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This was a hard round!
As a slow walker, I knew it was going to take a long time, but it was still a surprise when it turned out to be 19½ hours!
Meg (the fast) was in season, so had to stay at home.
Living close by, I left home just after 04:00 and was walking at 04:50. When I reached the car park, I was surprised to find 9 vehicles already there and another 2 in a nearby layby.
The weather forecast was for a clear day; the reality was very low cloud, but I was hopeful that it would burn off soon.
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- The forecast…
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- The reality – Near the start of the walk.
I was a bit concerned about crossing the Allt Taige after reading the WH report, so decided to reverse the route. It’s just under 6 miles from the car park to the end of Loch Mullardoch, which took me 3½ hours to complete. The track varies along the route: at first very easy, along a wide vehicular track to the first footbridge, then it becomes indistinct, fractured and difficult to follow as far as the Allt Taige. I needn’t have worried about the river, as it was almost dry, and I walked across easily on the riverbed.
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- The Allt Taige riverbed.
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- Brightening up ahead 😊.
After the river, the track improved in so far as it was much easier to follow but was eroded and fallen away completely in several places. Towards the end of the Loch, it became boggy and indistinct until finally reaching the end, where two rivers flow into Loch Mullardoch. I decided to stop for a coffee break there.
There was still a lot of low cloud, but it was warm, so I sat down by the river and was immediately joined by the resident midges!
The next part of the route was the climb up to An Socach, which felt like it went on forever (4 hours in fact). For the first 1½ km it was a good ATV track, dry and pleasant to follow as it winds its way up alongside the river, then after crossing a small tributary the path narrowed but was still dry and easy to follow for about another ½ km. After that, the path disappeared, and it was just the grassy banks of the river. Then the route crossed the river and headed south-west across peat hags and boggy bits, but the mud/peat was quite dry, so not a problem - I expect it would be entirely different after heavy rains.
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- Looking up towards the first part of the ascent to An Socach.
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- Looking back down the river to Loch Mullardoch.
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- The view south, from part way up An Socach.
The next part of the route from 500m was very steep and pathless, over grass and heather. However, a path does appear at around 700m; it’s intermittent but carried on up to the summit. There was a flattish section at around 800m, which offered a nice rest, but didn’t last long; the gradient then increased again, before another flattish section around the ridge of about 1 km to reach the summit cairn.
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- The final part of the route to the summit of An Socach.
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- Looking towards Affric, with Beinn Fhionnlaidh and CÃ rn Eighe on the left.
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- Looking south from part way up An Socach.
It was just before 1pm, so I had a lunch break on the summit and met a man with his dog, who was walking anti-clockwise and had started at 07:00, so he was going to be back in time for tea – clearly I wasn’t!
It’s about 3 km from An Socach to An Riabhachan, over steep rocky ground with some scrambling. Initially there was a drop of 200m to a bealach, then a climb up to a minor summit, then a small drop of about 40m before a climb of 120m to the top. I found this part quite tough, with tired legs – it took me 2½ hours, but the weather was superb and the views all along the ridge were stunning, especially towards Loch Monar, Strathfarrar and the north.
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- Looking south-west from An Socach.
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- Looking north-west from An Socach.
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- Looking north from An Socach towards Loch Monar.
Between An Socach and the minor summit, I met two more walkers (separately), both of whom had started walking just before me and were doing the round anti-clockwise. A brief calculation in my head told me that they had been walking about 9 hours, so that was at least how long I had left
, meaning that it was almost certain that I’d be finishing the walk in the dark, which I never enjoy
.
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- Looking towards An Riabhachan.
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- Looking north-west from the approach to An Riabhachan.
On the summit of An Riabhachan, the route to Sgùrr na Lapaich doesn’t look too bad – but looks can be deceptive! There was another two km of steep rocky terrain, with a drop and reascent of around 325m – it took me another 2 hours.
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- Looking towards Sgùrr na Lapaich from An Riabhachan.
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- The descent from An Riabhachan and reascent to Sgùrr na Lapaich now becoming clearer!
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- Another look across to Loch Monar and the north-west (well it was a stunning scene 😊)!
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- Looking back at the route down from An Riabhachan.
On the summit of Sgùrr na Lapaich I met a landscape photographer who was camping out to photograph the sunrise. He had camped the previous night on An Socach and been rewarded with an amazing inversion. So, that was the band of cloud I’d been walking below earlier in the day – if only I was able to walk faster, I might have seen it as well
. He was the last person I saw, so just 4 people the entire day.
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- Looking north-east from Sgùrr na Lapaich (probably my favourite photo of the day 😊).
The route off of Sgùrr na Lapaich was difficult to find and I went the wrong way twice to start with. I couldn’t see a path and even when I did find one, it was hard to follow. The terrain was very steep and rocky with some scrambling – at a couple of points I felt a bit exposed, but I was probably not taking the best line. Once down to the bealach (350m drop), there was a 200m ascent to Cà rn nan Gobhar.
A little way from the bealach below Sgùrr na Lapaich there is a lochan (Loch Tuill Bhearnach), which looked like it would be a good place to camp. I didn’t go over to the lochan due to the time, but would have liked to for water, which was a bit scarce on the ridge. Instead, I settled on taking water (for the second time) from a small shallow pool on the bealach – I don’t like doing that as I prefer the water to be running but needs must! Still, it looked and tasted ok after being filtered.
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- Looking towards CÃ rn nan Gobhar with Loch Tuill Bhearnach in the mid-ground.
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- Looking back at the route down from Sgùrr na Lapaich.
The ascent to Cà rn nan Gobhar was straightforward (200m), over grass with scattered rocks, although did get more rocky just before the summit, but no more scrambling! I reached there at 21:00 just as the sun was disappearing behind Sgùrr na Lapaich.
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- Sunset!
No more photos now because the light was too low, and I wanted to get as far as possible before I lost it completely.
Initially, the descent crossed a flat plateau for a few metres on lovely soft grass, but it was short lived and after the second cairn the ground become rocky again. No scrambling but the first 100m descent was over loose rock, where I needed to go even slower to avoid the risk of falling on very tired legs. After that, there was a short strip of grassy ground, then more loose rock, and just when I thought it was all grass ahead there was a dip, and you guessed it – more loose rock beyond!
After the bealach at 730m there was a very slight ascent over Mullach an Maoile, but there was a path of sorts that avoided going over the highest point (760m); the path (just an impression in the ground really) continued intermittently from here down to the first footbridge over Allt Mullardoch. At 600m it was too dark to see properly, so out came the head torch – it was 22:40.
The next 200m of descent was steep, wet, slippery grass and slow going because I couldn’t see further than a few metres ahead. At around 400m there is a fence but it was low and easily stepped over. From here it was straightforward to get to the footbridge and then just the short walk back along the vehicular track to the car park, although by that time it felt much further than it actually was!
I got back to the car at a quarter past midnight!
Stats tell me: total duration - 19:27:48; distance – 20.27 miles; moving time 17:41:02; and an average speed of 1.2 mph. An epic day!
There were still 7 vehicles in the car park, although not all of them occupied – I hope I didn’t disturb any of them as I sat there for 10 minutes eating my last sandwich, before driving off. The road from the dam to Cannich is single track and open – there were numerous deer (as there had been in the morning), but also hares running around, so care was needed to avoid hitting any of them.
