Laura and I have not walked in a while, but as Lockdown 2020 is Easing, now felt like a good time to get together for a stroll. It seemed a good idea for us to each travel a similar distance and we settled on an area both of us have driven by but neither have walked, Dulnain Bridge.
As often happens, one of us was early and the other late, but I found Laura waiting patiently at the car park off the High Street and after a minimum of faffing we set off.
From the High Street we followed the road towards the Skye of Curr, walked along Fraser Road until we left the road to take a woodland path signposted Old Laundry Path. At a crossroads, we took the path along the River Dulnain and continued through lovely woodland.
After about 1.5km, we reached a quiet road which we followed until we passed the Heather Centre and met the A95. This was the only uncomfortable section of the walk, a brisk pace was set over the next 200m along the verge until we found the little stile. After climbing the stile we found ourselves on what remains of the old A95, pleasant, but with the noise of passing traffic until the track headed uphill away from the main road.
We continued through lovely woodland, passed a quarry but with lovely views through the trees to the Cairngorms and the Cromdale Hills.
Laura suddenly stopped and pointed to the path, there was a tiny vole, trying to hide from us in the grass! Cute. I got some photographs, of its bum, mainly.
We reached another short stretch of tarmac before taking another little path through woods to get back to the start of the walk.
On returning to the cars, Laura brought some seats out of her van and we sat in the sunshine eating the lunches we had carried on our walk.
It was lovely to be out again, feeling almost normal.
Roughly 8.83 km and 186 m total ascent