Think of riding up Glen Etive from Taynuilt next week. Which shore do folk reckon is best to do? North shore involves riding out to Connel and back along the road to Bonawe but does it involve a lot less push/carry round the loch than the south side?

Cheers.

From Taynuilt North East is a dirt track that is driveable in a landrover as far as the hunting lodge & a few miles further on & easy on MTB, but I've not done the full length of the track or the North side of Etive.

We did from Glencoe & down the East side of Etive a few years back. Very pushy/carry across the boulder fields in places but excellent from Ardmaddy virtually all the way back to The Coe. Looking at the map, if your'e going from Taynuilt I'd fancy going up the South East side to Ardmaddy then up Glen Kinglass to come out at Victoria Bridge then Bridge of Orchy where you can pick up a trail (MTB trail on the OS map)looks like this comes out on the B8074 road at about grid ref 243321. Then its road back to Taynuilt.
Actually I think I'd do it the other way round & get the road out the way first

The north shore is almost all rideable I'd say, its a quad track basically with a few tricky stream crossings and one or two quite steep loose pitches, but good overall. There are also a couple of very nice singletrack sections, but they're a little short. I've always wanted to check out the climber's path to the trilleachan slabs as well, might be fun?