• Location
• Description
• Contents
• Introduction
• Sample Route
• Reviews
• Further Reading

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Inversnaid to Inverarnan

The shoreline walk continues northwards, always pleasant and in places rather rough. Indeed, the 4.5km north of Inversnaid are the most rugged part of the WH Way – though in terms of the mountain deviations in this book, that’s still only moderate ruggedness.

Overhead, the higher route along pathless Beinn a’ Choin is also rather rough. So either way you get at least a feeling of what this country was like in the time of Rob Roy before the coming of the roads. For full authenticity you’d need to have soft deerskin moccasins, non-waterproof clothing, some redcoats in pursuit and the midges flying in underneath your kilt.

WH Way: Inversnaid to Inverarnan

Distance    10km (6 miles)
Approximate time    2.5hr
Not the WH Way    4 Hill Crossing: Beinn a’ Choin; 5 Inverarnan Outing: Beinn Chabhair

North from Inversnaid, the lochside track soon diminishes to a wide path. After 500 metres from the hotel, an RSPB trail turns up right for a brief steep excursion into the trees, the main path continuing more easily at the same level. Soon after this, though, the main path itself becomes rugged as it passes below a crag and descends steeply to where a sign points back left for Rob Roy’s Cave. It’s worth spending half an hour exploring the tumble of boulders where wild goats now sleep in the former bed of the brigand. The main path continues above the shoreline, still rugged and narrow. It passes through a clearing with the ruins of Pollochro, then crosses a meadow and heads uphill in a shallow valley. After 500 metres it descends, to pass Doune Byre bothy.

The path gradually drops to the shore, with views across to Ben Vorlich. It climbs away from the shore again, and a side-path leads down to the pier for the Ardlui ferry. The main path passes above the head of the loch, into the col behind Cnap Mor, the ‘big hummock’.

Small hill side-trip: Cnap Mor

The rugged little summit itself is another minor side-trip: ten minutes’ rough walking from the high point of the WH Way. There’s no path and no way is better than any other. The hill corner is a fine viewpoint along Loch Lomond and is where, on my late-March walk up the Way, I lay in the grass and watched whooper swans migrating north for Iceland.

The path descends gradually through woods, passing above Inverarnan Inn (Drover’s Inn) on the other side of the river. Then it descends, and crosses the edge of a water meadow to a footbridge into Beinglas campsite.

For Inverarnan, turn down left; the stream bank leads to left of the campsite to River Falloch. Follow the river up to cross the campsite’s access bridge. A path leads to the left, alongside A82, to the Drover’s Inn. Meanwhile the WH Way will continue to right of the campsite along the slope foot.

4 Hill Crossing: Beinn a’ Choin

Start    Inversnaid Hotel
Finish    Inverarnan (Beinglas campsite)
Distance    14km (9 miles)
Ascent    1000m (3300ft)
Approximate time    6hr
Maximum altitude    Beinn a’ Choin 770m
Terrain    Pathless grassy hill

Beinn a’ Choin is the Hill of the Dog, but people will enjoy it too. It forms a long, rambling ridgeline above Loch Lomond. At 770m it is 200m lower than Ben Lomond, which makes it 200m easier, no?

Well, no. Because Beinn a’ Choin falls short of the 914m mark that would make it a Munro, almost nobody bothers to go. There is no company on the hill, no noise or litter, but more importantly, no path. The untrodden grass is short to walk over, but it’s surprising how much difference it makes having to choose your route every step of the way. Go over this hump, or try to circumvent it? Does that reddish patch mean shorter grass to walk on, or is it possibly a bog? And that’s assuming you get it roughly right. Get it wrong, and you’re lost.

The only way the Corbetts are smaller is the minor matter of size.

Note, too, that the glacier has done its job well here, if we take the job of a glacier as being to gouge. The slope above Loch Lomond is steep and craggy, all the way. There’s no easy escape back to the West Highland Way below.

But that same steep edge gives great views up and down the water. And who’s going to get lost anyway? There is, as it happens, a dead fence remnant all the way along. Well, almost all the way…

From Inversnaid Hotel return across the footbridge above the waterfall, and at once take a path turning up to the left. It climbs among trees, with a branch path on the right that would lead you to the Rob Roy Viewpoint above the loch. But the main path continues to reach a small car park.

Turn down the access track to cross Arklet Water and join a minor road. Follow this up to the right to Garrison of Inversnaid. The garrison here was built to restrain Rob Roy, but Rob burnt it down, his son burnt it again, and what little remains is incorporated into the farm walls.

Pass through the car park here onto open hill, and head up rough grass. Slant around to the right to join a fence, leading uphill onto Stob an Fhainne. A grassy ridge with a very small path leads down northwards. Cross a grassy col and make your way up to Beinn a’ Choin, its summit protected by a tiny crag.

The rambling and uncertain ridgeline northwards would be tricky to follow in mist, but for the fence that runs along it. Follow this north at first, then bending northwest over Maol an Fithich.

Beinn a’ Choin is ‘hill of the dog’; Maol an Fithich is ‘hump of the raven’.

The guiding fence turns north, to pass above Lochan Dubh and over Stob nan Eighrach. As it bends northeast, leave it to pass to right of Lochan nam Muc. Keep north across bumpy moorland onto the slight rise of Cruach. From here a grassy ridgeline leads down west of north. After passing under power lines, choose the easiest ground you can find to the Ben Glas Burn which crosses ahead. On the burn’s further bank is a peaty path. This follows the burn downstream, past Beinglas Falls, to meet the WH Way at Beinglas campsite.

For Inverarnan go straight across the WH Way path, and turn right at River Falloch to the campsite entrance.