Craig Maud (NO 238767, 814m)
The Dounalt (NO 245760, 802m)
Craig Rennet (NO 249757, 747m)

16 kilometres
920m of ascent

Another day, another walk along the rim of a glen—this time, the southern edge of Glen Doll.

I’d long been impressed by the potential viewpoint afforded by Craig Rennet, a sharp prow of rock that forms the northern limit of Corrie Fee. It juts unmistakably above the forestry in the lower reaches of the glen:

One could reach it by taking the usual pedestrian route up the back of Corrie Fee, and then diverting to the northeast along the corrie rim, but I had something different in mind. I wanted to take in the impressive line of crags that form the entire southern side of Glen Doll:

In the view above, we’re looking up to the head of the glen. The prominent summit at left is Craig Maud. The crags continue to The Dounalt beyond the left edge of frame, and eventually link to Craig Rennet. The White Water descends from the plateau into the glen through the steep-side gorge visible to the right of centre. The old droving route of Jock’s Road winds up along the more benign slopes on the north (right) side of the glen, and passes on to the plateau to the right side The Lunkard—the prominent little craggy lump at the head of the glen, standing between the White Water gorge and Jock’s Road.

So my aim was to follow Jock’s Road as far as The Lunkard, and then find a way across the White Water above the gorge, so that I could walk back to Craig Rennet via Craig Maud.

First, though, I had to reach the section of Jock’s Road visible in my photograph above. Unfortunately, the lower reaches of this historic path pass through the forestry on the north side of the White Water, and it’s still blocked by windfallen trees dating from Storm Arwen, at the end of 2021. At this late date, it seems unlikely this route will ever be restored, even after the mature, standing trees are harvested.

To bypass this mess, a new route continues a short way up the Corrie Fee path (which would be my route of descent), and then diverts on to the Dounalt path along the south side of the White Water, marked by an unobtrusive little sign:

The Dounalt path finally emerges at a substantial bridge over the White Water, and a short climb takes us back to the point at which Jock’s Road used to emerge from the forestry into the open glen.

And so, up Jock’s Road. Here’s the view as I approached the head of the glen:

The rocky prow of The Lunkard is centre frame. The gorge of the White Water is on its left, and you can also see a series of waterfalls marking the steep descent of the Burn of Fialzioch into the gorge.

I needed to reach the skyline above the Burn of Fialzioch falls, without getting tangled up in the White Water gorge. The obvious thing to do is to walk all the way up to the mountain shelter of Davy’s Bourach (of which I’ve written before), and then cross the White Water well above all the steep, craggy stuff (as I did on my way to Tom Buidhe). But I had another plan, born of a memory dating from the early 1980s.

I walked up Jock’s Road as far as the pleasant grassy cleft on the north side of The Lunkard. (This is an area that perhaps gives the crag its name, lunkard being a Scots word for a temporary shelter—the drovers may have camped in shelter near here after dropping down off the exposed plateau.) then I stepped across the wee burn that runs alongside the path, crossed the whaleback behind The Lunkard, and contoured across steep, heathery stuff above the White Water gorge, before emerging above a lovely little glade where the river runs quietly between a short upper set of waterfalls and the gorge itself.

I had a summer bivouac here in 1981, and then wrote a (deservedly unpublished) short story set at this spot. I suspect it’s largely unknown and rarely visited. It’s at NO 233776, if you care to take a look.

I was so pleased to find it again that I forgot to take a picture that does it justice. But here’s the waterfall at the upper end of “my” little glade:

The river is still wide enough here to be a little awkward to cross, but it’s manageable at a couple of spots, if it’s not in spate.

As I clambered up towards the plateau, my attention was distracted by several bright spots of reflected light, above and to my left. I diverted towards them, and found this:

When I deviated from my direct line of approach, the silvery rock turned black:

And here’s a close-up. Water seeping across the rock seems to be sustaining patches of dark algae, which retain a uniform sheen of reflective water:

A while ago, I recounted my visit to the rocks called the Glittering Skellies, above the head of Glen Clova. Having now seen how bright the reflected sunlight from water seepage can be, I’m pretty sure that this, rather than any glittering mica inclusions, is what gives the Glittering Skellies their name. Here they are, on a dull day—notice the same dark algal stains:

Ludicrously cheered by this discovery, I carried on towards Craig Maud, stepping across the Burn of Fialzioch just before it turned into a waterfall:

It’s pronounced “fee-AL-yoch”. Dorward offers Gaelic feith ailcheach, “stony bog-stream”, for its etymology, but these words seem to be fairly obscure.

Craig Maud is not named after anyone. It’s probably creag madadh, “crag of the mastiff”. It gives fine views down into the head of Glen Doll, and to the hills on the plateau beyond:

And from there I was also able to see my route ahead, over the whaleback of The Dounalt, with Glen Clova in the distance beyond:

The name Dounalt originally referred to the stream that issues from boggy ground between Craig Maud and The Dounalt. Dorward translates Gaelic dun allt as “stream of the hillfort”, but the Atlas of Hillforts records nothing in this vicinity—more likely, dun refers to the rocky eminence that has borrowed the stream’s name.

It proved to be a fine viewpoint. Here’s the view back towards Craig Maud and the head of the glen, with the line of Jock’s Road easily visible:

And ahead towards Craig Rennet and into Glen Clova:

Dorward connects Craig Rennet to Gaelic rinniche, a chisel or graving tool, for its sharp-pointed shape. To me, it seems more likely it’s just plain creag rinneach, “pointed crag”.

There’s a bit of descent to reach the true prow of the crag, from which the storm damage to the forestry below was painfully obvious:

Then it was back along the northern rim of Corrie Fee, over Erne Craigs. You’ll be pleased to learn that there’s no dubious Gaelic etymology involved with this one—the name comes from Old English, earn, “eagle”. Nowadays, the name erne is associated with the white-tailed eagle, but a few centuries ago it also designated the golden eagle, and these inland cliffs seem more like a golden eagle habitat. They certainly give a fine bird’s-eye view into Corrie Fee, which this autumn was positively psychedelic with purple heather, outlining the complex topography of the corrie floor:

And I could look across to the summit of Mayar, beyond the upper corrie, with the thread of the “tourist path” (mentioned in a previous report) clearly visible:

My plan was to cross the upper corrie, at right of frame above, to reach the path above the craggy stuff at the back of the lower corrie. Which worked out well, though the ground was fairly broken. Eventually I popped up out of the gully of the Fee Burn and on to the path, scaring the life out of a poor Munro-bagger who’d just settled down for a quiet sandwich on a handy rock.

Then it was just a matter of descending the modern, nicely engineered, zig-zag path into Corrie Fee proper, and following a broad woodland track to connect with my outward route.

In memory of Dave Hewitt (1961-2025), good friend and hill companion of thirty years. Missing you already.