I spent a solo week up in the Highlands and was rewarded as usual with mixed October weather. I drove up as far as Stirling SYHA on the Sunday afternoon, having paced Jeff to a PB around Lichfield Half Marathon that morning. A good night’s sleep in a private room for the bargain price of £21!
Monday’s forecast was for the morning to be better than the afternoon, and for conditions to be less bad well inland, so I got a reasonably prompt start to drive up as far as Bridge of Orchy for a walk up the Graham, Meall Tairbh. I parked by the Inveroran Hotel and started off up the West Highland Way to gain the north ridge of Ben Inverveigh, which led easily all the way to its summit, with some views over Loch Tulla and the Munros to the east, surprisingly almost clear of cloud.
A short descent on grass led to the bealach, with unusual glacial drumlins and a small lochan. Then a short, steep reascent led me up to the Graham summit, Meall Tairbh. A lull in the light rain as I crossed the bealach came to an end as I reached the top, confirming my decision to descend directly to the car rather than take the fair-weather option of continuing all the way around to Beinn Suidhe – which looked much murkier!
A few hours more driving took me, via Morrison’s in Fort William, to Kyleakin, just on the far side of the Skye bridge. I had booked into the Backpackers hostel for five nights, thinking it would be a good base for walks either on the island or the mainland according to weather conditions.
On Tuesday it seemed like the best conditions would again be in the morning, and the worst conditions would be on Skye! I therefore picked a half-day walk up a Graham on the mainland: Creag Dhubh Mhor above Strathcarron. A half-hour drive brought me to Achintee where I was able to park at the bottom of the road. My ascent route started off up the path towards Bearnais bothy, with decent views over Glen Carron. It was spotting with rain for a while but happily this soon petered out to give dry conditions for a couple of hours. An easy grassy gully led up from the path onto the ridge of the hill, and from there it was only a short further ascent to the summit, with very good (if hazy) views east towards the Corbetts and Munros south of Glen Carron.
I was pleasantly surprised to find that the ridge walk from Creag Dhubh Mhor to its subsidiary neighbour, Carn Geuradainn, was very attractively rocky, with several small lochans improving the views. Once I’d made the twisting and undulating traverse between the two, the west ridge gave an easy descent to pick up the path (from Bendronaig Lodge bothy) back to Achintee.
Rain and lower cloud came back in as I descended, and I finished the walk pretty damp. I ate lunch in the car before driving a couple of miles down the road to Attadale Gardens, which kept me occupied for an hour or so with only intermittent drizzle. The autumn colours were beautiful, and there were various sculptures to find around the woods and gardens too.
Wednesday’s forecast was a bit better, especially in the morning, so I arranged to meet up with Amy Ottway to bag a Corbett with her (a repeat Corbett for me). She lives nearby in Drumbuie but can’t often get out hillwalking due to full-time parenting duties. Fortunately her parents were currently visiting and offered to look after the girls, enabling her to come out for the day! We chose An Ruadh-stac, a very impressive rocky Corbett above Glen Carron, next to the more popular but less dramatic Munro, Maol Chean-dearg. I picked Amy up as I passed en route to Coulags, where we started our walk.
The first few kilometres of the walk are up an easy track into Coire Fionnaraich, to the bothy and a little beyond, before turning left on a steeper path up to the bealach between the Corbett and Munro. We had been sheltered from the northwesterly wind until this point, but were severely buffeted as we crossed the bealach to reach the more-sheltered rocky ridge up An Ruadh-stac! Grippy quartzite slabs make for an enjoyable climb for the final 300 vertical metres to the summit, and this section also coincided with a sunny spell that gave excellent views of all the surrounding peaks.
It was clouding over again by the time we reached the summit, so we only lingered long enough for a snack before starting the descent. The wind had abated quite a bit by the time we reached the exposed section, so progress was pretty quick and easy all the way down to the valley. A couple of rain showers passed over, so we paused in the bothy for a lunch break before continuing the final few kilometres to the car. It was great to spend a few hours catching up with Amy and to walk together again. I stopped at her house for a cup of tea before returning to the hostel.
Advanced weather forecasts for Thursday had looked very showery, but by the last minute it had improved a lot to predict sunny spells on the coast. I therefore chose to stay on Skye for the day’s walk, bagging the two Grahams (and one former Graham) close to the hostel. A short drive took me to the top of the pass over to Kylerhea, which is the easiest access point for these hills. I was surprised to find an intermittent but very useful trod leading up the heathery slopes of the first hill, Sgurr na Coinnich. This made progress relatively easy up to the summit, which gave very good views over the sea to the mainland hills, capped with snow (whereas there was only a very light dusting on the high ground on Skye). Beinn Sgritheall and the Knoydart hills looked particularly fine with shafts of light shining between the clouds.
More traces of path made the descent and reascent to Beinn na Caillich pretty quick and easy, with more great views over Loch Alsh and the Sound of Sleat. I returned to the pass by almost the same route, just contouring around the summit of Sgurr na Coinnich, surprisingly passing a walker and a runner ascending as I descended. Explains why a path is forming!
As the weather was staying pretty fair, I continued straight up the other side of the pass onto Ben Aslak, until recently also a Graham but surveyed and found to be slightly below 2000ft. This was a less dramatic hill, but still gave good views over the sea, and also clearer views towards the Cuillin hills to the west.
Friday, my final walking day, had the best weather of the week. I again walked on Skye, heading a few miles west to the pair of Grahams just beyond Broadford, the easternmost peaks of the Red Cuillin. I parked near the chambered cairn to the east, and followed the track to Coire-chat-achan. From there the ascent soon became very steep, initially over short heather and grass, then boulders, then more grass on the upper slopes. It reminded me of the climb up Glamaig from Sligachan.
Reaching the summit of Beinn na Caillich (same name as one of yesterday’s peaks!) revealed excellent views west towards the rest of the Cuillin hills, Black and Red, as well as south to Rum and north to Raasay. A good path led across the bealach to the second Graham, Beinn Dearg Mhor, which gave slightly close and better views. Bla Bheinn and Belig looked particularly good in the foreground in the sunshine.
A steep scree descent led me down to the bealach with Beinn Dearg Bheag (just a HuMP), where I had lunch before descending the easy east ridge back to Coire-chat-achan and the car. Amy had invited me back around to go to their local beach, so I spent the rest of the afternoon there before returning to the hostel for dinner and an early night ready for the long Saturday drive back to Derby.
No really big walks this time, thanks to poor weather at the start of the week, and the Skye hills not being very far from the road on Thursday and Friday! Nevertheless, a good relaxing break, ticking off six new Grahams and revisiting the Corbett with Amy. That takes my Graham tally neatly to 50 at the end of the trip.
Maps of my walks are available at the following links:
Meall Tairbh: https://www.plotaroute.com/route/1725049
Creag Dhubh Mhor: https://www.plotaroute.com/route/1726075
An Ruadh-stac: https://www.plotaroute.com/route/1726695
Sgurr na Coinnich: https://www.plotaroute.com/route/1727366
Beinn na Caillich: https://www.plotaroute.com/route/1728487
My full photo album is available on Google Photos here: https://photos.app.goo.gl/ozVTi6G51MV3iANVA
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