Mid-October brought my usual autumn week in the Highlands. This year I decided to make the driving easy by spreading the northward and southward trips over three days each. My travels commenced on the Thursday night, heading up as far as my parents’ new house in Kendal. Friday morning was a bit damp, so we had a leisurely start and an early lunch before heading out for an early-afternoon stroll on nearby Scout Scar. We were lucky to have sunshine, giving great views towards the Lake District and Morecambe Bay.
After that, I continued my drive, heading up to Pitlochry Backpackers’ Hostel for the night, with a quick dinner stop at McDonalds at Stirling Services. Parking was tricky, with the town thronging with evening visitors to the ‘Enchanted Forest’ and extra restrictions on the streetside bays, but I found a space to squeeze into in the hostel car park after taking a second look on foot,
I began Saturday with a visit to Faskally Forest parkrun, just north of town. It was a beautiful sunny morning, with the early-autumn forest colours shown off to good effect across the loch. The course is a challenging one, with seven sharp ascents totalling around 100m, and some rough terrain underfoot, so I was pretty happy to finish in just under 21 minutes.
Afterwards, I drove half an hour south to the hamlet of Amulree for a walk over a pair of Grahams. The route was essentially a horseshoe of the Girron Burn. I crossed slopes of grass and heather to reach Meall Reamhar – with good views towards Glen Almond and Schiehallion – then made a steep descent and reascent across the bealach to Meall nan Caorach, followed by an easy grassy descent back to Girron. The sunshine continued, but it was pretty cold in the breeze.
Route map: https://www.plotaroute.com/route/2419214
Once back at the car, I set off for the final section of my journey north, up to Torridon with a pause to pick up groceries at Tesco Extra in Inverness. This was the first time I’d stayed at the SYHA hostel in Torridon village, and I found it to be excellent – spacious, comfortable and well-equipped. I cooked and ate, then planned my walk for the next day, and had a good night’s sleep.
With fairly strong winds, cloud likely to be around 700m, and a possibility of frequent showers, it seemed like a good day to bag another Graham. My choice was Beinn a’ Mhuinidh, north of Kinlochewe. The guidebooks recommended an interesting route that I wouldn’t have picked out from the map alone, ascending on a small path beside the impressive waterfall on the Allt na Still, which tumbles down the crag on the southwest side of the hill. That gave access to the high western terraces, which were an impressive viewpoint for Slioch, not far away to the west.
The summit was just in the cloud, and quite cold in the wind, so I didn’t pause long there before descending south, soon regaining views over the plateau with its many small lochans. With the weather apparently brightening, I opted to make the small detour to the minor top of Meallan Ghobhar, before descending steeply by another small path beside the Allt Chnaimhean. This final section gave particularly good views over Kinlochewe to Beinn Eighe.
Route map: https://www.plotaroute.com/route/2419217
Monday’s forecast was a little better, with the cloud expected to lift off the higher tops in the afternoon, so I opted to walk up the pointy Corbett of Beinn Damh, via the adjacent Graham, Beinn na h-Eaglaise – a clockwise circuit of Coire Roill. The initial climb through the forest above the Torridon Hotel was easy and pleasant, with an impressive waterfall in the gorge below, and gave access to a fairly easy, rocky ascent of the northwest ridge of Beinn na h-Eaglaise. Cloud was swirling around the summit but giving intermittent views up Glen Torridon and along Upper Loch Torridon. Beinn Damh and the Glen Carron Munros were stuck in thick grey cloud though, so I had no views that way!
The descent to the bealach at Drochaid Coire Roill was more awkward than expected, with a series of small rocky terraces to find a way through. The climb up the other side onto Beinn Damh was very steep and heathery, but I found that any scrambling was easily avoided, which was welcome in the damp and slippy conditions. The cloud didn’t seem to be showing any sign of thinning or lifting, and the visibility at the summit was very poor, such that I required a compass bearing to follow the ridge path onwards, despite that path being marked with closely-spaced cairns!
