Looking for a half-day solo adventure, I chose the Corbett Meall nan Subh close to Killin for a sunny August Saturday.
Distance: 12.75km / 8 miles
Start/finish: Car park at the end of Glen Lochay.
How to get there: The drive to the start of the walk, along Glen Lochay, is long but beautiful. You turn on to the single-track road from the tourist town of Killin, Perthshire, and keep on driving until a sign tells you that you can’t. There is a car park for about a dozen cars.
• Take a look further down to see a video guide to the route.
Walk or run of Meall nan Subh
The walking/running route starts on a well-made private road that heads further along the glen to start with. Just past some buildings, the road heads right and starts to climb.
The route is zig-zagging but because it is on a tarmac surface it feels fairly easy. I ran what I could and walked when it became too steep.
Finally, as the road straightens, you see the top of the pass and then the road drops a little. Just a bit further on, the route for the Corbett strikes off on to open hillside.
Look for a fenceline and then head right, just beforehand. From here, the going is on rough and pathless hillside. Look up and northwards to see a grassy gully and find a route to the top before reaching steep upper slopes to the north-east.
Good navigation is required, even in good weather, to ascend and then cross an undulating plateau of moorland.
I kept my eye on the route map and made sure I was heading in the right direction.
There is a false summit at close to 800m above sea level, which you can ascend to or bypass lower down the slope. The true summit of Meall nan Subh at 806m is then obvious in good weather. Head for this and stop for a while to enjoy the wonderful views into neighbouring Glen Lyon.
The return route is the same and as soon as you reach the tarmac road again it’s a straightforward jog back down the hill.
Even on a busy post-lockdown Saturday I saw no-one on this Corbett and only a few cyclists.
See a video overview of the route:
See: Walk Highlands route
And my route on OS Map.