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Glencoe Lochan.

Start. Glencoe Lochan car park.

Route. Glencoe Lochan car park - Blue Mountain Trail - Glencoe Lochan - Yellow Forest Trail - Glencoe Lochan car park.

Notes. Welcome to a tiny slice of the Canadian Rockies in the Scottish Highlands. This gem of a walk is set in the grounds of the home of the Earl of Strathcona, who was governor of Canada for a while, he brought back to Scotland his Canadian wife, so homesick was she he designed the grounds of his estate to look like the Canadian Rockies.

I've looked at this small lochan on-line many times, it's a stunning body of water surrounded by woodland with high mountains reflecting off its still surface, broken only by the ripples caused by the various water fowl that call this beautiful place home. In reality what we found was a muddy puddle full of debris, drained to enable maintenance work to be carried out, so I just sat on a bench, closed my eyes and imagined what it usually looks like.

It had rained all day, the hour was late, the Winter light already fading as we set out from the lochan car park. Our route first followed the blue route, billed as the mountain trail, it ascended over steep ground depositing us at a picnic table with views across Loch Leven. With the light fading fast we descended to what remained of Glencoe Lochan, wandered along it's north shore to join the yellow route, this a woodland route extending the walk another half a mile or so, it guided us between stunning examples of Douglas Firs and Sequoias, we visited another view point before descending back to the patiently waiting car just as the light finally faded.

view route map.

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