Ben Lawers is the friendly face of 4,000-foot mountains, rising proudly above the shimmering waters of Loch Tay and set in a softer landscape than the rockier or more remote giants to the north. With the option of a high starting point and a gently graded path, the ascent might just feel a little like cheating. But does that make Lawers a lesser mountain?

In the field of lure and status Ben Lawers reigns supreme as Perthshire’s highest point. However, there is far more than significant altitude, more even than the fact that it is Britain’s tallest mountain south of Britain’s tallest mountain, Ben Nevis. Enhancing this magnitude are antiquity and character, the story of its natural features impacting human activity on several fascinating levels.  This mountain has plenty to shout about.

Ben Lawers is the tenth highest Munro, although originally ninth in the tables until the revisions of 1997. The summit stands at 3983ft (1214m) yet, despite not quite attaining 4,000ft, the mountain attracts some 40,000 ascents each year. Only a small number of those who make the ascent are aware of the extraordinary depth of interest, so let’s take a close look at the true charisma of this mountain.

Ben Lawers is not a solitary peak, but a range of seven separate Munros. While the majority simply climb Lawers (many also include Ben Ghlas as it’s on the way), few tackle the full ridge. The traverse of all seven summits elevates a straightforward outing to expedition status. Even though the walk may only cover twelve miles it involves a minimum of 5740ft of ascent depending on which direction or route is chosen. Both Loch Tay and Glen Lyon are options. In general, it’s a grassy walk with just a short section of scrambling on An Stuc, the most shapely of all the seven peaks, although this can be avoided if required. For more details see here: https://www.stevenfallon.co.uk/lawers.html

The outlying Munros on the ridge are lower and the most grassy, therefore the central four from Ben Ghlas to Meal Garbh are often favoured by those not intent on ticking summits. This route probably blends the finest of the range. If Ben Ghlas is not included then a circular route via Lawers Burn/Lochan nan Cat makes for a satisfying round of the highest three.

Returning to the principal height of Ben Lawers, the mountain was long considered to exceed 4,000ft. This may be one reason why it was chosen as one of major Scottish mountains for observations during the Principal Triangulation of Britain (see our feature Triangulation Matters for more details). Most importantly, such mountains needed to provide extensive views. A surveying party took measurements from the summit as early as 1776 and the remains of an 1840’s surveyor’s camp for the Principal Triangulation can be discovered behind a stone windbreak in a gully 250m ESE of the summit. Such camps were named Colby Camps after General Thomas Colby, who reconnoitred triangulation stations for the Principal Triangulation, and known to walk thirty miles a day for three weeks at a time!

It is therefore with some irony that subsequent altitude measurements revealed that Lawers did not actually attain the magic 4,000ft. This was presumably a contributory factor in the building of a cairn twenty feet high on the summit. The enterprise was the idea of Malcolm Ferguson from Killin who, in 1887, recruited around thirty local men to gather rocks, build the cairn and surmount it with a huge block of quartz weighing 300kg. A contemporary report recorded that “the mountain top was a scene of busy animation all day”. Ten years later, Ferguson also built two cairns on Ben Ledi and Callander Craig to commemorate Queen Victoria’s Golden Jubilee. The Lawers cairn began to deteriorate quickly and the Ordnance Survey cleared the rest of it away when constructing their trig pillar in 1936.

Ben Lawers has been known by an English name for centuries, although there are suggestions that it has a Gaelic derivation, possibly from labhar (loud as in a stream) or ladhar (a hoof or claw). Nonetheless, ancient man was attracted to the mountain, which exhibits a concentration of rock art from prehistory in the form of over one hundred rocks carved with cup and ring marks. No one knows their purpose or what attracted people here, although there is speculation that this could be due to the local prevalence of quartz dust. Take a look at your boots when walking on Lawers and they will be coated in glitter. This is a special feature of the mountain, and while in modern times we know this as quartz dust, primitive man may have thought this to be some kind of magic, stimulating their expression in rock art.

