. This is quite a common name for a waterfall in Scotland and in fact this is one of the lesser known Grey Mares Tails (the tallest and best known is near Moffat in the Southern Uplands), but I thought it would still look particularly spectacular due to the rain. First I had to climb the steep path with torrents of water pouring down the path itself, but the climb was enlivened by bluebells growing amongst the young bracken which kept me going until I reached the thunderous series of cascades. It was an awesome sight to see huge amounts of water pouring down the hillside, but the ground was so wet and muddy I was unable to get a good look at the waterfall. I found myself wishing that I could return in better weather, until I realised that then there’d be less water and it would less spectacular.

Returning onto the path I continued to climb above the cascades and onto the bleak moorland above the waterfall where the Ben Glas Burn snakes a course through a hanging valley with the Munro of Ben Chabhair hidden in the distance amongst the thick clouds. During a brief respite from the rain I tried to have my lunch beside the burn, but when the rain started again I packed up and made my way back down into the valley on an estate track that gave me a relaxing and easy descent down to the West Highland Way. As the rain continued to fall I made my way back along the Way all the way back up Glen Falloch to Crianlarich. I had intended on this walk to do a repeat of the walk that I had done in 2005 around the Glen Falloch Group, but the high winds and persistent rain had changed my plans. Nevertheless I enjoyed being back in the highlands and walking past those great mountains even though on this occasion I wasn’t able to get to the top of them.