Correen Hills circuit

Ian and Steve had to pull out of yesterday's walk but we still had 8 of us heading over to Donside to tackle the Correen Hills circuit, which takes in Clova, Badingair, Brux and Edinbanchory hills, finishing with Lord Arthur's hill.

We cut a little bit off the full ViewRanger route by parking cars at the Dubston Farm entrance instead of back on the main road at Tullynessle, thus saving a total of about 3kms of tarmac walking. The walk was easily followed on good, clear tracks, mostly landrover routes, some grassy, some a little stony. We followed instructions and completed an anti-clockwise circuit, which initially meant a slightly hazardous crossing of a fairly full burn that eventually feeds back down to the Don.

Here's a couple of shots of us starting the climb up from that burn crossing:

As we climbed, the views became more expansive:

Eventually, we reached the apparently disused quarry where a hut remained, apparently still in good working order - but who would quarry at the top of a hill in such a remote location?:

I can't claim as much credit for the weather on this occasion - we did suffer a few short showers, none of them bad enough for me to put my waterproof jacket on and certainly not as heavy as the ones we experienced on the drive back to Banchory later on. Overall, however, conditions were pretty fair - this landscape view gives a fair impression of what it was like most of the time:

The only hill that had a cairn/shelter on it (and a trig point) was Lord Arthur's hill, where we took a team photo - eventually. My camera blew over in the wind and I had to put it back up again and try to get back to the team before the timer expired. I didn't quite manage it on this occasion:

Next time was better, however:

This is the cairn/shelter:

and here are the stats:

The walk took a little longer than we thought it might and we didn't have time for a beer on the way home. As it transpired, the Forbes Arms at Bridge of Alford looked like it was closed (again) anyway, so we made do with tea/dinner at home before ending up at the golf club for the traditional Friday night session.