Not sunny but a dry day and not too cold. We started from
the Triangle with only a single explorer once again (Alexander,
plus Mairi, of course), but when we arrived at Arivegaig car
park, there was Kate, with Maighsi and Roanna hiding under
the bridge doing fish impressions. Before we left the Triangle
we spoke to a couple of visitors, one of whom had been brought
up at Drumbeag.
I was a little apprehensive this time since I had been told
there was a lot of traffic on the track related to the TV
project, but the only vehicles we saw were driven very carefully
by local friends. The road surface was greatly improved and
we had an easier walk to the power station than I expected.
The power station at Gorten is an old stone building which
I have always thought to have been built when Mr Rudd had
the estate. I had never photographed it before so this time
I got a few shots, including one with the explorers.
Then we set off on the main expedition; the last time I was
on this ground (almost exactly six years ago, Expedition 227)
we had a bit of trouble getting up the burn but this time
I took a different route and we all managed OK, although we
needed our wellies from time to time.
The Gorteneorn Burn led us to a lovely walled meadow with
big ash trees all down the river. This place always has a
nice feeling about it and I'm surprised nobody built a house
here. The winter storms had brought several fallen trees down
the burn and they were spectacularly piled up to make a dam
at one point. The centre of the field was rather wet and the
dam may have caused the river to flood.
We had a good look at the ash trees and found owl pellets
under one of them, but there were no otter spraints along
the river. We carried on up the burn, crossing at intervals
when the going was easier on the other side, but we didn't
get as far as the waterfall. We turned east across a bracken-covered
field and climbed to the top of it where we found the remains
of two houses, and also the remains of a deer which hadn't
made it through the winter. The deer skull had been crushed
by an animal and there was some discussion as to what did
it. The unsightly remains did not put us off our Tunnock's
wafers when we stopped nearby.
I didn't want to come back exactly the same way so we followed
one of the many deer tracks across the hill and eventually
crossed a broken part of the stone wall back into the big
field. We forded the burn, except for one brave person who
crossed on a fallen tree, and followed the deer fence back
to the main track.
This area has always been good for tadpoles, but we didn't
see any this time although Roanna found a magnificent frog
and later transferred some stranded frogspawn into a pool.
We then carried on along the track back to the car park, but
one of the party spotted a strange little cairn near the shore
so we all went to see it. It turned out to be one of the most
skillfully-built cairns we ever saw, if the builder reads
this, congratulations. I got a picture of the cairn and then
we hurried back to the car, Kate and the girls having left
their bikes near the bridge.
Unfortunately the Tearoom was closed that weekend so I didn't
get any drawings.
John
Dye
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