On Friday 19^th October Graeme Tutin, Graeme Boydell and myself travelled from the Northeast to the River Tilt campsite in Blair Atholl, meeting Janet Chubb there who had travelled up from her home in the Borders earlier that day. We intended to walk the 46 miles from Blair Atholl to Aviemore via Glen Tilt & Glen Feshie in 4days with 3 wild pitches along the way.
Saturday
We left the campsite around 10am walking for about a mile on the road to the Old Bridge of Tilt and then following the track into Glen Tilt. The walking was all fairly easy going, we had lunch near Clachghlas farm, Graeme Tutin then headed by himself to climb the Munro Carn a’ Chlamain. The rest of us followed the track past Forest Lodge to pitch near the Falls of Taft. Graeme joined us 90 minutes later having bagged his Munro.
The pitch was made memorable by the seemingly constant barking of stags in rut,” they went on all night”.
Sunday
We started walking at 9.30 crossing Beaufort Bridge over the Falls of Taft, the path eventually opening out into some wonderful open country with many herds of Red Deer to be seen on the high ground, next we had to cross the Geldie Burn which if we had had wet weather could have been a bit of an obstacle, but fortunately it wasn’t bad and only one of us got wet feet.
We had lunch at the Geldie bothy then headed west along the path and across some remote moorland into the head of Glen Feshie.
Pitching opportunities seemed very limited at first but we found a wonderful spot in a Scots Pine forest about a mile from the Glen Feshie bothy. 16 miles today and fantastic scenery, a wonderful day's walking.
Monday
We started at 9.30 again taking the path past the bothy down Glen Feshie to Auchlean, we now had 5 miles of road walking to Feshiebridge, then entering the Moor of Feshie forest. On the map once you leave the forest there appears to be a large treeless level area with we thought would have lots of opportunities to pitch.
When we got there the ground was either bog, heather or huge tussocks, luckily there is a bothy at GR884057, which had short grass and enough space for our tents.
Tuesday
A short walk today, passing Loch an Eilein and on to Coylumbridge. The walk around the loch was almost alpine in nature, the air being cool and the heavy scent of pine.
From Coylumbridge we walked along the road via Inverdruie where we had one of the best bacon sarnies that I have ever had, and on to Aviemore.
Wednesday
Then returning to Blair Atholl at 3.20 pm by train.