It was only when I dropped off the side of the ridge into the head of Toll Ban that I finally got clear of the cloud at around 550m. Torridon village and the loch seemed to have been in the sunshine all day, while all the mountains were in thick, damp clag! The good path made for a quick descent back to the car. Even by sunset, the cloud had not lifted off the hills, so at least I did not wish I had made a later start.
Route map: https://www.plotaroute.com/route/2419222
Tuesday was the one day with an excellent forecast, so it was no surprise that Amy picked that day to meet for a walk. We decided to take advantage of the fact that we had two cars available and do a linear traverse over both the Applecross Corbetts. We met, around sunrise, at Tornapress at the bottom of the Bealach na Ba road, and drove up to the top of the pass in convoy. There seemed to be a rush of traffic into Applecross at that time of the morning, but luckily almost nobody going the other way (it’s a single-track road). We left my car at the top, then drove back down in Amy’s, and north to the shores of Loch Shieldaig, where we parked at Inverbain.
The stalkers’ path beside the Allt an Srathain was pretty solid and rocky to start with, but became boggy and indistinct as we approached the bealach below Croic-Bheinn. There were excellent views over the loch to the Torridon hills as we climbed. At the bealach, we turned left to cross fairly rough, grassy terrain to reach the long north ridge of Beinn Bhan, which gave improving views towards Skye on the right and the Glen Carron hills on the left.
Once past the Far North Top (the unnamed 710m ring contour), we stuck close to the eastern side of the ridge to enjoy the dramatic views over a series of steep and rocky corries: Coire Gorm Beag, Coire Gorm Mor, Coire Toll a’ Mheine, Coire an Fhamair, and Coire na Poite – lots of photo stops required!
Eventually we reached the summit of Beinn Bhan, then turned west for the long and rough descent to Bealach nan Arr. There were fragments of path here and there, but often they were not easy to spot from above! We traversed a terrace around the head of Coire nan Arr then continued south, climbing steadily to the transmitter on the west top of Sgurr a’ Chaorachain.
After a long and mostly pathless walk, it was good that the continuation to the summit of Sgurr a’ Chaorachain only involved a modest descent and reascent, and had a small path much of the way. The narrow ridge gave more superb views of the Na Ciochan ridge towards Beinn Bhan. After a short pause at the summit, we headed back to the transmitter, then easily down the access track to the Bealach na Ba, arriving a bit before sunset. That just left me to drop Amy back to Inverbain on my way back to Torridon. A fantastic day out on dramatic hills with good company and perfect weather!
Route map: https://www.plotaroute.com/route/2420319
Wednesday was a windy but mostly dry day, with high cloud. I was sorely tempted to have a go at a traverse of Liathach with an attempt at bagging Meall Dearg, the Munro Top beyond the Northern Pinnacles, but finally decided it was too reckless in the wind. With hindsight, it might actually have been okay. Instead, however, I headed back around past Kinlochewe to bag another Graham, Beinn a’ Chearcaill, which offered fine views of the north side of Beinn Eighe.
My walk started up the good stalkers’ path up Glen Grudie, then forked right onto an unmapped path up Coire Briste, which petered out at a lochan near the bealach on the ridge. As the weather was pretty good, I opted to include the book’s suggested scenic detour to Creag na Feol, which gave grand views into the big corrie between Ruadh-stac Mor and Ruadh-stac Beag.
Then it was an easy walk west across the plateau, with a tail wind, to the main summit of Beinn a’ Chearcaill. The summit area is very unusual, a huge flat sandstone slab scattered with boulders, with a cairn at the northwest end. The views into Beinn Eighe’s Coire Mhic Fhearchair, with its famous Triple Buttress, were particularly good. Beinn Dearg (with Beinn Alligin beyond) and Beinn an Eoin were also impressive to the west.
Once I’d finished taking in the scene, I continued for three kilometres north along the ridge to the minor summit of A’ Choineach Beag, a better viewpoint for Loch Maree, with the Letterewe and Fisherfield hills beyond. I found an almostly totally sheltered spot below a crag to eat my lunch, then pottered back down Coire Briste and Glen Grudie to the car.
