Ups and downs (but mostly ups) on the Treig and Ossian
I'm just back from a couple of days tandem paddling with Jenny, up in the Highlands.
The only bad bit was at the start when a rather grumpy chap in an Alcan landrover, drove up and tried to prevent us from getting on. I'd thought those days were over in Scotland, but it seems that news of the Land Reform Act hasn't quite reached Fersit yet. I've contacted the SCA access team, and I'll keep you all posted with any developments.
Anyway, initial issues aside, we trolleyed up to the dam, and got onto Loch Treig.
Paddling against a F3-5 headwind, and giving the hydro intake a wide berth, it took us a couple of hours to make it to the south end of the Loch. Then came the hard bit of the day - the portage up and over into Loch Ossian. The first mile and a bit of ascent is fairly hard (despite being on a good track).
"are we nearly there yet?" (answer: no!)
We got some suitably amused/pitying looks from a team of guys in vehicles who were working maintaining the track. Then another mile or so of gentle up and down leads to a long gentle descent down to Loch Ossian. Nice to have the trolley pushing me, instead of me dragging it.
A very short paddle on Loch Ossian took us to the youth hostel there. We arrived to a roaring fire and a hot kettle. Thanks very much to Jan (the warden) and all the other guests for making us very welcome.
An early start, saw us at the other end of the Loch around 1000 and onto the river Ossian. I think we were pretty lucky with levels (a bit of grass underwater, but definitely nowhere near bank full). There's a tiny little weir as you leave the loch, and a few deer fences to squeeze under or portage round. The river pootles gently down to Loch Ghuilbinn.
Some fantastic views, with snow on the hills and a few deer grazing away. On the Abhainn Ghuilbinn the fun begins. It stays wide and open for a few kilometres, never really getting above G2+, but with (at the level we had) some quite tight lines between rocks which keep you on your toes.
It then obviously narrows into the first mini-gorge. We portaged the entrance drop at river level, and then ran down through the rest of the mini-gorge.
A brief opening out leads to the next gorge (which I think is the first one mentioned in the WW Scotland guidebook). We swamped on the entrance slab, but managed to keep the canoe upright enough to make it into an eddy on the river left. I got to solo the next few class 3 drops in the gorge, before we came round to a left/right dogleg, with a drop that probably doesn't go in a canoe, and definitely didn't go for the two of us in a laden boat a long way from help! This bit would be a great kayak run, and you could probably run quite a few of the drop in an open boat, and possibly line the rest from river level. However, deciding that cowardice is the better part of valour we opted to portage up and around the second half of the gorge. The river then opens up for another mile or so of tight class 2 before dropping into another gorge which we portaged around on the river right side, above the top of the gorge.
From here you can see Loch Laggan, but there's one more significant rapid - a long set of slabs, which we portaged on the right before pottering down to Loch Laggan and collecting the car.
All in all, a lovely wild mountain trip, with a bit of everything.
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Originally Posted by Rockhopper
