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First hill of the year, just getting over a cold so wanted something easyish. This one's a cracker.
Layby is about 7 miles after Arrochar, after Loch Restil it's just round a right hander so careful or you'll miss it. Then down to the stream, path leads to stepping stones but water was high so I walked left a bit for the wee island.
Beinn an Lochain from the layby:
Then short walk over boggy ground, clear path leads to ridge just before crags start:
And that's the boring bit over, there's a lot of varied terrain on the ridge to maintain interest:
View back along Glen Kinglas:
Next challenge, path follows grass left to right here.
View over to Ime & Cobbler:
Looking back down path:
After hearing about guy rescued from Ben Ledi I was overloaded with gear I wouldn't need - crampons & ice axe. But path was snowed over here so they came in handy. Snow was deep & steep and had an icy crust so was tricky to kick steps, but no problems with crampons. Alternate route up steep grass on the left, decided to go that way on return but might as well use crampons since I brought them.
Next section leading to summit, more snow here & getting cloudy.
Quite a bit of snow here, decided to veer off path & get a bit of crampon practise. Bit time consuming putting them on & taking them off, worst bit is squeezing them inside crampon bag.
View down the snow, if you fall you'll just whizz off the end & land gracefully in Loch so no worries.
Cairn:
South Summit:
Weather suddenly changed at the summit, couple of flecks of snow then wind got up and got a snow/hail mixture. Time to go back, on the path this time to avoid snow. Path was snowed over though so had to get crampons on again:
Snow off again:
Rest of path down was ok, there was always a scrambly bit or something different so it didn't seem to take too long.
Decided to go down steep grass rather than get crampons on again for snow section, was flattened long grass with water running so snow was acually easier.
After this it was back down to the end of the ridge then a very short walk to the car, unlike eg Cobbler where there's a long walk in/out. Great hill, but winter conditions definitely changeable even with sunny forecast.