- Bothy with Beinn Dearg Mor
I thought I'd tell you all of the time I volunteered to join a work party to renovate Shenavall bothy at beginning of May. The plan was to spend a few days there doing what I can.
On the day of travelling down the weather forecast showed that the following day Tuesday 1st May would have glorious sunshine. Oh dear, I came to work and not play. Damn.
On arrival at the Bothy I was the first there so made a cup of tea and done a tidy up. Later the organiser Peter arrived with a few others. Since this was my first time at a work party, Peter told me there was no rules. Stop, start, come and go as you please. This I took on board.
I started to demolish a wall and take in goods that had arrived by argocat.
- Demolition in progress
I started to pack for the day but only had my big rucksuck with me. That'll have to do and then managed to put some food together.
Next morning we woke up early to a beautiful day. After breakfast we set off to the river crossing. At 0720hrs we were crossing the Abhain Srath na Sealga aiming for the north west face of Beinn a' Chlaidheimh.
- River crossing
- Admiring the views
- Mark with a clear An Teallach
- On the ridge at last
A bit of undulating walk took us to the 916m summit. That was 3 hours of hard work . The worst thing is it's not even a Munro. All that work for nothing. After a resurvey recently it didn't quite make the mark. We can still pretend though.
- The non Munro summit cairn
Down to the Am Briseadh bealach with it's lochans and then we hit the extended stone boulder field for the long pull up Sgurr Ban.
- Boulder field of Sgurr Ban looking north
- Mark and Adrian with their dogs
Dropping south from Sgurr Ban to the bealach we could see a track leading up the north face of Mullach Coire Mhic Fhearchair.
- Ahead Mullach Coire Mhic Fhearchair
- Time for lunch and rest
Dropping down south we came to the bealach at the foot of Meall Garbh, a 851m peak where a bypass path takes you to the Bealach Odhar.
From here a 200m easy ascent takes you to the Beinn Tarsuinn summit. One of the dogs was with me, at the cairn looking down to see if his master is coming. I do like that photo.
- Looking east from Beinn Tarsuinn summit
- Our ridge walk behind me with AnTeallach to the left
Once we all arrived decisions had to be made about continuing to do the other 2 or cutting it short here. The time was 1530hrs. Adrian was up to do the other two while Mark was a fair bit slower. I was happy either way. It was decided we'd call it a day. There is still the long walk back though. We continued until we came to the flat area of rock which some call the tennis court. To me, I'd call it Table Mountain as it reminds me of it's namesake in Capetown which I've hiked on a couple of times. At it's west end we dropped down into the north corrie, a bit steeply at first and with no path we made our own line trying to pick out grassy areas for a quicker descent.
- Beinn Tarsuinn left and "Table Mountain" at centre of picture
At this time Mark was at the rear so I decided to walk with him as his mate Adrian was trailblazing ahead.
As we talked he mentioned that a few years ago he was rowing across the Atlantic from Canada to Falmouth with 3 others to break the West / East record which had held for 108 years. That's 2100 miles. I listened with interest as this was not the usual thing you'd hear when hiking the hills. They were on course to do this until a force 11 storm hit them 370 miles of Isles of Scilly with a rogue wave smashing their boat ( Pink Lady, named after the apple ) in two. They clung on to their life raft for 6 hours till they were rescued by a Danish ship. Luckily no -one was injured but it could have been a close call. Mark saw his life flash by as he waited to be rescued and vowed not to do this again as being married with family it was too much of a risk.
Wow, what a story to hear. I'm glad things worked out OK in the end but it could have been oh so different.
This talk made our time go by quickly as we kept on descending down the rough ground. Every so often we came across a path, we'd use it and then somehow lose it. Soon we were in the lower part of Gleann na Muice making our way to the Abhain Gleann na Muice to find a suitable crossing point. Once done it wasn't long till we came to the good path which joins up with the path from Gleann na Muice Beag.
All the way down the majestic An Teallach stood ahead in glorious sunshine getting slowly closer and larger as we kept on descending.
- Beautiful An Teallach
At Larachantivore we crossed the river trying not to get wet feet. Then across the flat but not too boggy ground to the river we'd crossed earlier that day, all of 12 hours ago.
What a relief to walk into the bothy at 7pm to find mince and tatties waiting for me. To be followed by cake and custard. A dream combination.
I thanked Mark and Adrian as we drunk some whisky for their company and for an excellent day out.
The next day the weather was also good but I worked on painting the bothy woodwork and fetching a large pane of safety glass from Achneigie.
- Work party having lunch
- Walking from Achneigie to Shenavall
