Craigmore is a prominent hill, 387 metres high, above the village of Aberfoyle in the council area of Stirling in

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to th ...

Geography

The summit of Craigmore rises about a mile northwest of the centre of Aberfoyle. The top of the hill and much of the upper southern and eastern slopes are open moorland with a few scattered trees. At its southern foot, the

River Forth The River Forth is a major river in central Scotland, long, which drains into the North Sea on the east coast of the country. Its drainage basin covers much of Stirlingshire in Scotland's Central Belt. The Gaelic name for the upper reach of ...

, accompanied by the B829 road to Loch Ard and the village of Stronachlacher, runs from west to east. To the north and northwest, a line of increasingly higher peaks runs all the way to

Ben Venue Ben Venue (Scottish Gaelic: A' Bheinn Mheanbh) is a mountain in the Trossachs area of Scotland. The name Ben Venue is derived from the Scottish Gaelic words meaning "the miniature mountain". The summit lies approximately 2 kilometres south ...

about 3 miles away. To the east, the A821 climbs up to the Duke's Pass. On the other side of this road is the David Marshall Lodge, a visitor centre for the Trossachs region. Although it is not particularly high, Craigmore appears prominent due to its location on the fringes of the Trossachs range and its steep southerly slopes that drop sharply down to the valley of the River Forth and the

Scottish Lowlands The Lowlands ( sco, Lallans or ; gd, a' Ghalldachd, , place of the foreigners, ) is a cultural and historical region of Scotland. Culturally, the Lowlands and the Highlands diverged from the Late Middle Ages into the modern period, when Lo ...

beyond.

History

On the steep, south face of the hill is an old quarry that once supplied blue-grey

dolerite Diabase (), also called dolerite () or microgabbro, is a mafic, holocrystalline, subvolcanic rock equivalent to volcanic basalt or plutonic gabbro. Diabase dikes and sills are typically shallow intrusive bodies and often exhibit fine-grained ...

for the traditional buildings of Aberfoyle. About a kilometre north of the summit are Aberfoyle Quarries, disused

slate Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade regional metamorphism. It is the finest grained foliated metamorphic ro ...

quarries that were used to supply roofing material for the railways and for much of central Scotland. The route of the old tramway, which transported men and material from the quarries to the local

branch line A branch line is a phrase used in railway terminology to denote a secondary railway line which branches off a more important through route, usually a main line. A very short branch line may be called a spur line. Industrial spur An industr ...

, is still discernible.

Ascent

The Lodge Visitor Centre is the easiest start point for an ascent of Craigmore, a path branching off the A821 and heading up to the line of the old tramway. From there the route follows the top of the ridge to the summit. Craigmore can also be tackled from Aberfoyle itself, passing near the visitor centre on the way. There is a cairn at the top.

Views

From the summit there are views of Loch Ard,

Ben Lomond Ben Lomond (Scottish Gaelic: Beinn Laomainn, 'Beacon Mountain'), , is a mountain in the Scottish Highlands. Situated on the eastern shore of Loch Lomond, it is the most southerly of the Munros. Ben Lomond lies within the Ben Lomond National M ...

and the Arrochar Alps as well as the

References

{{Reflist Mountains and hills of Stirling (council area) Mountains and hills of the Southern Highlands