The Wee Buachaille

Craig was desperate to do another mountain and the forecast looked promising. The only possible problem was persuading Jennifer and boyfriend Gavin that a hill walk was a good idea! However the mention of the Real Food Cafe did the trick and so the only thing to decide was which mountain to do?

A check of the forecast on Friday night suggested that the further north and west would be the best. I had considered the Luss hills but decided that to be sure of at least a bit of sunshine we should head further north.

I was a bit unsure whether the kids would fancy the long drive to Glencoe but I assured them that there was a good path up Buachaille Etive Beag and it wasn’t actually that big a hill! Despite planning to leave at 9am we didn’t get away until 10.30am. However we made good progress and arrived at the very full car park at about 12.30pm.

We made our way up the Lairig Eilde beofre heading south east up to the beallach below Stob Coire Raineach with the sound of stags rutting echoing across the glen. Much to the kids delight we saw seven deer above us but they quickly ran off (the deer not the kids!).

Craig waiting for Jennifer and Craig!

Craig looking over to Buachaille Etive Mor

It really was very windy but quite sunny until we reached the summit when the cloud came in. A pity as we had been getting fantastic views. However Craig was actually delighted as he had never been in a cloud before. I think he was expecting fluffy cotton wool and was probably disappointed to be walking in mist!

Craig with a moody Stob Dubh and Glen Etive behind

The wind did drop on the way down and it was a very pleasant walk back to the car at about 4.30pm and on to Tyndrum for Gavin’s first experience of the Real Food Cafe. Was good to catch up with Sarah and hear that quite a few folk had been mentioning the write ups in Trail magazine.

Jennifer and Gavin smiling on the way down!

Cracking day out for Jennifer and Gavin’s first Munro and Craig’s second. Lots more to come hopefully!

Always look on the bright side of life!

For some inexplicable reason Jennifer decided she’d like to go hillwalking with us this weekend. I suspect it was more to do with the fact that she discovered that the Real Food Cafe, which she has frequented a few times while travelling to and from her Duke of Edinburgh expeditions, isn’t as far away as she thought. However I’m not complaining!

So the task was to find a wee hill near Tyndrum. We did consider Beinn Chuirn but the forecast wasn’t too promising so we settled for the 590m Sron nan Colan. Not the prettiest of hills as it is scarred by old mines but the zigzag path made the climb through the scree bearable.

We had one heavy shower which gave us some good rainbow photos…

Cool Craig!

Jumping Jennifer!

We were soon at the summit and after we’d taken some photos I realised that we looked like a scene from Monty Python’s Life of Brian so given that Craig likes singing the song anyway it only seemed natural to have a singalong! Apologies in advance for the quality of singing!

Of course regular readers will know where we ended the day…

Jennifer and Craig outside the Real Food Cafe

The Cobbler

As Jennifer was away this weekend doing a Duke of Edinburgh Gold expedition practice it was just myself and Craig. The forecast looked good so I suggested that we do the Cobbler in the Arrochar Alps.

We arrived at the car park at about 12.30 and were soon on our way. Craig kept asking when we would get to the Narnain boulders and soon he got his chance to do a bit of scrambling.

Craig with the Cobbler in background

On top of a Narnain Boulder!

We were soon heading up the front of the Cobbler and then made our way to the south top to watch some folk thread the needle.

Dad showing Craig how to thread the needle!

We were going to have lunch but midges put paid to that! Not sure why but there were none lower down but hundreds on the summit. We headed back to the beallach where there was a bit of a breeze to keep them away. We then headed for the north summit then took the well made path down the north side back to the path down to the Narnain boulders this time for a joint clamber up one!

On top of the north summit

Dad and Craig on the Narnain Boulders

The only disappointment of the day was the football result in which the Tigers were mauled by the Lions 4-0. To make up for that we made a slight detour to the Real Food Cafe for some well earned fish and chips! And on the way home we popped in to the Drovers Inn to show Craig the infamous stuffed bear!

The Drovers Inn Bear!

