| Date | 21 Jun 2026 |
| Route | Link to Route |
| Distance | 10.62km / 6.60miles |
| Ascent | 566.01m / 1857.00ft |
| Enjoyable | |
| Difficulty | |
| Conditions | Warm, dry and sunny |
| Summits | ✔ (C) Carn na Drochaide |
Nice weather and feeling the itch to get out for a walk decided for a short outing to Deeside, parking up at the Linn of Quoich car park around 8am.
Heading north east past the barrier, around the corner and over the bridge where someone had been camping overnight alongside Quioch water. I continued past a few houses and followed the track for just over 2 kilometers to another house named Allanmore on the OS Map, strange to see electrified deer fences for much of the way.
A couple of hundred metres past Allanmore, I struck off the path too late and couldn't find a trail at first, so doubled back a little to pick up a trail that heads up and back west. After around half a kilometer beside some trees another less obvious path heads north. This was a good bit steeper and eventually disappears further up. At this point I spotted a large herd of deer at the base of the Corbett, unfortunately bit too far away for good photos.
I now made a beeline through the heather up to the higher point called Creag a'Chleirich before heading down to the beallach where I picked up a path that wound its way up to the west of the Corbett. I felt I was getting to far around, so I turned west and headed straight up, picking up a trail at times that made its way to a small cairn, but not the summit. Now turning north east I headed gently up over quick rocky terrain at times to eventually reach the summit of Carn na Drochaide.
During a long break at the top taking in the views I met a couple of people that had come up via the punch bowl, so I decided instead of retracing my steps I would make this a circuit. I tried to aim straight towards the punch bowl and found a good path over to Carn Dearg, but after that it was heather bashing and some light boggy areas all the way down to the track running to the punch bowl.
Having never visited the punch bowl before, it was a surprise to find Queen Victorias Picnic Lodge which would be a great place to relax and have a swim. From here it was a short walk back down to the car. Overall the circuit took around three and a half hours including stops.
