Ben Vorlich (Loch Lomond)

[Stuart Blakeley]

Our group go out on the last Saturday of every month come rain, wind, snow, hail, sleet, or the occasional shine!

However, usually when the slightly better weather comes in one or two of us try to get a few 'sneekies' in!

This time my walking buddie was down from Skye staying with family at Balloch so we decided to do Ben Vorlich on the Friday (he was going to do Ben Lomond on the Sat but I have already done the one).

We parked at the car park at Inveruglas and set off along the road, following the excellent tarmac road headed for Sloy Dam. As it was a clear day, I could easily see the path heading up Ben Vane which was nice as I still these three to do to complete the group. We, rather surprisingly found the path by the very small cairn and made our way up the grassy slopes.

Contrary to what I read in McNeish's book re no real erosion until you reach the final stretch, I though there was a very good, clear path pretty much all the way up. We took a little bit longer than expected due to a combination of too many 'breather' stops and as much as I hate to admit it, I had my phone with me as although I was on annual leave for the day, there was a mini crisis with one of my projects at work and I had to keep answering calls (I always try and 'switch off' on the hills and relax away from work!

One of our walking buddies who could not make it but said he had driven past the area and there looked a lot of snow at the top. When we were there, we only found a very small pocket and as a laugh, Donny got down on hands and knees and I tilted the camera to imitate Donny was climbing. We sent this back to basecamp to our friend for a laugh!

After stopping at the top for a bite to eat and another few calls, we decsended back pretty much the same way and back to the car park.

Great day out.....always is when you get back to the car dry!

[ChrisW]

love the climbing the snow face shot

[celt12345]

mmm,i dont remember ben vorlich as being that steep.