Waet Highland Way - Day 2

Monday 5 June - Drymen to Balmaha

We awoke to a bleak, gray, wet day. There had been overnight rain and light rain was still falling as we went down to breakfast at 8 o'clock.

We were in no rush today and, as we were returning to the Hillview B & B for a their second night, we kitted up in our wet weather gear and left packed only the bare minimum of items for the days walk.

By the time we got going the rain had almost stopped and we could have discarded our wet weather gear quite early.

The first part of the day, once we cleared Drymen, was initially next to and then through the woodland of Garadhban Forest. Parts of the forest had been harvested while tall trees remained in places. The soil depth appeared to be very shallow as we saw a number of large trees that had fallen and the root system was virtually flat.

From time to time we had views over Loch Lomond.

There were also views over the surrounding countryside which was particularly pretty when the sun was out.

There are two ways to reach Balmaha. One is around (sort of over) Conic Hill and the other is a low route. This seemed perfectly reasonable as the song about Loch Lomond refers to the "high road" and the "low road". Jen and split up as we decided that she should not push herself by going via Conic Hill. I think that this was a wise choice. So while found her way to Balmaha on the low route I tackled the high route which included climbing to the top of Conic Hill.

Conic Hill

 

The track skirting Conic Hill

The views from Conic Hill down onto Loch Lomond were excellent. The track to the top of the hill was challenging particularly on the way down.

Ah, Loch Lomond!

Conic Hill had a number of interesting features. Entering the area was through a very high gate in a fence that stretched up to 6 feet high, too.

These measures are to protect the Conic Hill sheep (which don't look all that different to those we saw when doing the Coast to Coast).

There were plenty of wee burns gushing forth water from the overnight rain as well as the odd larger waterway roaring down the side of Conic Hill.

The roar from this waterway was almost deafening

 Here I am standing atop Conic Hill with Loch Lomond behind me.

As well as the loch there was plenty of other pretty vistas.

Todays flowering plant is an Ajuga

All up today, I walked 12.17km with an elevation gain of 386m. Steps came in at a tad over 21K