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Fieldnotes
| Meall Nan Clachan (AKA Na Carraigean Edintian) Sunday 12/8/01 3:15pm It's taken a trip of almost 4 hours to get here- 1 hour travelling from the Kavan at Bridge of Cally and another 3 hours walk from the car park at Allean. Saying all that we've got Harrydog who has been tracking deer through the forest and Aedan in his heavily-laden off-road buggy, plus we also stopped off for lunch! We'd tried before to get to this stone circle a few years back, but we set off a bit too late on a Winters afternoon and it was starting to get dark whilst we were still on the Allean forest trail so decided to leave it for another day. This is one of the best preserved of the Perthshire four-posters and is in a fantastic setting- I expected the circle to be set in trees, but these have been felled since the last OS survey leaving a great moorland top. There's views over to Schiehallion and Farragon to the south and Ben Vrackie to the east with Beinn a Ghlo just hidden by a line of trees. The stones are four fairly large granite blocks which run in a perfect N/S E/W alignment. The southernmost stone has a beautiful spiralling quartz pattern with rose quartz veins. Up here there's only the sound of very distant dogs barking, flies buzzing past (on the way up here we saw some monster dragonfly- we've seen smaller birds than those), and the occasional squeal of delight from five month old Aedan who is looking at a map of the area with Kat. Another cracking site that's well worth the journey. NB-see the folklore section- I never noticed the hut circle (not on Pathfinder map) or the avenue lined with stones- however, this was probably written before trees were planted here and could have all been lost in the cultivation process. Directions Travelling through Pitlochry to the North stay on the B8019, past a caravan site on the left hand side, then turning next left over the Garry Bridge (still on the B8019) towards Queens View and Tummel Bridge. On past the Queens View visitors centre and just beyond is a sign for Allean Forest walks etc on the right. Turn in here and start walking! I used a combination of maps- Pathfinder 294, a rather good 1:10 000 orienteering map I had bought a few years before from the Queens View visitors centre and the guide to Tay Forest Park (mebbe a bit overboard, but I'm dead sad and love a good map to myself :)). The easiest way to get to the stones (though mebbe not the most direct route) was to follow the red way markers to a junction in the forest track at 862605 (basically the furthest northeast of the waymarked trail). From here we followed the forest track round Meall na h-lolaine (this was built after the OS survey and is only marked on the orienteering map) and had cracking views on the north side of this hill. A pretty indistinct path leaves the main track at 841619 approx NWW across the moor to the circle. Whew! |
Posted by Martin 27th August 2001ce Edited 27th July 2003ce
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