15 October 2025: Ben Vrackie revisit

 

On 17 May 2017, at 6 in the morning, on a day without a cloud in the sky, I set off up Ben Vrackie. Two hours later, without meeting a single person (unsurprising considering the time of day), I got back to Bertie-the-Motorhome and rushed off to meet Mick.

If I’d known that some eight years later I would find myself going up there again, I could have saved myself the early start and the rush to reach Blair Atholl by 9am!

Today's visit to Ben Vrackie didn’t, strictly speaking, require me to visit the summit, as the purpose of this TGOC East recce was to see what the ground was like dropping off the hill to the NE, to pick up the track on its N side, then to see whether the track to Shinagag is still evident on the ground. However, given that my route took me within metres of the summit, it would have been silly not to have nipped up there.

The Visitor Centre at Killiecrankie was my chosen start point (mainly because it was my end point, so it made the logistics easier if I started there too), so I left Mick & Bertie in the car park and headed off up what I would assess as the less-oft trod route. Most people ascend from the car park to the N of Pitlochry, and thus I only met one couple until I reached the main path at Loch a’Choire. 

 Loch a'Choire on approach and looking back at it

Looking up that stone staircase I couldn’t believe how many people were ahead of me. A group of about 10 had stopped for a break, and decided the best time to set off was moments before I reached them. I was so close to the summit by then that it was a toss up as to whether to just slowly bring up the rear, or to make them aware that I wasn’t a member of their group and that I’d quite like to pass. Reaching a switch-back where there was a well-trodden cut-off, I made an impulsive decision and managed to pass the whole group – but goodness, was I huffing and puffing by the time I popped out in front of them. Maybe the slow plod at the rear would have been the better choice!

With 17 people on the summit, I didn’t loiter. A quick selfie, a few snaps of the view, then onwards with my route. I did stop for a chat with a chap on the next nobble along the way, one of the topics of which was the bellowing of the stags, close by yet invisible (technically camouflaged, rather than invisible, I suppose (because I know that Mick will pick me up on the point when he proof-reads this post!)).

The initial trodden line petered out, but the going was easy enough to pick up the track (a grassy, boggy ATV track), and it was along there that I started seeing the deer. Great groups of does being tracked by bellowing stags both sides of me. Fortunately, the stags were sufficiently transfixed by their harems to not see me as a threat. 

A locked deer-fence gate, followed immediately by a well-secured six-bar gate. What’s that about!?

The views from the next, out-and-back section of my route were superb, but I fear my photos haven’t captured the array of colours.
 

I didn’t need to go the whole way to Shinagag, opting to turn back at the point where I could clearly see that the rest of the way ahead was clear and problem-free.

Lovely old grassy track to Shinagag

At Loinmarstaig the area was alive with pheasants. More surprisingly, there were patches (I would say fields but that feels like the wrong term in the context of the hillside location) of brassicas growing.

 

At the exact location where I took this photo I was supposed to be checking out something that was immediately behind me. I only remembered that element of ‘things I was supposed to be checking out’ about a kilometre later, by which time I didn’t feel inclined to go back.  

 

Aside from the autumn colours, the only other notable feature of the rest of the outing was the wooden walkway by the waterfall along the Allt Girnaig. It’s an odd location for such a grand walkway, and I can’t imagine many people go up there just to see one waterfall, which is perhaps why the walkway has fallen into such disrepair – not only with lots of broken planks, but with part of the structure itself having suffered a failure. I proceeded along it with utmost caution.

It was then a stroll along a track back to Killiecrankie, after an excellent outing, mainly carried out in my shirt-sleeves, it was so warm in the sunshine.

(20.2km, 880m)