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As the walk report will be quite short, here are a couple of dorm room anecdotes, and another one after the report.
Inconsiderate behaviour #1: Time: 2:30 am. Place: Knoydart Foundation bunkhouse, 8-bed-dorm. Something tears me from my sleep - I hear someone snoring, but that's not it. No, it's the guy in the corner furiously tossing around in his bunk and making annoyed grunting sounds. Obviously disturbed by the snoring. He starts packing his stuff noisily, grabs his backpack, leaves, slams the door (!) - only to return a minute later to get his duvet, and leave again with a bang.
The nerve! I notice from the sounds of the others that I am not the only one he's waking up. The snoring person didn't wake up during all the ruckus. The snoring stops soon after.
The scary moment: Time: 3:30 am. Place: Knoydart Foundation bunkhouse, 8-bed-dorm. Something tears me from my sleep - a giant black wobbly monster is looming over me and extends its hands to grab my throat! I fully wake up. No, it's my neighbour who needs to go to the bathroom. He has put his torch on the floor to minimise disturbance and is bending over it to find his shoes. What I saw was his shadow on the ceiling. He leaves very quietly, and I don't even notice his return.
The weather forecast for the day is excellent. During breakfast, I chat with the "monster", by daylight also known as Joe, a very nice Geordie living in Yorkshire, about our plans. I want to got to Meall Buidhe first, then to Luinne Bheinn. He just wants to go up Luinne Bheinn, via Mam Barrisdale. He leaves some 10-15 minutes before me.
When I enter the open valley on the track, there is no trace of beautiful blue sky and sunshine. It is rather chilly like the day before. At the branch-off to Gleann Meadail, I see the Yorkshireman disappearing in the distance ahead, but catch up with a lady who had also briefly been in the kitchen while I was preparing my breakfast. We walk together for a short distance and have a nice chat. She has already compleated her Munros and has done some of them twice to accompany her husband who is still on his first round. So what else to do but the Corbetts? Her target for the day is Ben Aden. She carries a tent and intends to spend the night near Ben Aden. I sure hope she found her way to it in the mist and did not give up and return, because the following day would be a splendid one.
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- Approaching the monument - I wonder why they do not tear it down given the questionable person it commemorates
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- Looking back towards the monument from where the path up An t-Uriollach forks off
The walk description tells the same story as for Ladhar Bheinn - the ascent to An t-Uriollach is through a sea of hip-high bracken. I expect the worst - a repetition of the walk the day before. However, there's a quite clear path through the bracken, so no problem. It peters out higher up in the grass. I see some frogs jumping in the grass and start thinking whether jumping really is the most practical way of locomotion on a steep slope. As if to confirm my wondering, the frogs don't look too comfortable, sometimes land on their backs or their sides in the high grass, which at least prevents them from rolling downhill. I leave them to their jumping and climb on - too diagonally in retrospect. I should have headed straight for the ridge, which would have made this section less strenuous.
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- The narrow path through the bracken
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- Looking back along the ridge of An t-Uriollach
Even before reaching the top of the ridge, I enter the clouds. The weather forecast is far from being accurate - I would spend more than the next six hours in the clag. No sunshine, no blue sky, certainly no cloud-free Munros. There's not much to report either. I walk in eerie light and silence thanks to my fleece headband which I need because of the damp chillness. Luckily, there's a path all the way. Otherwise, I would probably have had to abandon the walk and go back. I only knew roughly where I was, but that was good enough for me. From time to time, I checked the altitude on the GPS to get a rough idea of how far I had come.
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- Meall Buidhe
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- Into the unknown
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- On Meall Coire na Gaoithe'n Ear
On Bealach a' Choire Odhair, the clouds lift a little for a moment, and I see - hills! I am quite surprised to see that I must have come down a rather steep hillside. Hadn't noticed... The fence remains help me identify where I am, close to Luinne Bheinn already.
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- Any other view than greyish white is most welcome
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- Looks like some living organism has turned to stone here
Like a forbidden world. Right click on image to open in a new tab and watch the video.
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- Climbing the final ascent
I soon reach the East summit, and go on to the highest one. And whom do I meet half-way? The Yorkshireman! What a coincidence that we should meet precisely at the summit! He has seen enough (well, nothing), and starts going back down. While I'm performing my secret summit ritual, the clouds lift for a moment and allow for some brief views of Loch Hourn. Very brief.
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- Looking back to the East summit
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- My favourite summit view this year.
Impressions from the summit. Right click on image to open in a new tab and watch the video..
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- Barrisdale Bay appearing
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- There it is!
I go down very carefully in the mist. When I come out of the clouds, I see the Yorkshireman below me, already below the level of Mam Barrisdale. I cross over to the left and wait for him at the pass. We go back together the last 10 km and have a nice almost three-hour talk. Thank you again for the company, Joe!
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- Mam Barrisdale with clouds even below
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- Loch an Dubh-Lochain in view
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- Perfect hillside posture
Epilogue:
Inconsiderate behaviour #2, the night after the walk: a group of seven friends from all over the UK have arrived in the evening. When they spot me, one of the ladies says to the others in the kitchen "let's find out what specimen he is" and comes into the adjacent dorm room to interview me. When the interview is over, she relays it to the others. In the morning at 4:30 am, I wake up to loud talking in the adjacent kitchen. It's two of the group. Soon others of the group start getting up and don't make any effort being quiet. I lay awake with eyes closed until about 6 am, when I start moving about more and open my eyes. From that point on, the group exaggeratedly pretends to be quiet without actually being quiet. I wonder what I have done. Did I snore? Did I fart all night?
I had overheard that they wanted to leave for their walk at 7:30, so I get up at 7. On my way to the bathroom a try some small-talk, such as where they want to go (all three Munros), but only get condescending answers when trying to be helpful about the route. Some people...
The weather would be fantastic that day, I hope they were able to enjoy it. I also enjoyed it very much. It was by far the best day during my whole trip to Scotland this year - and my travelling day with two ferries (over to Mallaig, then on to Skye) and the car travel to the next accommodation. Talk about bad timing...
![20240531_MeallBuidhe_LuinneBheinn_ACTIVE LOG070401-Erweitert_Grafik2D.jpg]()
- Altitude profile created with GPSTrackAnalyse.net
