0:14:50 > 0:14:57.
0:15:21 > 0:15:24Its name has the ring of a war cry
0:15:24 > 0:15:27and it's one of the most mystical mountains in Scotland.
0:15:29 > 0:15:32Every year, 20,000 people climb to its summit,
0:15:32 > 0:15:33and I'm going to climb it today.
0:15:33 > 0:15:35It's called Schiehallion.
0:15:35 > 0:15:38That translates as "The Fairy Hill of the Caledonians,"
0:15:38 > 0:15:40so why don't you come and join me?
0:15:47 > 0:15:49All around the flanks of Schiehallion,
0:15:49 > 0:15:52there's a lot of evidence of ancient settlements
0:15:52 > 0:15:56and cup and ring marks which go way back to prehistoric times
0:15:56 > 0:16:00but even more surprising is the link between this mountain
0:16:00 > 0:16:04in Perthshire and the Holy Land - the link between Schiehallion
0:16:04 > 0:16:07and the Knights Templar and Freemasonry,
0:16:07 > 0:16:11and it's said that one of the very early chapters of Freemasonry
0:16:11 > 0:16:15was set up on Mount Moriah in the kingdom of Judea.
0:16:15 > 0:16:18And that chapter was later reconstituted
0:16:18 > 0:16:21here on Schiehallion by none other than Robert the Bruce.
0:16:35 > 0:16:39We've got a nice wee viewpoint here and that's Loch Tummel down there
0:16:39 > 0:16:42but we've got a much better view of Loch Tummel and Loch Rannoch
0:16:42 > 0:16:43from higher up the hill.
0:16:49 > 0:16:52The Scottish Charity The John Muir Trust
0:16:52 > 0:16:54bought Schiehallion at the end of the '90s
0:16:54 > 0:16:57and one of the things they did almost immediately
0:16:57 > 0:17:00was improve the footpath that climbs up to the summit.
0:17:00 > 0:17:04The old path took a line of least resistance
0:17:04 > 0:17:06right up the north-east flank of the hill
0:17:06 > 0:17:09and it crossed great areas of peat and bog
0:17:09 > 0:17:12but the John Muir Trust discovered a very old path,
0:17:12 > 0:17:17which took a zigzag line up the nose of the east ridge
0:17:17 > 0:17:20and they improved that, and I think they've done pretty good job,
0:17:20 > 0:17:23bearing in mind this path has to sustain
0:17:23 > 0:17:27about 20,000 pairs of boots every year.
0:17:27 > 0:17:29So this path really does help.
0:17:42 > 0:17:45Running along below us here is the old road to the Isles.
0:17:45 > 0:17:47There's Loch Tummel,
0:17:47 > 0:17:49Loch Rannoch and beyond at Lochaber,
0:17:49 > 0:17:52although that's not a stretch of water, but an actual district.
0:17:52 > 0:17:55I wonder if you remember the old song,
0:17:55 > 0:17:57# By Loch Tummel and Loch Rannoch
0:17:57 > 0:17:58# And Lochaber I will go
0:17:58 > 0:18:01# La la la la la. #
0:18:01 > 0:18:05HE CONTINUES TO HUM
0:18:17 > 0:18:20Quite a nice little poem was written in 1905
0:18:20 > 0:18:24by a local minister, the Rev John Sinclair,
0:18:24 > 0:18:26who lived down in Kinloch Rannoch.
0:18:26 > 0:18:28In this poem, he kind of hints
0:18:28 > 0:18:32at this relationship between Schiehallion and the Holy Land.
0:18:33 > 0:18:35"If there be on earth a paradise
0:18:35 > 0:18:39"Where righteous souls in glory wait and trust
0:18:39 > 0:18:42"To the sweet resurrection of the just
0:18:42 > 0:18:45"Methinks that region round Schiehallion lies
0:18:45 > 0:18:48"And the good angels hovering over its cone
0:18:48 > 0:18:51"Impart to it that chased and heavenly tone.
0:18:53 > 0:18:56"I love to view Schiehallion all aglow
0:18:56 > 0:18:59"In blaze of beauty against the eastern sky
0:18:59 > 0:19:02"Like a huge pyramid exalted high
0:19:02 > 0:19:05"O'er woodland fringing round its base below
0:19:05 > 0:19:09"The Bible tells of Hebrew mountains grand
0:19:09 > 0:19:12"Where such great deeds were done in days of old
0:19:12 > 0:19:15"As render them more precious far than gold
0:19:15 > 0:19:19"In our conception of the Holy Land
0:19:19 > 0:19:22"But every soul that seeks the heavenly road
0:19:22 > 0:19:26"May in Schiehallion, too, behold a Mount of God."
0:19:29 > 0:19:31SNOW CRUNCHES
0:19:34 > 0:19:35A mountain like Schiehallion
0:19:35 > 0:19:39is a kind of unlikely place to carry out scientific experiments,
0:19:39 > 0:19:43but in 1774, the Astronomer Royal,
0:19:43 > 0:19:46one Rev Nevil Maskelyne,
0:19:46 > 0:19:48came to Schiehallion to try and discover
0:19:48 > 0:19:53if the Earth had a dense core or a hollow core.
0:19:53 > 0:19:56I think the experiments discovered that Earth had a dense core,
0:19:56 > 0:20:00but what was quite interesting from a hillwalking perspective,
0:20:00 > 0:20:04is that one of the surveyors on those experiments, Charles Hutton,
0:20:04 > 0:20:07hit upon a way of joining up places of equal height.
0:20:07 > 0:20:09He actually discovered contour lines,
0:20:09 > 0:20:12those little brown lines that we hill walkers use
0:20:12 > 0:20:14so much today, when we're out in the mountains.
0:20:22 > 0:20:26If you take a line of latitude between the most northerly point
0:20:26 > 0:20:28in Scotland and the most southerly point,
0:20:28 > 0:20:31and a line of longitude connecting east and west,
0:20:31 > 0:20:36where the two cross over, you have the exact centre of Scotland
0:20:36 > 0:20:40and that's right here, on the summit of Schiehallion.
0:20:40 > 0:20:42Oh, wow! It's wild!
0:20:42 > 0:20:45There's not much in the way of views today.
0:20:45 > 0:20:46I'm sorry about that.
0:20:46 > 0:20:49But just in case any of you are wondering where the name
0:20:49 > 0:20:53"Fairy Hill Of The Caledonians" come from, down below me here,
0:20:53 > 0:20:57at the head of Glenmore, there's a little hill called Tom a Mhorair
0:20:57 > 0:20:59and below that hill is a cave,
0:20:59 > 0:21:02and in the recesses of that cave,
0:21:02 > 0:21:07there's allegedly a door - a door that leads to fairyland.
0:21:07 > 0:21:09I tell you, you'd have to be a pretty tough fairy
0:21:09 > 0:21:11to live up here in these conditions.
0:21:11 > 0:21:14It's too tough for me, so I'm off. See you next time!
0:21:14 > 0:21:17Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd