Invergarry Lodge

Archive for the ‘Hill Bagging’ Category

Maol Chean-dearg

A few pictures (and not many words) from todays hill outing. I headed up Maol Chean-Dearg near Loch Carron, very cold in the wind and some heavy showers on the way up  but it cleared up nicely for me in the end.

An Ruadh Stac and Beinn Damh

Beinn Damh from the summit

Across to the Torridon giants

Matt

A grey grey corries?! (I am super fast!)

Not much to report from an enjoyable but uneventful run in the Grey Corries, oh, except it seems I can run 45 miles per hour!

I would never claim to be able to run 45 mph but the facts seem to suggest I can. Lets look at the evidence.

1. Wind speeds were 45mph with gusts up to 70mph.

2. I was running downhill from the summit of Stob Choire Claurigh with the wind behind me.

3. I slowed down to help Dylan over some slippery rocks and it started raining on me.

4. Looking back it was very grey and I was about to get soaked.

5. I set off running again and was soon out of the rain and stayed dry all the way back to the car.

I’ve done a quick technical diagram to help explain.

One thing that doesn’t quite add up though – If I can run 45mph, how come it took me 3 hours to do 11 miles and two munros?

Oh, I nearly forgot the obligatory mountain photo…Stob Ban from the bothy

The Sgurr nan Eugallt Fan Club

We, Invergarry Lodge, now declare ourselves lifetime members of the Sgurr nan Eugallt fanclub (as long as knowing how to pronounce it isn’t a prerequisite).

Sgurr nan Eugallt is a Corbett (2946m high) between Loch Hourn and Loch Quoich, basically the last hill on the left as you head down the joyous 25 mile dead end road to Kinlochhourn.

A quick little hill, only 4km form the road to the summit, I was up and down in about 2 hours 20 minutes including plenty of time to take in the views, and what views…..a fantastically placed hill.

Looking back to Loch Quoich munros

Dyls enjoying the view

Looking across Loch Hourn to the Saddle

And finally, sun rays over Sgurr na Ciche on the way home

A stalkers path zigzags up to about 650m which is pretty boggy (makes for a good descent) and then just follow the ridge up to the trig point. The true summit lies 600 m beyond the trip point so make sure you continue along the ridge for the tick…you’ll probably want to anyway for the views!

–Matt

A blue sky day: Corrour to Fersit

We’ve got a mountain marathon in 6 short weeks and despite a few outings recently it feels as though training has suffered due to a busy summer season so it felt great to get out yesterday on what seemed like the first nice day in ages.

Ian and I (and his dog Isla) caught the train to Corrour and then headed back to Tulloch over Beinn Na Lap, then over to Chno Dearg continuing to Stob Coire Sgriodain. It worked out about 14 1/2 miles and was a good day out, would have been even better if I’d had remembered to bring my running shoes! The trainers I had on turned out to be OK for most of the run but I slipped and fell over at least half a dozen times on the final (boggy) descent.

The view from Beinn Na Lap

Ian (the triathlete) – note proper hill running footwear!

Heading up to Chno Dearg

And the view from the final munro across loch Treig

Finally, a note to anyone considering the same route… the path that is supposed to follow the train tracks for the last 2 km back to the station doesn’t seem to exist where it is supposed to, we ended up following the tracks.

It felt good to be out yesterday but doesn’t feel too good today after all those falls!

-Matt

North Shiel Ridge

Someone recently sent me a chapter of their upcoming book on the Munros  entitled “Why do we do it?”, this is something I often ask myself when I head out to the hills. The relentless slog up what seems to be a never ending mountain, the thoughts of all the other places you could be running through your head and sometimes even thoughts of turning back creeping in, then…the views open up and all those doubts are forgotten.

This is exactly the type of day I had yesterday on the North Shiel ridge, the long, steep, pathless ascent (although I did have Dylan to help pull me up) was soon forgotten as the gradient levelled and the ridge narrowed and got more interesting. Terrific views in every direction and wonderful light on the hills that my little point and shoot camera can not do justice. I won’t dwell on the route (it’s the one in Ralph Storer’s book) and I’ll just show you a few photos…

Along the ridge to the Five sisters of Kintail

Back towards Mullach Fraoch Choire

A’Chralaig and a wee Am Bathach in front

The South Shiel Ridge

–Matt

Am Bathach (A QUICK HILL FIX)

We whipped through the hostel duties in record time this morning and I was soon heading up to Am Bathach in Glen Shiel for a quick hill fix before the afternoon’s chores began (cutting the grass and going to the shop for beer). I couldn’t get parked in the usual layby due to some forestry operations so headed onwards to the Cluanie Inn. A slight route change involved following An Caorann Beag up to Bealach a’ Choinich before reversing direction up to Am Bathach’s summit rather than the usual steep slog up from the A82.

