By: Blonde One
You might assume that a week long trip to Scotland would be full of mountains, hills and hard slog, but you would be wrong. I had the pleasure of a very easy loch side walk on my trip and was rewarded with some amazing scenery that a mountain couldn’t provide. There was something very special about having lunch on a beach covered in deep snow, whilst gazing at the loch backed by mountains. It was very reminiscent of my trips to Norway and the fjords.
Loch Ericht begins at the village of Dalwhinnie which, although very small, hosts a railway station, a great café and a distillery. The 14 mile long loch is good for trout fishing and is overlooked by several Munros, including the 1148 metre high Ben Alder.
The Loch Ericht estate has several houses that can be hired and they looked so romantic in the snow. I would have happily had a holiday there and spent the entire time looking at the stunning vistas of the water and mountains.
My advice if you’re visiting Scotland is to make sure you have a mixture of hill walking and lowland walking. There is so much to see on a lowland walk that you might miss if you are hell bent on Munro bagging.
Many Munros can be more easily accessed using a mountain bike. The group at the end of Loch Ericht including, as you mention, Ben Alder is a good example. I cycled a large part of the way and abandoned the bike not long after the bridge in my Photoshop painting – link below:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/fzadr142gd0k56c/BenAlderjpga%20copy.jpg?dl=0
I would rather swim across than use that bridge!
If you click on “full screen” at the bottom you will see the painting to better advantage.