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A pre-arranged outing to make the most of the continuing weather window. Cat (cmarcol) had volunteered/suggested the outing and after looking at my red balloons was kind of regretting offering to be the pilot for the day
We have walked a few times before and have taken it in turns to drive, which makes sense as we are almost a stones throw apart, providing you have a strong throwing arm
Cat suggested Stob Ban and I assumed she was meaning a trip to the Grey Corries, so the route was studied and downloaded to my phone. However we had crossed wires
as Cat was fancying the Mamores and had a very good reason for heading back to the Mamores. I will let her explain and divulge all the gory details
So Stob Ban and Mullach nan Coirean were to be the destination and they proved to be an excellent work out in more ways than usual
Cat was uplifting me at 7am and we set off, the first major decision was which way to head, up the A9 to Dalwhinnie or west to Crianlarich and through Glencoe. I suggested the A9 so that was the way we went, returning by the other route.
We arrived at the far end of Glen Nevis and parked in the large car park which was almost empty, I suppose being a Tuesday we could hardly expect it to be heaving
As Cat had been along the initial part of the walk, navigating or keeping to the path was easy. I would imagine after a wet spell the path would be more like a burn, there were a few boggy patches and that after the recent dry weather - probably caused by snow melt
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martin_beswick, a low level shot of Glen Nevis
The path climbs gradually up to the bealach at the top end of Glen Nevis and as you start the gradual ascent the views start to open up. Just before we reached the bealach the first patch of snow appeared, we surveyed the surrounding area and even though there were obvious footsteps on the snow, we skirted round the side of it as we did for the majority of the day. Having said that the only real snow field that we had to negotiate was on the summit of Stob Ban, more of that later
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martin_beswick, - Cat demonstrating the good meandering path
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martin_beswick, - Glen Nevis from a bit higher up
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martin_beswick, - this shot indicates how the glen narrows towards the top
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martin_beswick, - water feature on the way up
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martin_beswick, - zoom to a couple who followed us all day
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martin_beswick, - another water feature
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martin_beswick, - interesting singular trees surviving on quite steep slopes
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martin_beswick, - large snow field which was easy to cross, Stob Ban can be seen peeping up in the back ground
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martin_beswick, - Stob Ban looming a bit larger and looking rather impressive
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martin_beswick, - Cat demonstrating how warm it was even when being surrounded by snow
Before we knew it we had reached the bealach, where we had superb all round views which was mainly dominated to the west by the "Ring of Steal" which looked interesting, undulating and challenging
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martin_beswick, - Stob Ban getting bigger
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martin_beswick, - Glen Nevis again
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martin_beswick, - Nice cornice with Ring of Steal in the background
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martin_beswick, - view to the south
We decided to have our 'elevenses' before tackling the interesting ascent of Stob Ban and after the fuel stop the hardest part of the walk began
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martin_beswick, - The way ahead avoiding the white stuff to the right
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martin_beswick, - looking back towards the Ring of Steal
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martin_beswick, - nice bit of blue snow
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martin_beswick, - looking down on the West Highland Way and a few ants walking along it
Having said that there is an excellent path that winds it's way steeply up the side of Stob Ban, interrupted occasionally by some mild scrambling over larger obstacles
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martin_beswick, - looking back, first shot of the Ben with it's own individual cloud
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martin_beswick, - Stob Ban summit getting closer
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martin_beswick, - looking back down to the bealach
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martin_beswick, - first view of Mullach nan Coirean and the ridge that takes you there
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martin_beswick, - Devils Ridge and Sgurr a Mhaim (Ring of Steal)
The summit of Stob Ban was reached after a few stops, purely to take photo's and to admire/take in the views
The summit area was tiny and what looked like the highest point was snow covered and as the approach shots show didn't look entirely safe. So we gingerly took a few steps near to the highest point and quickly retreated
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martin_beswick, - snow covered summit
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martin_beswick, - Cat pointing at something
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martin_beswick, - West Highland Way winding it's way north
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martin_beswick, - the north ridge up Stob Ban, we were tempted to venture out that way
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martin_beswick, - ready to drop?
After taking quite a few photo's it was time to move on and start the descent over the loose stones and scree, a path had been worn into the stones and zig zagged down. We decided to venture out and have a peek at the approach route from the north ridge, however we didn't go very far as Cat was a wee bit freaked out by the narrowness and exposure of the ridge
The main problem was we would have had to cross the exposed ridge in both directions
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martin_beswick, - north ridge, looks interesting and rather narrow
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martin_beswick, - Cat on the approach to the north ridge, view to the south in background
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martin_beswick, - looking back up to the summit of Stob Ban and the stoney scree descent
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martin_beswick, - the way ahead, summit of Mullach on the far right
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martin_beswick, - the Ben in cloud for a change
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martin_beswick, - the couple who were following us, taking the high route
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martin_beswick, - looking back at Stob Ban, looks totally different
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martin_beswick, - noticeable change in rock colour
The walk along the ridge between the summits was very pleasureable and the little sting in the tail was the trudge up to the summit of Mullach nan Coirean
We knew it was psychological but we still huffed and puffed
The summit cairn was worth the effort, a very well constructed mound of stones, which made an excellent spot to take some photo's of and from
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martin_beswick, - first real view of the summit cairn on Mullach
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martin_beswick, - summit cairn in the foreground with the ridge leading to Meall a' Chaorainn in the background
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martin_beswick, - the Ben still in cloud
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martin_beswick, - can't remember what direction this was
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martin_beswick, - how to climb a cairn
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martin_beswick, - summit pose
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martin_beswick, - another summit pose
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martin_beswick, - and another
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martin_beswick, - looking back, what a shot
And so to the final descent, this where things didn't exactly go according to plan
We could use lots of excuses, too much talking, lack of concentration, enjoying the views etc. End result we started the descent down the wrong shoulder
This after I had made a mental note of the descent route, by looking over the route the night before and Cat was also aware of the possibility of taking the wrong shoulder
It wasn't until we had descended maybe 100m that Cat realised the error, especially as the shoulder we should have descended on was to our right, with a rather large gully in between
We contemplated going back, but after checking the map and surveying the way ahead (down) we decided to continue. We could see we weren't the first muppets to descend this way as at times there was a path
In the distance we could see a fence coming up the side of the shoulder and a newly constructed style over the fence which was obviously there for a reason
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martin_beswick, - the shoulder we were descending
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martin_beswick, - fence and style
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martin_beswick, - fence going downhill
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martin_beswick, - looking back up our descent route
We opted to make use of the style and follow the fence downhill, the descent turned out to be very easy on tufty grass intermingled with the usual heather. The one concern we had was we knew there was going to be a river/burn/stream to cross at the bottom, however when we reached the burn, crossing it required no wandering up and down the bank, makes a change for me
Once across the burn we reached another style and this is the point where we were back on track
We estimated that our mistake was probably a much quicker descent and as the majority had been on grass, far easier on the joints
After the style there was a nice stoney path that descended through the deforested area, that really does look a mess. You would think in this day and age there must be some way of tidying up after the timber has been removed
There are diversion signs that virtually direct you back to the car park, avoiding any active forestry work. We arrived back at the car park in just under 6 hours, feeling rather pleased with our days efforts
Big THANKS to Cat for 'volunteering' to drive and for your great company, the only time there was any silence was when we were puffing and panting going uphill
Off out tomorrow before the weather changes, little hill/s