Meall na h-Airse, another wet and boggy hill

[The Rodmiester]

This was the hill chosen to kick start the October Walkhighlands meet weekend and had been on my radar for some time, and I was hoping to catch maybe a three hour good weather window to hopefully be able to arrive for the rest of the meet with dry clothes, but I'm afraid things didn't turn out that way. When driving through the rain at Drumochter I decided to stop off for a roll and coffee to sit out the storm. By the time I had arrived at the start the old General Wade's bridge at Garvabeg the start being the same as for the Munro Geal Charn the rain stopped and I had a few words with another walker when putting on my gear, he was to be climbing the Munro.

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

After crossing the bridge then taking the track on your right following the burn on your right

Soon this track crosses over the motorway build by the contractors for the Beauly Denny power line. Don't cross the new bridge on your right (you do if doing the Munro) cross over onto a more grassy track which heads North then North West towards the plantation and a bridge, take the right branch towards the bridge

Heading up the grassy track towards bridge and plantation

Bridge crossing, the grassy track is very muddy in places after the many recent rainstorms

After following the track to the high point and before it starts heading West just come off it and tackle the long grass and bogfest and walk towards Leathad Gaothach shown on OS map

Looking back showing some of the bogfest. the rain had not re appeared at this point

It was from then a matter of just heading for the 844 m point and as the cloud clag and rain had now come on with a vengence the GPS and map was out at regular intervals to try and find the summit with avoiding the deepest of the peat hags which was not the easiest thing to do. Soaking and a bit fed up made it in 2 hours 10 mins

Summit trig point

In an effort to miss some of the hags I decided to head down further West down the Southerly slopes when the cloud lifted and I took this rare photograph. Walking more in the direction of the plantation hoping to find the end of the grassy track I was on at the start

This in fact was a good plan as apart from missing many of the hags there were shorter grassy sections to walk through which made things easier

After picking up the track on the North side of the burn I just followed it back to the bridge crossing

Bridge

And back to the car. When I was walking the latter section of track I found myself walking parallel to the walker coming off the munro but on the other side of the Allt Coire nan Dearcag. After another few words in the car park where he was to have a cuppa in the car I was to be heading off to the Laggan store for a wonderful hot bowl of pea and ham soup which warmed me up enormously, just what I was needing to continue my travel to the Sligachan Hotel Bunkhouse where I was to be staying the night before my Skye Corbett tomorrow

[Yorjick]

I tried the wrong approach, heading for a different bridge (NN51769797) that was no longer there and then slipping on wet rocks, getting wet in the process.

http://www.mountainmann.co.uk/corrieyairack-hill-gairbeinn-meall-na-h-aisre-and-geal-charn.html

I then continued to Geal Charn, a Munro that defeated me on the first two attempts!

Nice to have this forum to compare notes!

[mountain thyme]

Thats some selfie

[The Rodmiester]

Thats some selfie

At least it got a reaction from you Mountain Thyme I was not going to hang about up there and my glasses were all steamed up as usual I'm glad the Skye weather was load better than that

[litljortindan]

Some say the wet and boggy Airse is more an idea than a place. Well done on persevering.

[The Rodmiester]

Some say the wet and boggy Airse is more an idea than a place. Well done on persevering.

Aye in more ways than one, lol. But the next day on Skye totally made up for it.