“The best weekend ever…”

I’ve been promising to take my son Craig camping for quite a while but have been waiting for a guaranteed good weather weekend (those that know me well know that I don’t really do wet weather camping anyway and I certainly didn’t want to put Craig off). So on seeing the forecast on Friday it seemed like too good an opportunity to miss. Picked him up from his mum’s on Friday night and headed to the new Go Outdoors at Clydebank to get him a decent pair of boots. Also picked up a pair of walking trousers for him with zip off legs to convert to shorts – in the event that turned out be a good move!

We set off at about 10am on Saturday morning to head for Kinlochleven where I knew there was a good campsite attached to the Macdonald Hotel. Arrived there at about 1pm, got the tent set up and were ready to go for a walk by 2pm.

Craig outside tent at Macdonald Hotel Campsite

Given the time I wasn’t sure how far Craig would be able to manage so I did consider the 764m Beinn na Caillich but then thought the steep initial ascent might not be the best of starts. So we decided to go for a walk up to the beallach (875m) below the Munro Am Bodach (1034m) where I knew we would get a fantastic view of Ben Nevis and the Ring of Steall. It’s also a much more gradual ascent and would, depending on time, give us a chance for Craig to bag his first Munro!

We drove up to Mamore Lodge and parked the car. Normally they charge £3 for the pleasure but it looks like it’s not open – a shame as it really is in a fantastic location but I know from the times I’ve been inside it that it’s not really been maintained. Anyway it’s a great place to park for doing the Mamores as it saves about 200m of climbing! Craig did really well on the ascent, my only worry being the river crossing I knew we would have to make. But he got over it with absolutely no problem and we continued on, with a few stops to get to the beallach just before 5pm. I’d said to Craig that we would need to turn back at 5.30pm at the latest but as we could see the summit I asked him if he wanted to carry on. Of course he did! So we left our rucksacks at the beallach and headed upwards. A few false summits left Craig a bit exasperated and few snow patches slowed us a bit but we got to the summit at about 5.20pm.

Craig on Am Bodach with Ben Nevis behind

A few photos and then we headed down. I did warn Craig that although going down is easier than going up on your legs it can sometimes be easier to slip going downhill. And so it turned out as his enthusiasm got the better of him a couple of times. Nothing serious though thankfully although he did go for a paddle at the river crossing – not too bad although the water did go over his boots so that was the boots well and truly christened! Got back to the campsite at 7.25pm meaning we did the walk in 5 hours 15 minutes which I though was absolutely brilliant for his first real Scottish hill walk (we’ve done Conic Hill and Ben A’an before). Had a well deserved bar meal in the hotel and then crashed out in the tent.

We got up at the leisurely time of 9am and after packing up we headed for the Ice Factor for breakfast and then Craig went on the High level rope course.

Craig on the high level rope course

We had a quick stop at the new layby at Loch Achtriochtan in Glencoe to take a photo of the Aonach Eagach ridge.

Loch Achtriochtan and the Aonach Eagach

We were going to meet up at the Real Food Cafe with Elaina, Petesy, Sandy and Bobinson who had gone wild camping up at Loch Quoich but they were having so much fun in the good weather that they were still high up in the hills (it turned out they didn’t get down until 7.30pm!). But we couldn’t go home without introducing Craig to the best fish and chips this side of Whitby! After that it was the long drive home, made worse by the inevitable traffic jam on Lochlomondside as half of Glasgow had obviously been making the most of the excellent weather! Still we made it back to Ayrshire just after 6pm with Craig telling me several times on the road back that this had been “the best weekend ever!”. May it be the first of many!

