Coire Lair and the Coulin Forest

About trip

Minimum Time: 5hrs Ascent: 1,700ft Difficulty Level: 2 - Medium Paths: Well-made path, then track, no stiles Landscape: Boulder-scattered moorland between high hills Dog Friendliness: Keep under control in deer forest Parking: On A890 below Achnashellach Station Public Toilets: None en route (note: During stalking season on Achnashellach Estate (15 September- 20 October, not Sundays), keep strictly to route, which is right of way Description: The path winds up from Strath Carron into Coire Lair. The corrie is a fine one, with scattered pines, waterfalls and craggy mountains. The path that takes you there is terraced at the steep places, drained at the level places and avoids the boggy places altogether. Over a century old, it was built not for walkers but stalkers - or rather for their sturdy Highland ponies bringing down a deer corpse weighing 2cwt (100kg) or more. Recent resurfacing has been done sympathetically in the traditional style. Deer stalking calls on the legs and the intelligence in equal measure, appealing to man’s ancient hunting urges. ‘The beautiful motions of the deer, his sagacity and the skilful generalship that can alone ensure success in the pursuit of him, keep the mind in a pleasurable state of constant excitement.’ Thus said William Scrope Esq, in the book Days of Deerstalking, which presented this sport to the leisured and affluent of 1845. Red Bedrock. As the path rises above the tree line, you’ll notice slabs of Torridonian sandstone underfoot - the ghillies have deliberately routed it over this maintenance-free surface. On the left, Fuar Tholl (‘cold hole’) is of the same red rock, but ahead on the right, Beinn Liath Mhor is composed of pale Cambrian quartzite. As you top the pass and look east, the hills ahead are rounded, grey and slightly less exciting all the way to the North Sea. As you come to know Scotland you realise that all the way along its northwestern edge there’s a zone of rather special hills. Applecross, Torridon, the Great wilderness, Coigach, Inverpolly: these names mean sandstone and quartzite to the geologist, and pure magic to the mountaineer. The rest of the Northern Highlands is made of a speckly grey rock -Moinian schist. The boundary line is the Moine Thrust. It’s called a ‘thrust’ because these grey mountains have been pushed in over the top of the Torridonian red and the Cambrian white. It marks the western limit of the crumple zone from when England crashed into Scotland 400 million years ago. On the face of Beinn Liath Mhor, the arrival of the Moinian has crumpled the quartzite, like a boot landing on a carelessly placed cheese sandwich. A short wander from Point 3 further into the corrie will show this more clearly, and you’ll also see the famous Mainreachan Buttress on the north side of Fuar Tholl. While you're there: Strome Castle stands on a romantic headland overlooking the narrows of Loch Carron. It was besieged by the Mackenzies in 1602, and surrendered after some ‘silly women’ poured drinking water into the gunpowder. The Mackenzies blew it up, but left enough of the walls to make a fine foreground for views along the loch. What to look out for: The hill on the left as you enter Coire Lair is Fuar Tholl. A rocky projection seen from Glen Carron is known as Wellington’s Nose, in commemoration of the duke who defeated Napoleon in 1815. From Coire Lair, it reveals itself as the top of the steep Mainreachan Buttress. The first climbers to venture there in the 1960s found classic routes of middling difficulty. Today, it’s climbed even when covered in winter ice. Where to eat and drink: The Strathcarron Hotel at Strathcarron Station serves home cooking and real ales in its restaurant, bar (dogs and children welcome) and coffee shop. Loch Carron Hotel at Lochcarron village does good bar meals and also welcomes children and dogs. Directions: The track to the station runs up behind a red phone box, then turns right to reach the platform end. Cross the line through two gates and head up the stony track opposite, past a waymarker arrow. After 100yds (91m) you reach a junction under low-voltage power lines. Turn left here on a smooth gravel road to a gate through a deer fence. After 0.25 mile (400m), look out for a signpost where a new path turns back to the left. 2 This path goes back through the deer fence, then runs up alongside the River Lair. As the slope steepens above the treeline, a short side path on the left gives a view of a waterfall. The well-maintained stalkers’ path runs over slabs of bare sandstone. A cairn marks the point where it arrives in the upper valley, Coire Lair, with a view to the high pass at its head, 2 miles (3.2km) away. 3 About 200yds (183m) after this first cairn, another marks a junction of paths. Bear right here, between two pools. In 110yds (100m) there is a second junction with a tall, well-built cairn. Bear right, on a path that leaves the corrie through a wide, shallow col just 350yds (320m) above. An elegant conical cairn marks a final path junction. Bear right; in a few steps you’re heading downhill above the path. The path runs downhill among drumlins and sandstone boulders, slanting down to the right to join the wooded Allt nan Dearcag. The path now runs down alongside this stream; you may notice pale grey quartzite. The path drops to reach a footbridge. This bridge crosses a side stream, the Allt Coire Beinne Leithe, with the Easan Geal, White Waterfalls, just above. 4 At an open bothy shelter hut, a track continues downhill, with the gorge of the Easan Dorcha (Dark Waterfalls) on its right. After a mile (1.6km) there’s a stone bridge on the right. Turn across this, on to a track that runs up the wide, open valley to the Coulin Pass at its head. Coulin, pronounced Cowlinn, is the name of the deer forest, the river and the loch at its foot. Gaelic ‘Cuilion’ means holly tree. 5 After the pass, the track goes through a gate into plantations, then bends right to slant down the side of Strath Carron. At a Scottish Rights of Way Society signpost, follow the main track ahead towards Achnashellach. A clear-felled area gives views to the left, then the trees are bigger until just before you cross a bridge to a mobile phone mast. Fork left, just before a second mast, and descend gently to reach the junction above Achnashellach Station.