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Three Expeditions to the Salen High
Dams
A small but tough group assembled for this gruelling climb:
Robbie, assisted by Howard, Philippa and Richard, with Ellie
protecting us from the odd lion or tiger. The weather was
mild but damp, and the midges would have murdered us were
it not for a nice breeze.
First, a bit of history: in the 1840s a bobbin mill operated
in Salen, powered by a water wheel. Water was fed to the wheel
down a trough connected to a dam in the hill above Salen.
Unfortunately the lack of rain in the summer sometimes caused
the mill to shut down. Richard told me he had seen a much
bigger dam in the hills at the top of the same burn, clearly
constructed to maintain a better supply of water, so I decided
to go up to see it.
Unfortunately the dam is right at the top of the hill; we
had to climb to the big mobile phone mast before we even started
across the hill, it was hard going. Right at the top of the
climb, Richard and Robbie got out their kite and managed a
few short flights but they could have done with more wind,
so could we.
The dam is built across the burn which drains Loch a’Chaisil
(Dwelly is not much help on this one), and just before we
reached the burn, we had to cross an ancient wire deer fence.
The dam is enormous – it must have taken a huge effort
to quarry the stones and move them in such a remote place.
We found some traces of a track to the site; they must have
used horses and carts in the construction. The top of the
dam was built up on either side – I presume the stone
was holding an impermeable core of clay or peat. On the upstream
side were the remains of an iron penstock valve and a wooden
trough and on the downstream side the outflow was visible
at the bottom of the dam. We looked carefully at the loch
and could find no sign that the level had ever been raised
to the height of the dam – it had never been used.
We stopped for our wafers by the loch and then made our way
down. As we started out, Richard mentioned another dam around
the corner, below another loch. I decided it was too far for
one day and we decided to save it for later, we got a glimpse
of it in the distance as we crossed the hills on our way down.
While we were crossing the hill we found a few interesting
plants and Robbie spotted a round-leafed sundew, which he
made a drawing of when we got back to the Green Parrot.
John
Dye
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