EAST HIGHLAND WAY 

Day 2 - Kingussie to Pattack Falls

After a reasonable nights rest we had breakfast at the hotel before getting on our way. There is a slight ascent away from the centre of Kingussie towards a caravan site.

This section was quite rocky under foot, glad we were relatively fresh to concentrate over this type of terrain.

Making slow progress the path runs along the south side of Loch Gynack, however it doesn’t go to the shore of the loch.

The path becomes wide and easy to navigate before descending towards Newtonmore on the ‘Wildcat’ path. We took a quick pitstop at the Coop in Newtonmore. You know you are ‘hiker trash’ when you sit on the curb in a supermarket car park with everything you own in the bag next to you.

We ascended away from Newtonmore on the road which soon became very quiet and felt like we were walking away from civilisation. We had read that the next section could be boggy, thankfully we had had fairly good weather the days prior, so we were hopeful. We had also read that there wasn’t much of a trail after a certain point, however we were following the water to the left, so we couldn’t go too wrong.

After passing a few abandoned buildings, we soon found ourselves in no path land, however, it was good underfoot. It wasn’t long before we knew we had spoken too soon, and it became very boggy. Keeping the water to our left we made slow progress. We knew we would have to cross the stream at Dalnashallag bothy, which was just coming into view. Note, this is not to be confused with the derelict bothy to the right. By this point our feet were wet, which made progress slightly easier as we weren’t too bothered about avoiding the wet soggy sections. Thankfully the water level was low, which made crossing the water relatively easy.

Dalnashallag bothy, a haven to those in need, below the doorframe hung rabbit feet, and on entering we were hit by the strong smell of burning wood. We made ourselves at home on the bench outside, admiring the view, a perfect stop for lunch.

From here there was a stone path which led towards the A86. We were supposed to turn off towards the right-hand corner of a forest, however being slightly elevated the ground looked extremely boggy, so we decided to continue the path we were on and walk along the road to rejoin the route. It was a fairly quiet road, so it wasn’t too bad.

We walked on the road to Laggan, then made the turn towards Spey Reservoir. By this point, we were both flagging, and the sun was starting to fall. We were hopeful we would find somewhere to camp in the forest that lay ahead. However, I had read that Pattack Falls was a known place to wild camp, so we also had this in the back of our minds.

Sadly, we didn’t get to see the Dam or the Reservoir, the path didn’t quite go that far. As we headed into the forest it was good track and very easy to follow. There were a handful of places for us to camp, but we kept pushing on as we still had daylight on our side. We agreed we would stop at Pattack Falls, and as we crossed the road, I knew we didn’t have far to go.

On reaching Pattack falls, we were much higher up than anticipated and didn’t see any of the falls. By this point, we were starting to lose daylight and we were desperate to find somewhere to camp. We didn’t have the legs to walk back on ourselves at this point. So just before the bridge to the left-hand side of the path we found a decent area of flat ground with little foliage, where we pitched our tent for the night.

In hindsight, we should have applied common sense and realised that the camping areas would be towards the base of the waterfall, however this thought just didn’t cross our minds.

This was our first night wild camping on the EHW and the midges were out in force, we certainly hadn’t missed them.

With a few aches from a very long tiring day, we finally put our heads to our pillows.