by tom061087 » Sun Oct 25, 2015 8:44 pm
Date walked: 24/10/2015
Time taken: 4 hours
Distance: 14 km
Ascent: 1150m
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Walked in to the bothy at Glen Duror on friday night in the dark (quite tricky to find as the os map hasn't quite got the layout of the forest tracks right, first time i have ever known this happen and it doesn't look like there have been any recent changes on the ground either!)
Left the bothy and headed up to the main track at the edge of the forest at 023543 (again the os map is out of date as it shows this point as within the forest)
We then went NE straight up the face of Sgorr Dhonuill, aiming for a shallow u shape between the crags roughly at 027547. Very steep but no real difficulties although my companion suffering from a few whiskys the night before seemed to think differently!
continuing roughly north westerly on a bearing to the summit the gradient started to slacken until we ended up on a plateau which had a thin coating of snow, possibly the first of the winter!
The final few metres of ascent is a scramble over boulders then we arrived on the summit just as the clouds cleared giving a spectacular view over loch leven and revealing a very steep drop away which was is quite a surprise after approaching over the plateau.
We then descended down the ridge to the bealach at 048554, a steep and spectacular descent but not too difficult although you need a head for heights as there is a stretch where any sort of stumble would probably be very serious.
Once at the bealach we climbed up towards Sgorr Dhearg which is a very straightforward slog up about 300m to another spectacular view.
We returned to the bealach then descended following the fenceline to what is marked as the edge of the forest on the map at 045549. Very steepbut prime bum-sliding terrain so it didn't take us long!
We then headed for the end of the track at 046547 over what is now felled forest, keeping to the banks of the burn avoided the worst of the leg breaking tree felling waste. Following the track down to the main route through the forest then made for an easy last couple of km back to the bothy and well earned dinner.
