Glen Ogle and Creag MacRànaich

Friday 9th September 2016

Due to another poor weather forecast I decided that my original option for this day, to climb Ben Vorlich repeating a walk that I did in 2007, would have to be abandoned. Not far from Ben Vorlich is a disused railway line through the valley of Glen Ogle that used to be an unusually pretty section of the railway. I spent a lot of time the previous evening studying a map of the area and I realised that it is possible to do a circular route through Glen Ogle and even, if the weather is kind, to bag a Corbett at the same time. When I got to the Glen Ogle car park, at Glenoglehead, it was throwing it down with rain and as I set off into Glen Ogle I started thinking about alternative plans that stayed at the bottom of the valley. It wasn’t long, however, before the rain stopped and as the sides of the valley steepened while the railway hugs tightly to the side of the hill, the weather starting turning out good. There were stunning views down the valley on this dramatic railway and I was enthralled by the railway architecture loving every moment, but Glen Ogle is only three miles long and even at a slow stroll I was at the southern end overlooking Loch Earn within an hour and a half.

At this point in the walk the weather was looking very promising and as I passed through a more overgrown section of the disused railway the sun was actually shining so I had no hesitation in reverting to the circular walk that I had planned the evening before. I came off the railway and started climbing into Glen Kendrum soon noticing signs for construction traffic: another hydroelectric scheme was being built in the Highlands. Behind me Ben Vorlich and Stuc a’ Chroin were struggling to shake off the low cloud and made me wonder what might have been. The Munros were looking quite accessible and I was almost regretting my decision to abandon my walk up these mountains. The weather the day before had been terrible and I had been expecting similar conditions for this walk, but after the rain at the start of the day I was enjoying some surprisingly good weather, however I knew that bad weather was forecast for later in the day.

The track up Glen Kendrum has been improved to allow access for the construction vehicles and this made things easier for me as I slowly made my way up the valley. The weather worsened as I climbed and inevitably, before I reached the top of the pass, it had started raining again. This didn’t put me off from trying to bag a Corbett so just before reaching the top of the pass I came off the path and made my own way up the steep slopes towards Creag MacRànaich. The hillside was very craggy and required a lot of care and thought to get up to the flatter summit ridge where a faint path appeared that I followed north through the clouds, past a cairn, and after a small descent up to another cairn that I believe is the summit of Creag MacRànaich. Sheltering behind a crag near the summit I had occasional views across the moor northwards to Killin where the sun was shining. However, at the top of this Corbett the weather was becoming very rough with strong cold winds and low clouds that soon forced me to abandon my lunch and immediately head back down onto the track.

This was not an easy descent as there is quite a distance between the summit and the track and in between there are some steep crags. When I reached the top of these crags I had no idea how I was going to get down until after making my way north for a while through the strong winds I eventually found a small break in the crags where steep grassy slopes safely led me all the way down to the track. I was very thankful to be back on this track where I was finally able to finish my lunch. With the Corbett bagged, my last peak in Scotland this year, and the weather worsening I made my way down the track following the increasingly tumultuous Ardchyle Burn down Gleann Dubh until I reached the point where the track crosses the river. By this point the burn was so full of water that I never had any thought of attempting to cross it and elected instead to stay on the right bank following a path into a conifer plantation. But my problems continued as it was soon obvious that this wood had recently been felled, which could restrict access. Carefully I made my way through the tangled branches and tree stumps keeping a look out for any active tree-felling.

I couldn’t see any sign of forestry operations so I continued to follow the burn down until I eventually reached the track of the disused railway in Glen Dochart. There were a few abandoned forestry machines beside the railway but no sign of anyone so I turned right and headed along the course of the old railway veering right at Killin Junction. Soon after passing the site of the old station I started to be able to hear the unmistakable sounds of tree-felling being carried out further up the line, therefore to avoid the forestry operations I turned around and took the lower path of the old branch line to Killin, however this diversion meant that when I reached the main A85 trunk road I had to turn right and walk beside the road for a couple of miles in pouring rain up to Glenoglehead. The heavy rain that had been promised had finally arrived and I now had to endure it until I finally reached the car park at the top of the pass. This was an astonishing walk with a fabulous start through the spectacular Glen Ogle in surprisingly good weather. Nipping up to the top of the Corbett was very challenging in the worsening weather and then more difficulties had to be overcome to avoid the tree-felling operations. This was not the best walk to finish my holiday in Scotland, but it is typical of the weather that I had enjoyed during the holiday.