Holiday Hike up Cornival and Ben More Assynt

[JamesH]

Knocked out another two munros whilst on holiday in Clachtoll. Was accompanied by my future father in law, who soldiered through spectacularly despite the effort it took for this hike.

The ascent was not too bad, a nice flat walk along the river that comes down Conival to begin with, followed by a reasonably steep but not too arduous climb up the mountain with us climbing into the clouds about two thirds of the way up.

The rest of the climb to Conival wasn't too bad, it was cloudy and a bit windy but nothing that couldn't be handled. Something that was proven when we sat for a quick break as we were soon overtaken by and Australian fell runner in a jumper and shorts with a 2 litre water bottle. This man literally appeared out of the mist as if the outback had summoned him itself. I was a bit worried for him at first but he was confident and sure enough later on in our hike he was coming back past us so he truly was impressive.

Back to the climb, our first submit of Conival was a tad lackluster as the cloud made it so there wasn't much of a view. However, we had achieved one goal so it was then onto Ben More Assynt. The hike over to Ben More Assynt presented the most arduous and precarious part of the entire hike and I will summarise with one word "Rocks". Yes rocks, as the hike along the ridge to Ben More Assynt is littered with large boulders and small scrabbly shale which will slow your pace to a crawl. This is also accompanied by a few false peaks just for good measure. This part if why I can understand that this route of a grade four, as despite the clouds clearing up to show a beautiful view, the wind was still high in places. Therefore be careful not to roll and ankle or be pushed around at the mercy of the wind.

Regardless of these obstacles, we made it Ben More Assynt and thus completed what we had set out to do. With that accomplished, we looked forward to the dread of going over those rocks and false peaks again. This was when my father in law proposed a simply yet genius idea when he said "why don't we just go around". This made our lives a million times easier as a lot of the rocky false peaks have grassy reasonably flat paths round the sides. If you are doing this route, I cannot recommend this enough as it greatly shortened the time to get back to Conival. Be careful though as the wind had died down for us at this point but on some of the short cuts you will not have much room for mistake when it comes to slips or being pushed from strong wind.

With the worst behind us, came the best part. the weather had fully cleared and so when we got back onto Conival, the view was spectacular, making it all more than worth it.

Following this, with the clear and warm weather, the descent was splendid and relaxed. Despite us being tired (my father in law more so than I), it was a good way to end the hike.

To conclude, I thoroughly recommend this hike despite the hardship as it is more than worth it in the end. However, do keep an eye on the weather and condition (as you should do with all munros you are planning to hike) to make sure you are not caught out in inclement weather on the tough terrain. Finally, if you are going in the summer, make sure you prioritise mig repellent.

With that, all the best and happy hiking.