I was lucky enough to have a couple of midweek Annual Leave days, and I had been fantasising for weeks in advance about nipping quickly into a phone box, metamorphosing into my bobble-hatted avatar and bagging a few Munros


The day finally dawned, and for once the weather turned out better than the forecast: only “30% chance of cloud-free Munro summits” according to the www.mwis.org.uk website the day before, but in fact when I got to lower Glen Etive I could feast my eyes on the classic view of the whole ring of hills from Ben Starav (far right) over its east Top of Stob Choire Dheirg and on round to Meall nan Tri Tighearnan and Glas Bheinn Mhor, bathed in morning sunshine and with all the summits completely cloud-free, at this early stage anyway

I got parked easily in the rough parking area just opposite the start of the track to Coiletur Cottage in lower Glen Etive – in fact, I was the first car there: the joys of midweek walking

On the other side of the bridge, a pretty good path continues on the right-hand side of the stream for a few hundred metres until a smaller path branches off to the right to head up Ben Starav’s obvious north ridge. As many others have written, this gives a fairly unrelenting ascent

I also had some time to ponder Starav’s name. There seems to be hot debate as to whether it comes from a Gaelic word meaning “sturdy and muscular” or from a completely different Gaelic word meaning “rustling”


At first the north ridge gives good going on a grassy path. Higher up however, at the second of two levellings, the terrain becomes much rockier and things start to get interesting


A bit higher up, and although that last bit of ridge was still looking just as delicious, it was also starting to look like a very effortful slog up a prolonged boulderfield

Yep, right enough. The path tries its best, bless its shattered quartzite socks, but the last hundred metres or so of ascent really is just one long boulder-hopping extravaganza

This slowed me down a lot, and it was with considerable relief that I finally reached Ben Starav’s airy summit cairn and rather sad-looking rump of a Trig Point


To the south, the classic view down Loch Etive opened up, with Ben Cruachan to its left.
To the west, Beinn Trilleachan was stealing the show, with the famous Trilleachan Slabs glinting in the sun – a Mecca for Rock Jocks, I believe. Difficult to believe that this hill is only a Corbett – it looks higher from here.
And to the north, beyond the steep slopes of Stob Coir’ an Albannaich, all the Glencoe hills were backed by the Mamores and even – I think – the Nevis range in the far distance.
However, I was determined to get at least one of the other two done, so enough with the photography already. From Starav’s main summit, a clear path continues to a minor south-east top, which also sports a cute wee cairn. And from this spot, I finally got a good hard look at the deeply secretive Beinn nan Aighenan, a hill that sits so far back from the road – from any road – that, as Ralph Storer puts it in his ‘Ultimate Guide’, “it requires considerable effort just to lay eyes on it”.
It turns out to be another fine-looking mountain. However, three things struck me immediately:
1. It still looked a long way away; and
2. It looked a fair old way down and then back up again; and
3. Its north-west ridge looked a tad steep in its middle section.
Sadly, all three of these first impressions turned out to be completely true

However, I wasn’t down from Starav yet. From the minor south-east top, the path takes a sudden dive down a rocky slope to reach a fantastic arête that runs out to the Top of Stob Coire Dheirg.
I scrambled along the crest of this for a bit, enjoying myself enormously but making slow going, before I spotted a bypass path down to the right. I cut down to this, and thereafter made much faster progress along to the cairned summit of the Stob, which turned out to be another grand viewpoint. The ongoing route down to the Bhealachan Lochain Ghaineamhaich (just try spelling that one, or even saying it, after a few beers

No time like the present, then! The path from Stop Coire Dheirg down to the cairned Bhealachan et Cetera et Cetera et Cheathairadh was straightforward enough, although the subsequent falling traverse on the wee path on the right crossed some rougher terrain, and the steady fall from the 766m altitude of the cairn on the Bhealachan down to the much lower 615m altitude of the bealach with Beinn nan Aigheanan was a real heart-sink moment

It proved to be just as long and arduous a slog up to the summit of Aighenan as it had looked



Aighenan’s summit is another amazing viewpoint, though, and feels truly remote. To the north-west, Starav was rustling its musculature in the sunshine, with one of its two southern Tops – Stob an Duine Ruaidh, I think – looking impressively pointy on the left.
To the north, Glas Bheinn Mhor was also looking impressive, with Stob Coir’ an Albannaich behind it in the distance.
And to the south, once again that classic view of Loch Etive and Ben Cruachan.
By now, I had pretty much resigned myself to going home without Glas Bheinn Mhor in the bag. However, the traipse back down Aighenan’s north-west ridge and back up to the Bhealachan Lochain Ghaineamhaich actually proved much quicker than on the way out. Beinn nan Aighenan is “Hill of the Hinds” – I didn’t see any deer, but I did encounter a whole lot of grouse (Grouses? Grice?



Glas Bheinn Mhor is Gaelic for Big Greeny-Grey Hill: no arguments there. Unfortunately, to get to it, it is first necessary to climb Meall nan Tri Tighearnan, which is of course Gaelic for Confounded !?*!ing Nuisance of a Minor Hump


From the cairn of Meall nan Tri Tighearnan, Glas Bheinn Mhor was finally looming very close indeed, and looking eminently baggable.
...And it was

More grand views, with the big peaks of Glencoe and beyond looking spectacular to the north in the evening sunshine.
To the south, Beinn nan Aighenan’s long east ridge looked absolutely delicious from here. Apparently the approach to Beinn nan Aighenan via the east ridge is a superb walk: the only drawback is that it requires an unfeasibly long walk-in from Victoria Bridge to get to the bottom of the blessed thing

After all this grassy gentleness, the descent down to the bealach with Stob Coir’ an Albannaich was something of a shock to the system: it can only really be described as nasty, brutish and short

However, it is at least short, and I was soon down at the bealach where a good descent path romps down the Allt Mheuran, unexpectedly scenic and also unexpectedly dry despite all the recent rain.
In fact, although there were a few squelchy bits lower down, this entire route was striking for its practically Saharan aridity compared with my last outing to Beinn a’Ghlo, a mudbath if there ever was one

Sadly, the path may have romped down the Allt Mheuran, but I certainly wasn’t doing much romping myself