Am Bathach is a great little hill for a quick ascent or as part of a route up the munro Ciste Dhubh and provides a great viewpoint of the surrounding Munros. Up and down in 1 1/2 hours, a real shame I had to head back so soon, Ciste Dhubh was looking very inviting!

Oh, and make sure you check out the new fangled 360 interactive panorama thingymabob. Click on the icon on the right at the bottom for full screen goodness!

–Matt

Stob Ban (The one in the Mamores) with panoramic goodness!

I headed out for a run with Ian to the western Mamores this afternoon but we ended up cutting it short due to a mixture of adverse weather and laziness. We started from the lower falls and headed up the steep flank of Mullach nan Coirean where we donned what wet weather gear we had (which wasn’t much – it was forecast to be better than it was!)

From here round to Stob ban was lovely ground for running but unfortunately covered in cloud today and we took a battering from the horizontal rain before we reached the summit of Stob Ban.

Things brightened on Stob Ban but neither of us was much up for Devils ridge on a day like today so at the bealach we darted off north and followed the Allt Coire a’Mhusgain back down to the car….4km of fantastic downhill running that finished far too soon as far as I was concerned.

A great quick route among amazing hills but not much else to report and not a great day for photographs unfortunately. The hostel pc has packed up – along with our panorama making software – but whilst looking on the web I discovered this nifty software…what do you think? I wish i’d taken more than 3 shots now.

–Matt

Garbh Bheinn (Ardgour)

Skived off hostel duties today (with the wife’s permission of course!) and headed across the Corran Ferry to do the Garbh Bheinn horseshoe with Ian and Dylan the hostel Labrador.

It was hot and steep work under blue skies but plenty of lochans for Dyls to cool off in. The route was harder than I thought (I should have had more than a cursory glance at a map)  it takes in two Grahams and a Corbett – five significant up sections, two of which are very steep.

The view across to Garbh Bheinn

Looking back to the summit just before the final descent.

View towards Glencoe

A great hill with great views, will be back one day for some scrambling or easy routes.  Nice and quiet as well, we only saw a pair of climbers and a family walking….perfect when you’ve got an excitable Labrador with you.

–Matt

Loch Quoich Munros

A couple of photos from my late afternoon hill bagging session down by Loch Quoich.

One of my favourite views…looking back across the loch to Gairich

It must have been hot work…not often you see Dylan sat still!

From Gleourich Summit looking along the ridge to Spidean Mialach

Looking north over the South Shiel ridge to the Brothers of Kintail

–Matt

Lowe Alpine Mountain Marathon

My friend Ian and I enjoyed our first Lowe Alpine Mountain Marathon this weekend. It’s pretty exciting…you don’t find out where it is held until 36 hours before (this year Beinn Dearg near Ullapool) and you don’t find out the route until the clock has started on day 1. As first timers we entered class C (there are A,B,C,D,and Elite courses) which should be about 24Km and 1400m ascent on day one, and slightly less on day 2.

The terrain was tough (not as tough as my brother had in the elite category!), the weather was hot and the scenery stunning and we were pleased to find ourselves in 9th place out of 135 starters when we arrived at the midcamp on Saturday afternoon.

After a wet night in the tent it was time for Sunday’s chasing start (all the teams in the first 1.5 hours go in order so the first across the line is the winner). 8th place were only 12 seconds in front of us so we saw them at the beginning, by the time we’d made the 3rd checkpoint we’d overtaken 7th and 5th  as well (team 6 seem to be without their numbers as nobody saw them all day!) so we were in 5th position but then it all went horribly wrong. We messed up a check point (couldn’t find it) and found ourselves back behind teams 10 and 11!.

We dug deep for the last 3 checkpoints but messed up slightly when we took a gamble on the last forest section and lost a place we’d just gained. We ended up in 7th, just 1min 16 seconds behind 6th, a great result.

Big thanks to Ian for stepping in at shortish notice when new to all this hill running stuff and for some great navigation during the race. Fancy another?

Who would have thought: 4 Ticks + 2 blisters +1 sore nipple+ 1 black toenail (and another one for Ian) = 1 great weekend.

–Matt

ps. Stopping to take this photo probably cost us a prize!