If you’re driving north into the Scottish Highlands by way of Inverness, there’s a more than good chance you’ll spend a few hours driving along the A9. It’s not a bad drive (although you’ll inevitably get stuck behind someone driving at 40mph on a good 60mph road), and you pass very close to some absolutely beautiful spots. It’s a great place to find somewhere to stop for a while and stretch your legs – something we definitely needed on the 9 hour drive back from Wester Ross!
This time, we stopped off at the House of Bruar and took the opportunity to walk up to the Falls of Bruar, before picking up an enormous pie from the shop to take home for tea. The walk up to the lower falls is along a well-surfaced path, with a steady, easy climb. Make sure to climb up on to the viewing platform for the best view of the falls. The path continues to climb to reach the upper falls, crossing the bridge here to return along the other side of the valley (looking over the side made me feel dizzy so I quickly carried on to the other side!). The path beyond the lower falls is somewhat less well surfaced, but shouldn’t pose too many problems for most people.
We followed this route from Walkhighlands, but navigation is pretty easy, with the path running around a pretty obvious circular route. In total, the route is about one and a half miles.
It’s really, really special here – like something out of a fairytale. We visited in September, when the trees were still leafy and green, but I imagine at this time of year when the leaves are falling it’s totally off the scale beautiful. It hasn’t always been like this though: while the waterfalls formed nearly 10,000 years ago, the surrounding landscape was bare and treeless until the eighteenth century. The poet Robert Burns visited in 1787 and was sufficiently moved by the beauty of the site to write The Humble Petition of Bruar Water, entreating the Duke of Atholl to plant some trees along the river. The Duke and subsequent landowners have certainly fulfilled this request magnificently.
Dog friendly rating – 3.5/5. The walk to the falls has sheer drops off to the side, so we opted to keep leads on for the entirety of the walk. That being said, there are lots of good things to point out too: no stiles, no road walking and actual bins where you can drop off dog poos instead of having to carry them with you the whole way!
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