“Ayrshire Tiger I Presume…”

Well what a fantastic weekend! As promised the weather was superb and we finished up having three consecutive dry days on the hills! On Friday we had a relatively easy day doing the Pap of Glencoe…

Pap of Glencoe

View towards Kinlochleven and Saturday's hill Na Gruagaichean

Iain and Kirsten joined us on Friday and after a good evening in the newly refurbished Glencoe Hotel Saturday saw us heading for the Mamores to do Na Gruagaichean. At one point the clouds started rolling in particularly over Buachaille Etive Mor to the south…

Clouds over Buachaille Etive Mor

However the clouds cleared by the time we got to the summit. Words cannot really describe the scene…

Looking south to Glencoe

Looking towards Ben Nevis

Looking towards Na Gruagaichean's north top and Ben Nevis

Silhouettes on Na Gruagaichean

Near the summit we met a group of three folk coming down and as they passed one of them paused and asked if I was Ayrshire Tiger. Now I’ve joked for a while that one day this would happen but I was still somewhat surprised – it turned to be a chap Peter who had come along to an OM meet a couple of years ago at Killin – all I can say is that he has a better memory than I do!

We had originally planned to go on and do Binnein Mor but as we had spent so long on the summit of Na Gruagaichean we decided to be sensible and retrace our route. A spectacular day was completed with a brocken spectre…

Brocken Spectre

and an interesting descent in the dark…

Sunset over Loch Leven

Sunset over Loch Leven

So onto Sunday and yet another dry day and a wander up Stob Coire Raineach on Buachaille Etive Beag. We did the whole ridge back in the summer at which point the National Trust for Scotland were carrying out footpath work. Great views again including this one of yesterday’s hill…

View towards Na Gruagaichean

Another interesting descent as the path was very icy in places meaning we tended to by-pass it and use the grassy slopes instead culminating in a spectacular triple somersault by yours truly! At least it proved that old saying about cats always landing on their feet, well almost!

As ever we finished the weekend at the Real Food Cafe where we met up with ptc and Sandy who had been wild camping in the Grey Corries and Beinn a Creachain respectively.

The Cobbler

Petesy and a few pals were planning a West Highland Way endurance test with an overnight at Tyndrum so we had arranged to meet up with them in the Real Food Cafe on Saturday evening.

Jamie also had a few days off and decided to fly up from Manchester to join us on Saturday before heading off for a Corrour wild camp.  So we picked up Jamie at Glasgow Airport and headed off to Arrochar to do the Cobbler.  Absolutely glorious day as we headed up to the Narnain Boulders.

Elaina and Jamie heading towards the Cobbler

Jamie couldn’t resist climbing on to one of the boulders with almost disastrous consequences…!

Jamie trying to fall off one of the Narnain Boulders!

The Cobbler

Elaina's balancing act!

We were on the summit by 2pm but not before we met a young lad Kieran who proudly told us that he was “conquering the mountain” on his own as none of his pals were into hillwalking. Further enquiries found out that he was 14 years old and that while he had juice he had no food! So Elaina offered him a Snickers bar and we gave him advice on the easiest way down. We were well impressed that a young lad should be out in the hills on his own but something just wasn’t quite right…more on this later…!

Of course Jamie had not done the Cobbler before so had to “thread the needle”. I’d done it before so offered to take the role of photographer…well that’s my story and I’m sticking to it!

Elaina and Jamie threading the Needle

Time was getting on and as we had a rendezvous in Tyndrum we decided to take the easy way down round the back. At the Narnain Boulders we met up with Sandy who had spent last night wild camping on Ben Lomond and had decided to join us for a fish supper!

As we wound our way down the track we came across young Kieran again who was now walking with a group with another young lad.  That’s nice we thought, he’s met up with a family and he’s made a pal!  But then it became obvious from a comment made by one of the adults that Kieran was part of the family!  Ah well, so he wasn’t actually on his own, he’d obviously just gone on ahead from his family when we met him earlier, still we could forgive him for having his own little adventure and good luck to him in his future hillwalking career.  Still not sure about the Snicker bar though!

So onto Tyndrum to meet up with ptc and co.  We waited…and waited…Jamie had to leave to get his train to Corrour…we had our fish suppers…and hot chocolates…we were getting worried by this point as it was 8.45pm by this time but the lads staggered in for well deserved suppers of various descriptions and copious amounts of coffee!

All in all a cracking day, made even better by getting free fish suppers following a misunderstanding with our order…10 out of 10 for customer service to the Real Food Cafe…although I suspect the fact they know we are regular customers may have had something to do with it!

