Up the Snub and on to Ben Tirran

[davetherave]

Date. Saturday 6th feb 2010
Completed by. Dave, Julie and Wilson
Weather. Low cloud, zero vis higher up for all the circuit
Distance. 14 km
Time. 6hrs 30 mins

Ben Tirran by the snub.Loch Brandy and Wharral. Glen Clova

Starting at Glen Clova Hotel

Ben Tirran.gpx Open full screen  NB: Walkhighlands is not responsible for the accuracy of gpx files in users posts

Arrived at the Clova Hotel for 9.15 am and soon we are on our way, we know this area well having been up to loch Brandy twice before, and as recently as new years day 2010 we attempted the above route but failed miserably due to severe snow balling around the dogs legs.

Greeted with low cloud from the onset about 400m/450 metres we were hopeful of this clearing, or at least breaking as the day went on. (How wrong we were)

20 minutes in and we managed a couple of pics, but after this we had no visibility at all, and once we reached Loch brandy we had to decide if we would tackle the Snub or take the easier option around the SE of loch Brandy!

We notice 4 walkers about 50m away who were just in front of us on the way up coming back from the SE side they had obviously had enough and with the weather closing in maybe it was not a bad decision.

I asked the wife if she fancied going up the snub, she was keen enough so on went the crampons and out came the ice axes and we set off. The snub itself was not to bad and we were making steady progress, our only worry was navigating around the cliffs, and with visibility down to less than 20m and even lee this was a concern to say the least.

We did venture rather close at times and all we could see when we did was a dark shadow cast along the cliff edge indicating where not to go.

Soon we made our way to Green Hill and from there it was near a straight line hike of about 3k to the Goet.

Honestly, it took us about 30mins to find the trig point. I said to the wife we will have one more go in trying to find it failing that we would just head for the cairn on the SW and make our escape. We got lucky and found the top peeking through about 3 feet of snow.

Now we decide to make our escape SW to the cairn (just visible) and headed on down and skirted around Rough Craig 523m, and then on down to Inchdowrie and back up to the Clova Hotel.

[mountain coward]

Trying to find a summit cairn/trig on a wide, flat, grassy, featureless is probably my idea of a bad navigational nightmare! You did well to find it I'd say. Hope you were bearing in mind the possibility of a cornice on The Snub when you say you were getting near to the edge! Also, you may remember from when you were up there before, there are huge landslips by the edge in the area of the summit...

[davetherave]

Hope you were bearing in mind the possibility of a cornice on The Snub when you say you were getting near to the edge!

MC
It was never far from my mind. The snub it self was ok ish to climb, i was surprised with considering the conditions.

you may remember from when you were up there before, there are huge landslips by the edge in the area of the summit...

Was last up here on new years day, and visibility was slightly better than this trip. New years day we could just make out Loch Brandy as for the land slip i never new about that.

[Milesy]

Your cornice in a gorge is a "snowbridge" - and I have a habit of falling into them

[mountain coward]

Dreadful pic of the landslip (into the light unfortunately):