A fine wee wander in the muckle big hills

Richard and I chose the Linn of Dee, 6 miles from Braemar, for our first Christmas adventure. The weather was dry, the visibility was good, but the temperature was quite chilly, so we decided to opt for running rather than walking. This also meant that we could fit a few more kilometres into the light hours of the day.

From the Linn of Dee we ran along a track following the River Dee. Along the way we saw lots of newly fallen trees, probably as a result of the high winds in Scotland a few days ago. After about 1 hour, the track turned away from the river and we continued along it on a footpath. The path was a little wetter than the track and not quite so quick to move along, but eventually the views became more rewarding. Up the valley we could see the hill of Devil’s Point which is a huge pointy lump of granite and in the far distance we could see the start of the Lairig Ghru. We then spotted a bothy in the distance, so we had to go and take a look around. The Corrour Bothy would make a good overnight stop, but unfortunately we only had time to briefly flick through the logbook before continuing. At this point we left Glen Dee and made a roundtrip back to the Linn of Dee via Glen Lui. The path down this valley was perfect for running and Richard and I almost sprinted along sections of it. Soon we reached Derry Lodge. This is a picturesque deer lodge, which unfortunately is now boarded up, but the surroundings were beautiful. We continued down a track and started meeting other people, which meant that we were almost back at the car park. A nice 26km to start our holiday.