Craigellachie Nature Reserve and Pattack Falls

I had brought a book called "Aviemore and the Cairngorms: 40 Shorter Walks by Paul & Helen Webster", this little pocket book is a good source if you are looking for either ideas for walks or just wanting short a walk. When my Grandmother came to visit and had expressed an interest in going walking in Aviemore, I gave her the book to look at. From this she picked two walks; Pattack Falls and a walk in the Craigellachie Nature Reserve. Even though both walks are very short, they allow you to view a lot of beautiful scenery within the Cairn Gorm National Park.

It was decided to go to Pattack Falls first, as it was furthest point.

Pattack Falls was the shortest and easiest walk that I have done, a mere 500m on flat ground, taking under 20 minutes to complete (yellow path). The path passes the falls, then after a short walk in the woods, you come to an open heather-ed area with views of the mountains in the surrounding area. The path then slits in two, one route goes further into the woods and to the ruins of the deserted village of Druim an Aird, the other goes back to the car park. (We chose this one). This path went back into the forest and then to the car park. Even thought this was a very short walk, I did enjoy it, the falls where very pretty and this is a worthwhile spot to stop if passing through. 

After some lunch in the Happy Haggis (I love the name!!!) It was time to move onto our main walk in the Craigellachie Nature Reserve.

The Craigellachie Nature Reserve is located behind St Aidan's Catholic Church and Aviemore Youth Hostel. There are a view routes within the nature reserve, simple all ability paths around a pond (the pond seemed to be missing the water), a longer route along the base of the hill and then the longest walk up to a viewpoint on a hill that seems to have no name. We chose to do the viewpoint trail.

A - Aviemore, B - Start/Finish, C - Summit of No-Name Hill

This path is well signposted and is a single track that is mainly gravelled however parts are quite rocky. To begin the walk you have to walk under the noisy A9 via a bridge that goes under the road. The first segment of route is quite unimpressive, mainly due to the "missing" pond; however after this you enter a sliver birch forest. The path runs around the base of the hill and at this point rises VERY slowly. The path seems to stay like this until you come to a water reservoir, then the elevation becomes much steeper in comparison. This part of the route more or less goes straight up the hill. Towards the top of the first hill, you come across some stone stairs. My Grandmother referred to them as "The Stairway to Heaven" luckily she was wrong!!! After climbing these you reach the top of the first hill (about 477m). From here you can see the ski lifts on the Cairn Gorm as well as Aviemore and also surrounding hills/mountains. My Grandmother stopped here but I continued on until I reached the top of the next hill. From the top of this hill (about 542m), you get a better view of the Cairn Gorm. The decent from the hills were surprisingly simple, just straight down. We decided to go back the way we came but you could have followed a few alternative paths to the bottom. 

The completed walk took under an hour and a half to walk and was 3 miles in length.   

I enjoyed both walks, even if they were shorter than what I would normally walk. I would like to revisit Pattack Falls to explore more of the forest and hopefully I will.....

Here are some pictures from the walks:

All Comments are Welcome!!!