Leaving the minibus at 8:30am the six members of the group headed along the south side of Loch Muick.

Broad Cairn in low cloud

Approaching the Black Burn bridge

The President’s Party splintered at the Black Burn bridge and disintegrated at Alan’s Hut high above Loch Muick as Derek & Harvey headed straight down towards Bachnagairn after reaching there by the ‘streak of lightening’ path. Adrian had a break on Sandy’s Seat after ascending with Derek and awaited the arrival of the other party who came up via the zig-zag path at the bottom of the Black Burn which was impressive, pouring a large quantity of water into the Loch after 2 days of rain.

The Black Burn

Loch Muick from high on the zig zag path

Glas Allt from the high track

Like a scene from Monty Python, they stood about saying ‘what are we going to do now’ at Alans Hut

Broad Cairn now clear of cloud

Looking down Loch Muick with Mount Keen in the background

These 5 then set off in two different directions with Sandy and Roger heading down the same route as Derek and Adrian, Garry and myself heading up Broad Cairn. After taking a break on the summit a ‘plan’ was hatched to head west and descend to Glen Doll via Jocks Road.

Summit of Broad Cairn

After leaving the summit we set off towards the Cairn of Gowal which we contoured round before crossing some boggy ground to then ascend to the ridge to the south of the Knaps of Fafernie where waterproofs were donned for the first time as the rain pelted down for 10 minutes. We were kept entertained for a short time by a massive herd of deer that came up from Glen Callater, round the flank of Tolmount and over to the slopes of Tom Buidhe, something had obviously ‘spooked’ them. (I never got a photo which was daft of me)

Cairn Bannoch and Carn an t’Sagairt Mor from Broad Cairn

Looking back to Broad Cairn

Crow Craigies from above Glen Callater

After initially heading round the south side of Crow Craigies we hit Jocks Road near the col between it and the 874 point on the OS 1:50,000.
Jocks Road, new ground for the President, was then followed, firstly to lunch outside Davies Bourach, then back to the car park in Glen Doll which was reached 5 minutes after a rain shower started which saw waterproofs again being donned for the last 800 yards.

Heading down towards Glen Doll after lunch at Davies Bourach

Further down Glen Doll

Looking back from further down Glen Doll

Many thanks to Roger for organising and to Ken for being our patient driver for the day.