Route map: https://www.plotaroute.com/route/2421225
On Thursday, the easterly winds picked up much more, as Storm Babet pushed into Scotland. The forecast predicted 108mph gusts on Liathach, so it was no day to be on the high hills! As it was dry, however, I didn’t want to write off the day entirely, and decided to see if I could get up the lee side of nearby 437m Marilyn, Seana Mheallan, which had looked attractive from Beinn na h-Eaglaise on Monday. Others on the hill-bagging website had recommended a route along the Abhainn Thrail then up one of the streams on the southwest of the hill, and that proved to be good advice. The river had several pretty sections of rapids, then a small path beside a deer fence led me up into the corrie, only leaving a straightforward and mostly sheltered climb on grass to get close to the top.
The wind was really whipping across the summit, picking up water from the small lochans to give heavy spray downwind. However, it was only a short, crouched-down dash from the last sheltered spot to the summit cairn, where I was able to brace myself against the rocks to get a few photos before beating a retreat back to the calm!
Route map: https://www.plotaroute.com/route/2422049
I descended the same way, then drove east to Inverness, pausing in a layby for lunch near Achnasheen, and getting really poor fuel economy driving directly into the wind! I was too early to check into the SYHA hostel, so I left the car there and walked into town for a bit of a look around, passing the castle and cathedral and some of the bridges over the River Ness. I went back to the hostel, relaxed for a bit over tea and biscuits, then headed back into town in the evening for a meal out at Pizza Express – tasty!
Storm Babet continued on Friday, with frequent, heavy showers and more strong winds expected on the Cairngorms and Perthshire hills, so a hill day didn’t really appeal. It was dry in Inverness, so I opted for a rare flat, low-level walk along the River Ness and the Caledonian Canal. Carnarc Point gave a good view of the Kessock Bridge and the Beauly Firth at the start of the walk. Then I followed the canal all the way to Dochgarroch Lock – fairly dull walking with scenery that only changed very slowly! I had lunch there before walking back down the other side of the canal, finally heading back into the city via the attractive Ness Islands.
Route map: https://www.plotaroute.com/route/2423672
I spent the rest of the afternoon driving around 3 hours down to Stirling, where I again stayed in the SYHA hostel. I was feeling lazy so got fish and chips for dinner rather than cooking.
On Saturday, I found that I was just far enough west for there not to be flooding, and for the parkruns not to be cancelled! Having done Plean parkrun before, I went to University of Stirling parkrun this time. This was a two lap course, around Loch Airthrey in the middle of the university campus. It was quite drizzly as I warmed up, but pretty dry for the parkrun itself, and I ran a good time of 19:31 on the firm, mildly-undulating paths. There were a lot of other people milling around due to a university open day that morning, so I was impressed they had allowed the parkrun to go ahead!
I spent the rest of the morning driving back down to my parents’ house. I had lunch with them, then we met up with Ruth and Josh for a stroll in nearby Levens Park. We all had dinner together, then my parents and I walked down to town for a choral concert by the Royal Northern Sinfonia and Chorus, the highlight being Mozart’s Requiem. An enjoyable performance, and it was good to see the hall where my parents go for their cultural nights out.
I rose early on Sunday, as I wanted to be in Castleton (in the Hope valley, in the Peak District) by around 8am for the second of this autumn’s Peak Raid events! The drive was predictably quiet. Once parked and registered, it was a 2km walk up the lane to the start location, with some lovely early-morning views of Mam Tor and the valley. The race itself took me over Hollins Cross and across Edale to the southern edge of Kinder Scout, then back across Edale to Rushup Edge and down to Castleton to finish. I slightly misjudged it, finishing 6 minutes late and losing a few of my hard-earned points, but still had a fun (if very tiring!) morning’s running.
That brought an end to a varied and relaxing week of walking and running. I hadn’t revisited any Munros this time, but did revisit three Corbetts and tick off five new Grahams, as well as two new parkruns, despite the mostly fairly poor weather. A good break before the final couple of working months of the year.
My full photo album can be found on Google Photos here.
David Pettit's photo blog 