Glencoe 2019 trip - day 2

Three Sisters, River Orchy and Kilchurn Castle

We planned to go to river Etive to capture Buachaille Etive Mor from there, but as we drove past Loch Achtriochtan we soon found ourselves driving through a thick fog, which had built up near the Pass of Glencoe and stretched all the way to the location we had in mind. We couldn’t even see the Buachaille, so we drove on to Lochan na h’Achlaise to see if things were any better there. Unfortunately, this was not the case. What to do? We decided to drive back to Loch Achtriochtan, where there hadn’t been any mist when we left. Once we had made our way back through the Pass of Glencoe, the mist disappeared again and suddenly the sky was blue with shades of pink near the horizon. We stopped at the car park near the Three Sisters of Glencoe and started shooting. After a while, the mist started rolling into the valley, but the sky remained blue and the mountain tops were all lit by the early morning light. The wind made it very cold, but fortunately the location we were at is very close to the hotel and we were in time even for breakfast. One full Scottish breakfast later, we were ready to go again.

We drove to the old military bridge over River Orchy, to capture the waterfalls in that area. The last 10 kilometers are on the single-track B8074, which proved to be a bit of a challenge as this road hadn’t been cleared and the bits that were in the shadows were very icy. We managed to get through without any issues, but once we were there we noticed the water level was quite low and lots of trees had been cut. Not the scene we wanted to capture. Fortunately, another photographer mentioned a marble waterfall nearby, at the footpath along the river. Officially the path was closed because it isn’t in very good condition, but the bit up until the waterfall was OK so we went there anyway. Once we found the waterfall, we were quite surprised that it isn’t described in any of the books we have. It’s beautiful and we managed to get a couple of good shots there.

We had planned again to visit Lochan na h’Achlaise for sunset, but once again we changed our plans after Ton suggested we could visit Kilchurn Castle as this was not that far from where we were. All agreed, so we didn’t take a left but a right turn when we reached the A82. Light at Kilchurn was gorgeous and for the most part there wasn’t any wind so we could get near perfect reflections. After the cold wind in the morning near the Three Sisters, working in relative warmth was a very pleasant ending to our first full shooting day of this trip.

Our trip started yesterday.