Hull City 2 Wigan 1…Ben Lui 0 Real Food Cafe 1

Well at last the Tigers managed a second win of the season but still managed to make hard work of it by letting a goal in four minutes from time.  And then there were five minutes of injury time!  Much nail biting took place in that last nine minutes!  It brought back memories of the good (bad?!) old days at Boothferry Park when I could never really relax unless we had a three goal lead (not that that happened very often!).

Today we planned to do Ben Lui but a combination of setting off a bit later than planned and a problematic  river crossing saw us turn back at the foot of the mountain.  Still got a couple of decent photos…

Looking towards Ben Lui

Another view of Ben Lui

Probably for the best as the weather took a turn for the worse.   So regular readers will know where we finished up…

Fish Supper at the Real Food Cafe!

Glencoe OutdoorsMagic Meet

Had a great weekend up in Glencoe meeting up with old and new faces from OutdoorsMagic.com.  We had Friday off so decided to head up and do Meall a’ Bhuiridh and Criese, two Munros that Elaina hadn’t done.  In the event we only did Meall a’ Bhuiridh as we spent so much time chatting to a couple of other walkers.  Not a particularly exciting hill  what with all the skiing infrastructure about but there were some interesting bits…

Elaina attempts a bridge crossing!

We arrived at Signal Rock Cottage just after 4pm.  We’ve stayed here before and after a chat with Slawek and Luiza we had a quick shower before heading for the Clachaig Inn for dinner.  Eventually the rest of the crowd arrived although we did have to bring Polly the Parrot out to attract some of the OM folk who were on their first meet!  Highlight of the night had to be the arrival of Sir Jimmy Savile!  Have to say he’s looking well for someone who’s going to be 83 in a few weeks time!

Saturday morning saw reasonable weather to start with as some of us met at Mamore Lodge.

OMers meet at Mamore Lodge

We set off along the landrover track with the aim of doing Binnein Beag.  It’s a long walk in to the remotest of the Mamore Munros and it wasn’t long until we realised as we approached Loch Eilde Mor that we had walked past the turn off that takes you around the shoulder of Sgurr Eilde Beag.  A quick re-assessment saw us take the path up the east side of the Allt Coire nan Laogh (a route we had taken in reverse last winter when the stream was in spate!).  We eventually got back on the planned route and carried on towards Coire an Lochain below Sgurr Eilde Mor.  The weather had deteriorated by this time and Sandy and Louise decided to make Louise’s first Munro Sgurr Eilde Mor rather than Binnein Beag.

Sgurr Eilde Mor

The rest of us carried on hoping for the weather to clear and with immaculate timing it did as we approached Binnein Beag.

The summit party contemplate the final ascent!

Looking towards Buachaille Etive Mor

We did have discussions about going on to do Binnein Mor but the weather was still being temperamental and the realisation that it would probably add a good couple of hours to the day made it an easy decision to take the long path back to Kinlochleven for Haggis Fritters and Steak and Chips at the MacDonald Hotel!

Loch Leven Sunset from MacDonald Hotel

It was late by the time we got back to Glencoe and the campers decided to stay at the camp site.  Elaina and I headed for the Clachaig planning to meet Ian Gallagher of Kendall Mountaineering Services who had taken three OMers scrambling on Ben Nevis.  Unfortunately the pub was mobbed and we didn’t realise that they had decided to go through to the Lounge Bar.  So we just had the one pint before heading back to the B&B.

Sunday saw ourselves, Sandy and Louise heading for Glen Nevis and a walk up to Steall Falls and a play on the wire bridge!

Elaina crossing Steall wire bridge

On the way back we were interviewed by someone from the John Muir Trust who were doing a survey to find out if people thought the path to Steall was appropriate.  There have been several accidents, some fatal, and the Trust are looking to be able to justify not making changes to the path.  Hopefully our response will assist in that aim as it would be crazy if health and safety concerns led to “improvements” being imposed!

Sunday night saw us back in the Clachaig for a really excellent night with a dozen of us staying on to the bitter end of a cracking weekend.  It’s a good sign when you are having to be chucked out of the Clachaig at closing time on Sunday night!

