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Ski holidays
Severe weather
Ancient pine wood, the banks of the Spey and an 18th-century planned town.
Distance 7 miles (11.3km)
Minimum time 3hrs
Ascent/gradient 200ft (60m)
Level of difficulty Easy
Paths Tracks and smooth paths, 1 stile
Landscape Open pine forest, wide river
Suggested map aqua3 OS Explorer 419 Grantown-on-Spey
Start/finish NJ 035280
Dog friendliness Close control in Anagach woods, on lead on golf course
Parking Grantown-on-Spey Museum
Public toilets At start
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© The Automobile Association 2008. © Crown Copyright Licence number 100021153
1 Go down past the museum. Turn left into South Street, then right into Golf Course Road. A tarred path crosses the golf course to a small gate into Anagach Wood.
2 The wide path ahead has a blue/red waymarker. At a junction, the blue trail departs to the right; turn left, following a Spey Way marker and red-top poles. Keep following the red markers, turning left at the first junction and bearing left at the next. When the track joins a new fence and a bend in a stream is on the left, keep ahead, following a Spey Way marker.
3 The track emerges into open fields. After crossing a small bridge, turn to the right through a chained gap stile. A path with pines on its left leads to a track near the River Spey. (Bridge of Cromdale is just ahead here.)
4 Turn sharp right on this track, alongside the river. At a fishers' hut it re-enters forest. About ¾ mile (1.2km) later it diminishes to a green path and slants up past the cottage of Craigroy to join its entrance track.
5 At Easter Anagach, a grass track on the right has red waymarkers and runs into a birchwood. With a barrier ahead, follow marker poles to the left, on to a broad path beside a falling fence. At the next junction, turn right, following the red poles, over a slight rise. Descending, turn left just before a blue-top post, on to a smaller path with blue and red posts. This runs along the top of a ridge, to reach a bench above a lane. To the left down the lane is the handsome stone bridge built by Major Caulfield as part of the military road system.
6 The path bends right, alongside the road, to meet a wide track which is the former military road. Turn right, to a path on the right with green-top posts. At a small pool, the main path bends left for 150yds (137m), with blue and green posts; take the path ahead, with green posts. A very old tree in the middle of the path was once used for public hangings. At a five-way junction bear left to find the next green post. At the edge of the golf course turn left to a small car park and information board.
7 Follow the tarred street uphill, past the end of the golf course, to Grantown's High Street. Turn right to The Square. Just past the Grant Arms Hotel, a sign points right, to the museum.
'Sir Ludovic Grant and Mr Grant of Grant propose a TOWN should be erected, and will give Feus or long Leases, and all proper Encouragement to Manufacturers, Tradesmen or others'
In about 1750, young Mr James Grant returned from his Grand Tour of Europe. He'd seen Edinburgh New Town, just then being built, and thought Speyside could do with something of the sort. Somehow he persuaded his father, Sir Ludovic. The new town was set out, above the new military bridge over the Spey. Merchants, tradesmen and artisans, provided they had good references, were invited in. They were to build their own houses, to a set pattern, roofed with slate and walled with pale speckled granite from the surrounding fields. The town was to be supported by a linen factory.
In 1766 the market cross was ceremonially moved in procession from old town to new. To persuade the townsfolk away from whisky, a brewery was set up. The Grants put up a handsome orphanage, and established a daringly modern school where the young people were chastised with birch and the leather tawse only now and then. What James Grant was playing was the modern computer game of 'Sim City', but with real people and real money. And he lost the game. First he was obliged to subsidise the building of most of the houses, then he had to pay for the linen factory. Grantown was not handy for transport, and the Industrial Revolution in England was just starting to churn out cheap cloth. 'A Highlander never sits at ease at a loom, 'tis like putting a deer in the plough,' and in 1774 the linen factory failed. By 1804 the town was threatened with economic collapse, and Sir James had to sell his London house to buy meal.
But the real world doesn't have a 'Game Over' button. Grantown continued as a market town for the barley lands of the Spey. And in September 1860, Queen Victoria stopped off at the Grant Arms. Her ghillies got rather drunk, her secretary General Grey went shopping and bought himself a watch, and the Queen enjoyed some excellent porridge. With the arrival of the railway, middle-class Victorians came in the steps of their Queen. The inhabitants of Grantown moved into cottages in their own gardens, while the middle-class families of doctors and lawyers moved in for the summer, with 'Pater' becoming a weekly commuter back to Aberdeen or Edinburgh. 'I know of no more attractive mountain resting place,' said Prime Minister Ramsay Macdonald. And Sir James Grant's handsome granite town has been attracting tourists ever since.
Just north of Grantown, Ballindalloch Castle claims to date from 1546, but was burnt down after the Battle of Inverlochy in 1645 by the Marquis of Montrose when it was only 99 years old. It shows the gradual transformation of a fortified tower into an elegant country house, and is the home of a collection of much-loved teddy bears and an even more cherished herd of Aberdeen Angus cattle. It's open from April to September, but not Saturdays.
The forest ridge leading to Point f is a glacier feature called an esker. It's the gravelly bed of a river that once ran inside the glacier. As the river was enclosed in the ice, like water in a pipeline, it could flow along the side of the valley rather than the bottom. It could even flow uphill, back into the body of the glacier, at which point you'll see the esker disappears.
The unassuming JJ's Café on the High Street is open to 9pm, serving good home-cooked food. It's so popular with locals that it's often booked up - if disappointed, try a bar meal at Tyree House Hotel (no dogs allowed). Grantown also has two chip shops and many cafés and hotels.
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