On the subject of art, Ben Lawers was chosen as the subject for the first mountain to be painted to romanticise the Highlands. This was by Robert Norie in 1741 and typical of the style of the day, by over dramatising landscape features, adding classic ruins and fantasy figures.

What we might call the tourist route, can be undertaken as a figure of eight so is not quite the out and back that may be expected. The car park has been landscaped to be mostly hidden from road view and the exit is via a path passing inscribed interpretive stones providing information on the natural history of the mountain. These replace a visitor centre which stood on the other side of the road until 2012.

The visitor centre was created by the National Trust for Scotland in 1972, who have owned Ben Lawers since 1950 (and the neighbouring Tarmachan Ridge since 1996). The angular design was of its time, which earned it the nickname of the Starship Enterprise, although eventually financial constraints led to its demise. The chief function was to bring public awareness to the ecological variety on the mountain, which became a designated National Nature Reserve in 1964.

Due to a favourable combination of geology and climate Ben Lawers has the most extensive populations of arctic-alpine plants in Britain and a significant collection of lichens, in addition to a wide floral diversity.

The first part of the walk coincides with the Edramucky Nature Trail, which can be taken in its entirety to add an extra dimension to the ascent. A leaflet can be downloaded here: https://ntswebstorage01.blob.core.windows.net/nts-web-assets-production/downloads/Edramucky-Trail.pdf

The trail is enclosed by high fences to exclude deer and sheep thus encouraging regeneration, and just before these are crossed onto the open hill, there are reminders of former human occupation. Ben Lawers displays several clusters of constructed stone remains; shielings and peat stores that served as seasonal dwellings. It was a practice known as transhumance, exploiting summer grazing opportunities at higher levels, freeing up the glens for crop growing. The stock would be mostly cattle but there were also sheep and goats. Ben Lawers has a particularly high concentration of sheilings at different altitudes, so the animals could be moved from one to another. Shielings were mostly in use from the 15th to 18th centuries and there are around one hundred examples on the mountain.

So far, the ascent has been decidedly untaxing on a well-constructed path and if Ben Ghlas is not climbed then it remains so, the remarkably gently angled track gradually rising above the Edramucky Burn into Coire Odhar. This open grassy bowl was the hub of early skiing activity in the Highlands, with the first-ever Scottish Ski Club hut being built here in 1932. This was followed by Scotland’s first slalom and downhill races in 1934 and 1936 respectively. Popularity remained strong until the development of purpose-built ski resorts in the 1950’s. Nevertheless, Ben Lawers continued to serve as one of the foremost ranges for ski mountaineering.

To include Ben Ghlas on the ascent, continue straight up the ridge after leaving the intake fence. The path is steeper although again, thanks to NTS restoration, it is currently coping with the high level of footfall. At one time the paths on Ben Lawers were notoriously eroded. The summit of Ben Ghlas is a fine place, revealing the close proximity of Ben Lawers, which has been mostly hidden from view so far. A pleasing ridge leads gently down to join the path up from Coire Odhar for the final climb to the top. You will not be alone and finding solitude at the summit is even less likely, although the highest point is enjoyably compact and rocky and feels like a proper high mountain summit.

There are two summit structures, the OS trig pillar and a fine stone pillar that was constructed around 1980 to serve as a toposcope. Unfortunately, it never received its direction indicator plaque. The plate was produced, although never affixed. This is possibly because some of the information was discovered to be incorrect.

The trig pillar has long been in a sorry state, the concrete base eroding badly. The Ordnance Survey no longer maintain their pillars, Ben Lawers last receiving attention by the OS in 1980, nonetheless, some public spirited repair work has been undertaken from time to time.

The summit views are extensive although Ben Lawers affords the impression of being on the edge of the Highlands, which in some ways it is, there being no higher ground in Britain to the south. The considerable altitude brings a fine panorama of the northern mountains and contrasts this with the lush Perthshire countryside to the south and east.

Worth Rating: 72.5

Aesthetic – 22.5

Complexity – 12

Views – 16

Route Satisfaction – 14

Special Qualities – 8