
It was really nice to have some company and (for me anyway) the journey went by very quickly and we parked up on a handy layby on the Southbound carriageway near the Trinafour exit after Colin managed a very nifty manoeuvre to dodge the roadworks.
Bikes unloaded and boots on, released the Hound (just the one this time


After an initial uphill, the track flattened out and we were into the trees. Here is Colin fannying about with his saddle.

The route ahead

Off I go

A short distance further, we emerged from the trees to a panorama of rolling hills. The sun was out and it looked to be a good day


Jura hadn’t quite got the hang of Humans on Big Metal Things, and there were a few close calls which made me realise I should probably sort my brakes out

A downhill section – gonna hurt on the way back!

Speaking of hurting….I’d come out on a bike with no suspension without my padded shorts. Rookie error

Me trying to work out how weak the bridge was…


We reached the Ford – fortunately the river was too low to cause any problems but we obviously got pictures during the crossing just in case of any…mishaps

I was the guinea pig…

Followed by Colin and Jura (who seemed to have finally got the hang of not committing suicide by bike


An Dun looked pretty steep….and Maol Creag an Loch impossible


We dumped the bikes by the fence and continued on foot, picking up a vague path.

Looking back towards Sronphadruig Lodge

Loch an Duin and the impossibly steep side of Maol Creag an Loch

We were enjoying the path and the banter until Colin said “Aren’t we supposed to be going up this hill not around it?”


Colin found a frog:

It was steep but nothing we couldn’t handle. The beauty of steep is it gets you up pretty fast

Looking back down the valley

Eventually we met something of a path and two people who we had passed on the ride in. Turned out the dude worked with Colin….small world

Colin and Jura having a breather (or a “photo break”


We reached the very flat top and the first cairn. According to the map this cairn and the next one are the same height, but we had to visit them both anyway so it didn’t matter.
Jura posing

Looking ahead to the second cairn and the other people

Back the way – an interesting skyline!

Carn na Caim – a big flat lump!

We moved onto the second cairn where some posing was in order


A’ Bhuidheanach Bheag and Carn na Caim

Summit rituals completed, we were off again. The ridge continued for a distance, but then we had to bite the bullet and head steeply down.
The Gaick Pass

A small knee twinge had me worried as we were in the arse end of no-where


Fortunately the shower didn’t seem to be passing anytime soon, so it was time to get going again. We had thought the forecast was to improve throughout the day

We had decided to cut off some distance and just head up the steep bit:

A glimpse of clarity

It was a case of head down and get on with it, and we gained height quickly although not necessarily with any dignity….Wet grass, need I say more?

Once up the worst of it, I spied a wee ridge heading diagonally upwards.

Colin following my ridge

The rain had finally eased!

This brought us out on a plateau. We could see the people ahead of us heading towards a large cairn (presumably the summit although it looked lower). There was a wee cairn fairly close so we decided to visit that too, making jokes about Corbett Tops

As I discovered later, it was a good job we did go there, as it was in fact the real summit despite having a diddly cairn

Colin and Jura

Jaxter being photobombed by Jura

Although the rain had let off for now, it was very windy and we didn’t hang around for too long. The route was easy from here – followed the ridge to the deer fence.
Doon

I think those are the Alder Hills in the distance?

Colin and Jura leading the way

The rain decided to return and leggings were hastily reapplied. We followed the deer fence through a bog and we were back at the bikes – hooray!
Weather…

Back on the bikes, we were racing against the weather. We overtook the others who were going to get pretty wet and pelted doon the track. Fortunately Jura seemed tired enough to stay out of the way!
Back at the forest we had just left the weather behind.

And we arrived back at the car in the dry. Celebrating prematurely, we ditched the waterproofs only for the rain to start and we got pretty wet putting the bikes on the car (especially Colin because he’s a gentleman


It was a wet journey home and I felt the previous night’s lack of sleep catching up with me

