UKC

A quick post to thank Dave Hewitt for sharing his preferred route on Ben Lawers, starting at Tombreck Farm. Good weather yesterday tempted me out and I enjoyed a fine day out. However, I was struck by the very poor state of the path on the descent from Ben Lawers to Bheinn Ghlas - very badly eroded and ribboned. 

I was amused to meet a chap doing a water vole survey on the lower slopes. We agreed it seemed a very unlikely habitat!

Happy to be of help. Glad you had a good day. That initial moorlandy section above the track can be a bit of a grind, but it doesn't last too long and the top part is lovely. Did you meet anyone before the main summit?

Warm day for it yesterday - good effort. I went up Whitewisp from the Dollar back road in the afternoon and it felt a bit much. Couldn't even face the usual link to Tarmangie - flopped down at the Whitewisp cairn for 20 minutes and ate a Tunnocks that I'd somehow managed to keep from melting.

Re the main path off Ben Lawers, it is something of a trip hazard, especially in descent where the stepped sections need care and folk (me included, I must confess) tend to angle off left or right to easier ground. Mind you, it's not as awkward as the pitched section of the main Tarmachan path, in the steep little gully - that appears to have been built by someone with small feet!

Interesting about the survey - there are plenty of common voles around (again in the Ochils the southern slope of Blairdenon is a good place to see them), but water voles are more unusual.

I met the chap doing the water vole survey on the track up from Tombreck, but once I left the track and he headed further east, I didn't see anyone else on the way up, and on the way down, once I left Bheinn Ghlas, I saw a shepherd and his three dogs, and on-one else. By contrast, the section between Ben Lawers and Beinn Ghlas was quite busy.

The weather was very kind. There were clouds about, but they kept moving away from me for the most part, so the only part that wasn't sunny was the section above the track below Ben Lawers - which helped prevent overheating! 

Years ago a pal and I sort of helped a shepherd on that descent - we got back to the track and found a sheepdog very patiently sitting, waiting. Realised it had a cut paw. It wasn't for coming down with us, so we headed off with the idea of going to the farm when we got down, but on the zigzags we met the shepherd driving up, looking for the dog, so we were able to tell him where it was - he drove back down with it and offered a lift but we were almost down by then and out for a walk anyway. He said it was a borrowed dog, so was relieved to have got it back before anything worse befell it.

Yep!

I'd imagine the extra almost 600m of height you had would have helped - the top of Whitewisp had a light breeze but it was still pretty warm and the descent (by a slightly mad route beside the old fence) seemed to take me straight back into the fly/cleg zone. That was my 233rd time up Whitewisp and it appears to have been the first time I'd not linked it with any other hill - an indication of the warmth of the day and also the ageing process, I fear!

The one time I went up Lawers from Loch Tay I was rewarded on the upper slopes by these rare beauties, Alpine gentian and Alpine fleabane.

Brilliant - lovely photographs. When I last went up that way, on a warm day in May this year, I parked in the usual layby east of Tombreck. This has a big council bin beside it, and not for the first time when I've been there the council lorry appeared as I was getting ready. Two bin men (refuse operatives?) got out, one quite wiry and not young. I said I was heading up the hill and he said "There's lots of alpines up there". This took me by surprise and was a nice debunking-preconceptions moment to start the day. (His colleague, the more standard hefty baldy/beery type, added a cheery "Ah'm sweatin' like a pig".)

I'm sure there was gentian as I made my way up, but I don't recall seeing aby of the fleabane. 

It was fascinating to observe the change in plant life as I climbed. The initial track from the road was largely banked by bracken on either side, and then above the track at the 600m level, the habitats changed, including one section with a lot of small white flowers and moths flitting about. 

There wasn't a lot of birdlife, but there was one Red Kite and the first Golden Plover I've seen for some years.