On Monday we all headed home but not before we introduced Iain to the joys of the Real Food Cafe!  Two egg and bacon rolls, a very large coffee and a large hot chocolate later (and that was just for Iain!) we parted company with plans already in hand for the next OM meet in Great Langdale in the Lakes.

Got home and watched a recording of Sunday night’s “Munro – Mountain Man” programme in which I made a fleeting out of focus appearance in the background of the Clachaig Inn as Nick Crane was interviewing folk for the programme – you’d think I was never out of the place!

Beinn a’ Ghlo

The weather forecast was promising so we needed a plan…the east looked best so we decided to head for Blair Atholl to do the three Munros on Beinn a’ Ghlo.  The only downside being that it meant a trip up my least favourite road in Scotland, the A9!  Eventually we arrived at the small (very busy!) car park just before 11am and set off for the eroded path up the first Munro, Carn Liath.

Carn Liath

Surprisingly good progress found us on the summit at 12.30pm.  We then headed for Braigh Coire Chruinn-bhalgain and found ourselves on the second Munro at 2pm.

Looking towards Braigh Coire Chruinn-bhalgain

This was good even accounting for the fact that the car park had given us a 300m start!  So on to the third and final Munro Carn nan Gabhar including a “short cut” which turned out to be no such thing – Elaina sensibly stuck to the path – latest score…Ayrshire Tiger 0 Path 1!  Arrived on the summit at 3.10pm.  Now this was getting silly…three Munros in just over 4 hours…but we still had to get down, but it couldn’t take that long …could it?

Looking south from Carn nan Gabhar

Now we could have dropped back down to the beallach and skirted our way around Airgiod Bheinn, but we decided to go over this last top.  The ridge itself was fine but the descent off its southwest slope was tortuous and slowed our progress somewhat!  We eventually got to the bottom and picked up the track back to the car park, which included a comedy moment worthy of “You’ve Been Framed” when I decided to do a somersault and finished up stuck in a clump of heather unable to move!  As you would expect from a nurse, Elaina was very sympathetic to my plight and burst out laughing!  At least she didn’t have her camera to hand!

So eventually we arrived back at the car at 7.20pm, so that was 4 hours 10 minutes up and 4 hours 10 minutes down!  But for once we were not the last car in the car park!

A rare site indeed, another car in the car park at the end of the day!

Now I couldn’t fact the prospect of the A9 so we went back back across country via Aberfeldy, Killin and Crianlarich.  For some reason the car wouldn’t take a left turn at Crianlarich so we somehow finished up at the Real Food Cafe in Tyndrum! 

Absolutely cracking day made all the better on hearing the sporting news that the Tigers had scraped a win and the Aussies were well and truly on the ropes in the Ashes!

Edit to add a couple of photos takne by Elaina…

Summit of Carn nan Gabhar

Looking towards Braigh Coire Chruinn-bhalgain

Fersit Munros

Had a very pleasant weekend camping at Glen Nevis Campsite where we met up with other members of Air Na Creagan Mountaineering Club.  We had great plans for Saturday but on seeing the weather we decided to take our time driving north stopping at the Real Food Cafe for a cuppa.  We then had dinner at the Ben Nevis Inn before joining the ten club members who had done Ben Nevis, some via the CMD arete, some by the tourist route.

On Sunday we made up for our lazy Saturday by doing the two Munros to the west of Loch Trieg, Stob a’ Choire Mheadhoin and Stob Coire Easain.  We had thought of doing a circuit but Coire Laire looked distinctly boggy so we decided to re-ascend Stob a’ Choire Mheadhoin and return the way we had come.

Looking northeast from the pillar at NN337767

Heading towards Stob Coire Easain

We were very lucky with the weather especially compared to the previous day, just getting caught in a heavy shower right at the end.

Heavy end of day shower over Loch Treig

The rain continued as we drove home but we broke the journey with a stop at the Real Food Cafe in Tyndrum which had its wood burning stove going full pelt…well it is August!

Thanks to Elaina for the photos ‘cos some numpty left his camera at home!