Thanks to all the
Chasers yesterday , it was brilliant. The day was glorious – wall to wall sunshine – but perishingly cold in the wind.
I have no idea why Benaquhallie has only been activated once before, it is neither challenging (apart from the final uphill slog to the summit) nor difficult to find and park. It has brilliant views as well and it is possible to play “Name that SOTA summit” for ages. There is a disused quarry to the south of the road at NJ592073 and it is possible to park there (remember to leave the gate as you found it). The walk starts on the other side of the road following the track a short distance before cutting up the bank on a trodden path. From here follow the wall, through a gate then follow the fence until it meets another wall on the ridge. Just follow this wall to the summit
on a quad bike track with just a short detour through the copse of Larch. The summit is marked by a trigpoint and a very unusual cairn just below the summit (sorry, photo I took is rubbish). 40M and 17m were very lively and made for almost contest style operating to gain the points.
Parking for ES-068 is in an enormous layby on the North side of the road at NJ527064.
Across the road is a gated track leading directly up the hill (not the track to the house on the right). Simply follow this forestry track until a bend at NJ523054 where a small cairn marks the start of another track leading directly to the summit. Do not be misled by the marked shorter path on the 1:50k map it no longer exists (as far as I could see) due to forestry operations. The summit is marked by the trig point and a partially collapsed beehive cairn. Once again, great views and 40m and 17m were in fine form.
The cairn is shown as a memorial on the map and there is a broken engraved stone slab in the ground which, apparently, explains who it is a memorial to; the best I could do was establish that it was placed by estate employees in memorial to Farquharson of Finzean (that should give our non native English speakers a problem and probably others who are unaware of the local North East dialect – the place name is pronounced “Fingin”,
near enough!!). Anybody fancy trying to decypher the stone?
Altogether a great day out with the dog.