The Cateran Trail: Day 3 ~ Spittal of Glenshee to Kirkton of Glenisla

Well, would ya believe it? 

No porridge. 

We're in Scotland, staying in tourist accom, & they all seem to have forgotten to get oats from Lidl, or wherever :-/ 

I said it yesterday, so excuse me for repeating myself, but,  How poo is that?

Anyway, apart from no porridge, the breakfast was edible, & after Bob had finished describing an alternative route past Loch Beanie, we were on our way.

It turned out the 2 blokes we'd trailed yesterday were called John & Bob (a different Bob, & they'd had a crap dinner, too! ), & they'd set out about 10 min before we did. 

I think they took the Loch Beanie route as we never saw them again.

Our route was round the back of the hotel & across the "Old Military Road" & Shee Water ~ which we kept down on our right for quite a while. 

For about 3/4 of an hour we walked with farmland on the right & moor on the left, & having gone behind the wall marking the edge of the farm for a Rule10, I found this.

I was well chuffed. If you click on it (apologies, focus not great :-(  ) you may be able to see it was a black ram. 
Maybe these lambs' Dad? 

The buildings of the farm they belonged to was halfway between Shee Water & the moor wall, & it was horrendously muddy. The Trail appeared to go right through the farm yard, but there was no sign of life.

There were a lot of bullocks, though, & it was probably their hoof prints that churned up the mud such a lot?

Once out of the farm yard, John started casting about for the next marker & we found it lying on its side ~ possibly having doubled as a bullock scratching post?

Hazel stuck it back upright, & off we went again.

John was quite keen to find the turn off for Loch Beanie (does it wear a hat? ;-p ), & while we wear trying to work out where we were supposed to turn left, I found this.

How cool is that?

It wouldn't fit in my day sack like the horn (which had joined the muesli bars etc.), so I hung it off the top. I felt quite Wallace ;-p

The photos were taken today (25 2 15). They've had a bit of a scrub since May 15th 2013 & now sit on my lounge shelving :-)

John tried to find the waymarker to Loch Beanie for ages, & seemed determined to go that way. I don't think Hazel was keen to turn away from the basic route, & I certainly wasn't happy just following some verbal instructions from Bob. 

Maybe another time ~ accompanied by someone who knows the way. After all, we would have been a long way from Anywhere had we got lost, & I didn't trust a route through the Highlands that wasn't obvious to follow.

Anyway, the upshot was we followed the basic route along the Shee for about 5 miles, & it was lovely walking.

John taking his ball home ;-p

I spent quite a bit of this section walking with Hazel. I got the impression we had spoiled John's fun a bit. Ah well. C'est la vie!

The Trail eventually came out on an unmetalled road leading up to the back entrance to Dalnaglar Castle. 

There was big wall in the way, but being the monkey I am (according to the Chinese zodiac, & my penchant for climbing things), I got up high enough to take this pic.

Apparently it's a retreat for some family or other, but you can hire the place! I note the website says 'Prices on request'. 

In other words, if you have to ask, you can't afford it ;-p

My notes are a bit garbled, so I surfed a bit to check the name, & came across this pic of the castle in the snow. It looks like that photographer was a monkey, too :-)

With the castle to our right, the track curved round to the left & up through some woods belonging to the castle. We knew this because there were signs warning peeps not to go in as there was a danger of being shot! 

Um %-\

We then hit a small country lane, &, at a 3-way junction on the B951, found some logs & stones to sit on for lunch. There was a handy little wood for a Rule10 as well.

Too much information? ;-p

It had been pretty sunny & warm so far, but started to spit as we were finishing up, so Hazel became a crow again!

The Cateran Trail bumf says the next part of the trail "followed quiet minor roads" & takes you past Forter Castle.

God it was boring :-(

It doesn't sound far, but 2.5 miles on a tiny tarmac road, dodging traffic was crap. The best bit was eventually (after a couple of miles) catching sight of Forter Castle in the distance and getting closer, little by little.

A 1/4 of a mile west of Forter, the B951 curved right, but we headed down the lane to the village, & discovered a renovated keep in the valley.

