The Dotterel is one of the most handsome birds to grace the Scottish Highlands. The female in particular, with its jet belly merging into chestnut with pinkish grey chest and shoulders, is a little beauty. They come here in the spring to breed after wintering in the Middle East and North Africa.

The last time we'd seen Dotterel was on Little Glas Maol, some four or five years past; unperturbed by our presence, they'd allowed us to approach quite close. Would we see them again?

We set off early from Auchavan, where the road ends in Glen Isla. First stop: Tulchan Lodge. Usually we pass the lodge and make for the long south ridge of Monega Hill, that way goes an ancient drover's trail. For a change we decided to duck into the trees that shelter the house, beautiful old birch and restful larch; from there we could use the land rover track for Shanovan Hill and Little Glas Maol itself.

Although it was dry, the forecast wasn't quite living up to its promise; plenty of cloud and a keen breeze kept us on the move.

We were heading into Glen Brighty, a lovely green valley backed by the sombre grey screes of Creag Leacach, to my mind the finest of Glen Shee hills.It's at this time of year that nature, well into the business side of the year, treats the observant walker with all sorts of delights.

Before very long we'd stopped counting the ten pence sized Dor Beetles we watched scurrying across the track like little black marbles. We found alternate leaved golden saxifrage scattered by burns like discarded piles of pale golden coins. But so far, no dotterel!

We left the track for a while and battled up through straggly heather and boulders. Mountain pansies we found galore and plenty of devil's bit scabious. Dwarf cornel spread white dots in the grass too. Yellow tormentils were everywhere. We even found bilberry (blaeberries), fruiting. But neither feather or down of dotterel; perhaps they were already gone!

Dotterel are sometimes called 'the page bird'. Accounting for this is their habit of dogging the shadows of their bigger relatives, the golden plover, as if waiting on their beck and call. So where there's golden plover, there's often dotterel. We strained our ears for the plover's plaintive phoooee. And heard nothing but the wind moaning through the grass.

And then, at last, it happened! Just as we broached the summit plateau of Little Glas Maol, I heard a plover like whistle, but higher pitched than golden. A low flash, a glide of grey and chestnut and there she was, our first dotterel of the season.

She was all alone, perhaps the rearguard of her kind. And she really did seem tame; the little poser allowed us to get to within a couple of yards of her to take her photograph. We were delighted, enthralled and privileged.

Mission accomplished! Yet lots more walking left and much to see. We separated and quartered the ground all the way to Glas Maol's barren summit. Alas, not another bird came out to greet us.

Our original intention had been to wander over to Carn of Claise and from there find a way down into the vast rocky amphitheatre of Caenlochan Glen and thence back by way of Glen Isla. The hoards had arrived meantime and all seemed to be heading off that way. So inviting did Creag Leacach look now that the sun was breaking through that we decided to go that way instead.

We dropped south to find a little spring I knew with its bright green flush and yellow saxifrage. A dilapidated old wall must be one of the best known in the highlands; built from the glacially shattered detritus of quartz that so distinguishes the mountain, it led us along Creag Leacach's spine and on to its summit cairn.

From where the views were grand. The Glen Shee hills and those of the Angus glens filled the circle of the closer horizon, all old friends and familiar. Further out and northwards the Cairngorms threw their wall up against the rest of Northern Scotland; it was a cold looking barrier too, laced as they were even yet with straggking remnants of last year's snows.

We continued southwest to Carn Ait and found a steep grassy descent into the Glen of the Brighty.

Half way down we stopped to photograph a carpet moth, its huge feather like antennae lifting such a dull looking creature from the ordinary.

Down by the Brighty Burn we stopped to watch a pair of dippers, those white breasted blackbirds of the riverside, busily hunting to and fro for grubs and insects.

Now any backward glance was filled with the great boulder screes of Creag Leacach.

My mind drifted to my first visit to this glen, almost thirty years ago now. That time I'd dropped straight down those screes from the summit.

Amongst the boulders I'd drunk greedily from a spring, a little trickle of the purest water issuing straight from the rock at my feet.

Lower down the scree gave way to heather. Then it had been in flower; the palest pink and most extensive I have ever seen.

By the time I'd ploughed my way through, and reached the burn, my boots were pink as well.

Today, although the heather had already started to tinge the lower slopes, the display had not quite gotten properly under way.

Now we walked back under a beating sun. Slowly we made our way over rough ground until we were able to close the circle on our original track.

The Dor beetles were still foraging but this morning's plethora of black slugs had hidden themselves from the sun's desiccating rays.

Even the sheep that had eyed us so warily as we passed this way this morning, were gone.

And soon we were gone too, back along the Isla to the car for the journey home. The day had started with a quest and ended with success. It hadn't been a hard day, more a day of patient searching, watching, waiting. It had been a day of full rewards.



MAP: O.S. Sheet 43 Braemar & Blair Atholl
START: Auchavan; Grid ref: 191 697
DISTANCE: 13 miles/ 20.5 kilometres
ASCENT: 2800 feet/ 850 metres