Rannoch Moor Routes 10-12
A three-day route into the Scotland's most savage scenery
Rannoch Moor. Right in the middle of the Highlands, it’s 15 miles of nothing much at all. Peat bog, heather and a scatter of granite boulders. The Glencoe Macdonalds came through this way – once they were in among the peat pools, there was no point chasing after them and the cows they stole off you. Seven railway surveyors with umbrellas tried to cross in January 1889 and almost lost their lives.
Today, though, there’s a way across that misses all that. No sinking waist deep in the peat; no wandering bewildered among swampy pools. You can enjoy the cold whispering of the wind, the cries of geese on moorland lochans and the bleak, ochre bones of the peat-preserved pines from a series of firm-footed trackways (with a short soggier section on Route 11). This is a reasonably easy three-day trip through some of Scotland’s most savage scenery.
TRANSPORT
The only way to return from the end of the walk at Corrour is by
train, which links back to the start at Bridge of Orchy (with coach and train links). Both stations are served by the Caledonian Sleeper Highland route between London and Fort William, www.sleeper. scot. White Corries has coaches back to Bridge of Orchy or south to Glasgow; Rannoch Station is also on the West Highland Railway. www.scotrail.co.uk; www. citylink.co.uk; www.traveline.info 0871 200 2233
PUBS/GRUB
Bridge of Orchy Hotel www. bridgeoforchy.co.uk; Inveroran Hotel www.inveroran.com; Kings House Hotel www. kingshousehotel.co.uk; Rannoch Station Tearoom www. rannochstationtearoom.co.uk; Corrour Station House restaurant www.corrour.co.uk/ station-house/restaurant.
ACCOMMODATION
Bridge of Orchy Hotel with bunkhouse, also West Highland Way Sleeper bunkhouse at the station; Inveroran Hotel; Kings House Hotel with bunkhouse; Moor of Rannoch Hotel at Rannoch Station (01882) 633238 www.moorofrannoch.co.uk; Loch Ossian Youth Hostel (01397) 732207
PRACTICALITIES
Pack your wild camping gear and stock up at Tyndrum, which has fuel, cafés, shops, bunkhouse and hotels.
TOURIST INFO
Tyndrum TIC (01838) 400246; accommodation pages on www.west-highland-way.co.uk; www.visitscotland.com; www.kinlochrannoch.com