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Here we go this would be George's first outing since his cracking compleation, the plan hopefully is to get Parminder to 200 before the end of the year. I came up with the idea of tackling the 4 between Crianlarich and Tyndrum, George volunteered to drive. I looked at my blog to see when and how I tackled them first time round, over 20 years ago and I did them in 3 visits all solo. I did the usual research and downloaded a couple of routes onto my phone as well as the WH route for the first 2. I knew it was going to be a long day and one of the routes I downloaded was Jonathans and as it took him 11 hours I was guessing we would be about the same. With that in mind I suggested an early start and George uplifted me at 5,25am and Parminder at his usual parking spot at 5.30. I had also researched where we could have breakfast and suggested McDonalds at South Queensferry, which worked out a treat as we each had 2 bacon rolls.
The road NW was free of vehicles until we got just the other side of Crianlarich, where there was a sign telling us the road was closed until 8am. There were a few cars in front of us waiting for the road to open as we were there before 7.30, road opened early about 7.45 and we were walking just before 8am.
Car park, Parminder getting kitted up
We didn't see any kayaks
Lovely early morning shot
Good track, George telling Parminder to keep up
New path across the bog
New bridge over the river
The weekly train
Walking through the natural wooded area
Parminder in his usual position
Lovely wooded area
Lovely
Looking across to Ben More etc
Looking back out of the wood now
Water feature
Ben More from higher up, weather still behaving - not for long though
Not much water in this water feature
Looking back
Waterfall
Even less water the higher we get
George showing Parminder where to put the film in his camera
Even less water
Plenty of water features
Trickle
Head down and enjoy
Soon be in the cloud
Arty shot of the sun failing to break through
Not far from our first summit, break in the cloud as it was swirling round
Summit area of Dhubchraig
Summit of Dhubchraig, Parminder wasn't impressed with the "pile of stones"
Weather pretty dire now
Time to stick together
Summit of Ben Oss
Selfie with another couple of walkers in the background, this would be the last photo with my phone as I had to preserve the battery for navigating purposes
Fascinating clouds
May even be Lui?
Parminder demonstrating his ascending posture
George waiting for us after our challenging bit of navigating coming down Ben Oss
Our 3rd summit, we opted to traverse and aim to join the path on the bealach between Lui and neighbour. The plan was very good but what we didn't anticipate were the umpteen undulations
Plodding on through the clag
Looking down on the Oban road from the bealach
More fluffy clouds, Ben Lui is hidden in there
George enjoying the ascent
Parminder leading the ascent
Smiling on the third summit, the smiles wouldn't last
Me demonstrating how windy it was
We are now on the long slog up Lui
Parminder and his unique ascending style
At long last the summit of Lui
The happy couple zoomed
After giving Parminder a 10 minute briefing on how to take a photo, here is the result
Another cairn just along the summit area
It was shortly after leaving the above cairn that we had another navigational hiccup, we followed what we thought was the path off the summit - it was but was heading north. So we came up with a plan to get back on track, this involved more traversing, descending and then another slight ascent.
This is the slight ascent, we would pick up the path at the top
The descent route
Parminder and George following me down
Below the cloud now and we can see the track we are heading for
More water
Descent route was between the two lumps
Another shot of the lumps
Plenty of info on the long walk out to keep us amused
Nice waterfall in the fenced off area
This turned out to another great day out especially when looking back, the soaking we got didn't dampen our spirits. I ended up with very wet feet as the rian was running down the inside of my gaiters, note to self don't leave your waterproof trousers in your own car. The climb up Lui was a proper struggle, it was hard enough struggling after 3 previous summits but with a 40mph wind in our face made it extra tough.
