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Decided sat night that I would go n walk stob binnein and ben more, so I started looking at the maps and read some reports on the web site to get more info about what the walk is like. During looking at the maps I noticed that cruach adrian and beinn tulaichean were just across the valley that I would be using to return back to the car.
That got me thinking could I do the two pairs of hills in the one outing???
After a bit more reading n going over maps I found out it would be around an 18km walk with 2200m ascent and best done from inverlochlarig side rather than the side of the A85.
I decided to go up n walk the first two then if I felt upto it and the weather was ok I’d then continue on and do the next two. Weather forecast was for clear skies so that made me plan for early start… up at 0330 quick breakfast then on the road for around 0410. great thing was roads were clear so was at car park for around 0530ish.
Then as ever forecasters got it wrong!!!
Rain at car park but light n bearable so booted up, bag on n headed off. Under foot wasn’t as boggy as expected after what I had read but climb was instant as reported (not as steep as ben more route I think), at around 400m the snow started and that was the weather story for most of the walk no visibility and snow showers but no wind thankfully..
I just kept head down and plodded on up to stob coire an lochain then along to my first munro of the day stob binnein. I took quick view less photo of the cairn then on I went for about 100m where it starts to descend , there was solid snow field as far as I could see(about 20m!!) with slippy fresh snow on it so I decided to put on my small pair of crampons I carry just incase snow field was all way down to the bealach which is around 300m down, not a good plan slipping down there. After my effort of putting them on the snow went down about 40m
never mind better safe than sorry.
Once at bealach its just a case of following the well worn path up the 300m or so climb to the summit of ben more, there was a few patches of frozen snow heading up but all were easy to cross or go around. At summit fuelled up with bit fruit n jelly babies n good drink of water then another quick photo n off I went again back down to the bealach from there I headed west down into the valley where ben more burn starts.
Once in the valley I felt like I’d give the other two munros a shot it was 0930 n I had been walking for about 3hrs 45mins which I thought meant I had plenty more in me, so I headed across to directly below stob garbh and scrambled up the 400m or so of grass n rocks to get to the spot height between stob garbh n cruach adrian by this time I’m starting to question myself as I was pretty nackered and the snow was back on.
No choice now just got to plod on only two summits, 300m ascent n 7km till I’m back at the car. Doesn’t sound like much but the climb upto cruach adrian almost destroyed my legs another steep climb of around 150m in small increments of 10 to 20 steps at a time… took me about 25mins to do this part of the walk. When on the summit I had a short rest, quick fuel up n unpack the walking sticks to assist the auld legs. The last munro was by far the easiest with an ascent of 120m over almost a km, walk in the park compared with what I’d already done. Only descending to do n I’m home free but as ever it felt like a long slog which was very boggy in places.
I had reached the last summit in 6hrs and an hour descent which made for a hard 7hr walk taking in probably the most ascent I’ve done in a single walk. Was a great outing except for the lack of views as looking at other reports they show some great scenery.
I met two couples and a father n son who were up doing the latter two munros its nice to stop n have a chat with folk with the same mental imbalance wanting to walk huge hills just for fun!!!
- first munro of day
- second munro of day
- third munro of day
- fourth munro of day
