Creag a' Ghobhair

[Euan McIntosh]

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While perhaps not the largest hill in the north east Greag a’ Ghobiar does give a nice sample of the walking in the predominantly flat eastern half of Sutherland. If however you do decide to walk it, for your sake, do it on a day where it has not rained for a few months and there is either an eighty mile and hour gale or six foot of snow to combat the atrocious midges.

Me and the extended family we on our annual two weeks in the north where we visit the family we have up there and reminisce about what nice weather might look like. Me, and my dad had been planning to walk the four Munros in the area, of which we managed three, Ben Hope, Conival, and Ben More Assynt with Ben Klibreck being omitted due to dire warnings of bog and replaced with Canisp. The rest of the family had expressed an interest in joining us on at least the Ben Hope climb and we decided this would make a good warm up for them a few days before. The morning we had planned to climb Creag a’ Ghobiar it was bucketing it down outside as we prepared, but as I’m sure you know, once you’ve made the sandwiches no power in the ‘verse could stop you from going ahead.

It’s s short five minute drive from our house in Bonar Bridge to the start of the walk at the water purification centre on the road to loch Buie. There is a space for maybe three cars and due to the rain we left one 1 ½ kilometres up the road to pick us up at the other end of the walk. We opened the car doors and were immediately met by an almost solid wall of midges, only once in my life have I ever encountered so many of the blighters and on both occasions I found the balance between breathing and chocking on inhaled midge difficult. After waiting for the lucky drivers to drop of the second car we all participated in a most excellent impression of Laurence of Arabia with only our eyes visible and some sort of weird hoping dance that must have had the blood sucking insects in howls of laughter.

When we eventually set of up the hill we followed a track from the back of the water treatment plant for about six hundred meters before striking out for the top of the hill. The terrain is a mixture of bog, heather, grass and quite a few pits that have been dug into the side of the hill and now filled with water, which if one were to be so unlucky as to tumble in would most defiantly ruin your day. You should basically just aim for the top as there is not even so much as a pretense of a path and the terrain is the same most of the way round the hill.

Looking up at the Summit of Creag a' Ghobair from near the track

Once on the summit of Greag a’ Ghobhiar the best view is down onto loch a’ Ghobhair, which is also the source of Bonar’s water. The view to the north was rather limited with the showers sweeping past and my seeming inability to point a camera within 90 degrees of that direction.

Loch a' Ghobhiar

Next we headed over to Meall Moriag which has so little re-ascent i did not notice there was a "hill" until we reached a cairn. From there you descend between Meall Moraig and the next hill, which you could climb if you felt to inclined and down a beside what is marked on the OS map a burn, but instead is more of a twenty meter wide swath of bog running down the side of the hill into the outflow from Loch an Lagain. Reach this river and cross either via a rather pathetic weir, or simply cross the river, there is the third option of swimming the loch as you will not get any wetter at this point.

River crossing Panorama

You now join a track, or what must at one point have been a track, now it is two parallel streams flowing down the wheel ruts and a return to the swarms of midges. And I'm not exaggerating with the stream analogy.

Worse than no path.

Path, or river bed, I'm not to sure.

The final Km of the walk so me attempt to avoid a major bog patch by walking over some rocks, slipping off the rock with one foot and having it sink through the moss about three foot down. Which of course garnered some laughs from my ever so compassionate family. Apart from the mud and the rain and the midges I actually quite enjoyed this walk and would recommend you walk it if you get the chance.