Anybody reccommend any routes around the Arisaig/Morar/Mallaig area. Going up to stay in a cottage for a week in late october. Could also stretch to Moidart or Glennfinnan.

The shores of Loch Morar are fantastic, although you need to be on your toes as some sections are very rocky, and others are a bit unrideable.

Either get the ferry to Tarbert and ride back, or just drive to Bracorina and ride along the shore of the loch until you’ve had enough, then ride back.

Get the bike on the Knoydart ferry, that’s an experience in itself!, stay on the ferry up to the head of the loch, to tarbert. Get off and ride up and over the hill to Loch Morar and ride back along the side of the Loch to The Morar hotel, have a nice pint of real ale overlooking the sands of Morar, Lovely.

Not a long ride, maybe 8 miles, but the whole thing will take about 3 hours with the beautiful ferry ride as well.

Damn it, Ian beat me to it!.

Too slow greg! 😀

Edit: d’oh!

Aye, on the bike as well mate!.

Glenfinnan is an easier option, I rode through there in May, nice easy track all the way to the bealach beneath Streap. Don’t waste your time going down the other side, not very rideable!

I have a couple of 80/90km loops in mind over that way, but I’m loathe to send anyone on them until I’ve “inspected” them myself.

Thanks nobeerinthefridge and 13floormonk. The ferry trip to Tarbet and ride back with a pint is a defo. I assume the ferry runs all year. Also I have been up Glennfinnan before and wondered if there was any way to link it without doing an out and back. Any ideas re South Morar particuarly the path on the OS map from Lochailort or maybe even into Moidart.

druidh, if I get stuck in a bog on one of your routes I promise not to blame you. Go on give a sneek preview. Alternatively are you up for a recce week beginning 16th October?

If you like living dangerously you could check out geograph.org.uk, if there are paths on the ground then photos usually crop up on there (usually taken by a Mr Richard Webb, this guy seems to have photographed every sq kilometre of Scotland!)

The route to Scamadale from borrodale is considered ‘a faint path’ by someone on geograph, which in my experience means largely unrideable 😕

I don’t mean to hijack your thread framebuster but I just wondered if anyone else who had done the Loch Morar route had had a similar experience to that which me and my SO had recently.

We did the route about three weeks ago having previously heard from friends that it was a great route with excellent singletrack and could be done comfortable in about 3 hours. Maybe we would have had a different experience if my SO wasn’t an MTB newbie but we ended up having a bit of an epic due to the amount of carrying to be done. Whilst our friends remember riding nearly all of it we found that we had to carry or push many sections of the route. Some of these could potentially be ridden by very fit/skilled riders but many other sections would have required Danny MacAskill like skills to clear them. In the end we made the boat with barely more than a minute to spare – missing it really isn’t an option!

Dry conditions would certainly have helped a great deal, there were several sections that were too boggy to ride, but I would advise anyone considering this route to be prepared to carry and push a lot of sections and to allow a minimum of 3 hours between Bracorina (where the road ends) and Tarbet. Otherwise this is a beautiful place to spend some time and being picked up by the boat at Tarbet certainly adds an unusual element of adventure!

Its a fair point Tyres, although I did mention above that some sections were a ‘bit unrideable’.

I rode it a few years back now, and remember it being a great ride, despite a couple of sections of pushing. However, I also remember being on form that day and somehow out-riding a professional skills instructor (who, to be fair, had just spent 6 hours in a car…). Needless to say I’ve not really found that sort of form since..