The main entrance

Arty-farty castle & tree pic

This is what the web says about Forter Castle:

Forter Castle

This is a story of a bloody feud…and some prodigious walking.
Forter Castle is a 16th century keep, originally owned by the Ogilvies, one of the oldest families in Angus. The chief of the family was created Earl of Airlie in 1639 by Charles 1, and a year later he was away fighting for Charles in England when the Campbells of Argyll took their chance to further a long-running feud between the clans.
The story goes that the Campbell raiding party took just two days to cross from Inverary! The Earl’s wife was heavily pregnant at the time and living at Forter Castle, but she got enough warning from her eldest son to escape and walked over to Dundee with the younger children, where she gave birth to a baby girl.
The Campbells passed a leisurely two weeks burning and looting the Ogilvy estates. So much so, that it was said at the time the Earl of Airlie was ‘left not in all his lands a cock to craw day.’ On their way out of the glen they burned Forter Castle and it remained a blackened shell until was restored in the mid 1990s.

NB: Inveraray to Forter is about 100 miles using the current A roads, but I guess the Campbells would have gone across country. Nifty going in 2 days!

Forter to Dundee is 30 miles. Not bad going for a pregnant lady, & without the mod-cons of today's walkers like specialist boots, Gore Tex, etc.

The Cateran bumf suggests the "more energetic walkers" may wish to take the alternative route into Glenisla by crossing Mount Blair. It says "the summit offers panoramic views of the surrounding countryside and on a clear day you may even spot Ben Nevis in the distance." 

Well, we'd been able to see Mt Blair more or less all day. It's dead easy to spot ~ there's a telecoms mast on top!

After the castle, the road curved left through the village (a hamlet, really ~ no shop, pub or church), & then down & right ~ onto a road leading to Kirkton of Glenisla. A signpost by a Cateran Trail waymarker said it was 4 miles away along the lane, but we climbed over a stile & cut back on ourselves as we climbed over 100m along a track which took us up above Auchintaple Loch. By going this way we would end up doing 6 miles not 4, but at least it was off the tarmac :-)

The river Isla from the track up to Auchintaple Loch

I have to admit that initially I wasn't much chuffed having to walk Away from our destination for an hour, but it was nice once we got up there ~ & turned in the right direction again. My built-in compass had been having a right moan about walking north-east instead of south east!

John, Hazel & Auchintaple Loch

Once up top, there was short stretch above the loch, & then a marker showed we had to branch right & go down to the woods ~ the ones above John's head in the pic.

Ah. Woods :-)  

It was great in there. All dark green & peaceful. Awesome.

Even if the was a man lurking behind a rock ??

Shame it was less than a mile before we came out again. 

Shortly after we left the nameless wood, we branched left to climb above the loch behind us, and eventually ended up crossing a Really boggy bit. We could see the waymarker a little way ahead on (dry) moorland, but we had to negotiate a fair stretch of bog to get there. I stuck to the fence. I figured, if fence posts would stay in, it must be more stable there than the rest of it.

It was pretty hard going for well over 1/2 an hr., but once higher up, the going was easier. 

After that the trail stayed quite high, & we passed Loch Shanda on our left. Sorry, no pic.

Loch Shanda behind us, we took a right fork & walked across a high bleak bit of farm land (sheep country?), for a mile or so before walking down 2 sections of Very straight track down towards our old friend, the B951.

The high sheep-country, John, & a waymarker

Once there we turned to our right (WSW) & had our final few minutes' walk back along the road we'd 1st walked on 9K (& about 5 hours) previously.

Our hotel was named after the glen, & was clearly a 'walkers with money' place. 


It was quite pricey, but the fire was hot & the food was good.

John never made dinner, & Hazel came down a while after me.
So, I ate my garlic bread & brie on my ownsome, sitting with my back to the fire in the chair by the 2 guns.

Garlic bread & brie for tea. The malt's off-shot to the right!

My room was a west facing single, en-suite, & I spent a fair while in the power shower sorting out the bits that had worked hard that day.
Plus, with 11 miles to Alyth, I was hoping there'd be porridge to start me off ;-q
OAO