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Firstly, I know this walk was completed nearly two years ago but it has taken me this long to get my act together and start to include reports of my walks. This is my first.
Okay, how do I begin? Are you sitting comfortably? Well, I will start from the beginning. I don't know why but the Sow of Athol always intrigued me (probably as it looked an easy hill walk) every time my wife and I drove up north to visit my sister. So, one fine afternoon I persuaded my wife and my brother-in-law to walk it with me. This was my first hill in many a year (used to walk Fyrish regularly when I was a nipper living up north) and I caught the bug straight away, my brother-in-law got infected by it too. Not my wife though - after I had to retrieve one of her trainers from the boggy ground she instantly retired from hill walking.
My brother-in-law and I viewed Beinn Udlamain that day and decided this was to be our first munro. So, being the novices we were, I planned our route via Google Maps
and worked out we had to drive to Bridge of Ericht, then drive up to Coire Bhachdaidh Lodge and tackle Beinn Udlamain from there.
However, after a long drive we got to the turn-off leading to the Lodge and found it to be a padlocked private road
We were devastated! Determined that we were definitely going to tackle a Munro and not waste the diesel, we drove back to Kinloch Rannoch and set our sights on Schiehallion.
Loch Rannoch from outside Kinloch RannochSchiehallion's info board at Kinloch Rannoch. Weren't too enamoured to see it described as 'Fairy Mountain...' Looked pretty tough to us novices!View of Schiehallion from Kinloch Rannoch. By the time we seen Schiehallion like this we forgot all about our previous disappointment at not getting to tackle Beinn Udlamain.So, we made out way over to Shiehallion. We were always planning to camp up and tackle the mountain the following day so we followed the track from the car park and found a nice spot by a small patch of forest. The following pic shows me having a struggle setting up my tent as the wind picked up!
We had an enjoyble night with a few beers, decdiding to turn in at around midnight. When we awoke the next day we were surprised to see people already walking up Scheihallion (as I said, we were novices at this point and had no idea how popular this mountain is!) After packing up our tents and putting these back in the car we gathered up requirements for the day and made our way up our first Munro
I don't know whether it was the fact our fitness levels were really bad at that time or whether it was the after effects of the beers but we were struggling to keep up with people in front of us - from children to senior citizens. However it didn't dampen our spirits, we had a perfect day for walking. Some of the stones on the way up had us cursing but then all we had to do was look around at the view and realise it was all worth it. Felt absolutely amazing when we reached the top and I knew there and then that bagging Munro's was to become my latest passion in life.
Those cursed rocks!We couldn't believe the views to be found from SchiehallionTop of the world ma! Me and my brother-in-law at Schiehallion's summit
This is me thinking I'm being brave on my first Munro! Our route up Schiehallion. Returned via the same way.