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Ring of Steall at last

Ring of Steall at last


Postby pigeon » Mon Jun 18, 2012 6:33 pm

Route description: The Ring of Steall, Mamores

Munros included on this walk: Am Bodach, An Gearanach, Sgùrr a' Mhàim, Stob Coire a' Chàirn

Date walked: 17/06/2012

Time taken: 7.75 hours

Distance: 12.4 km

Ascent: 1590m

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Meant to be a big camping weekend this either the Fisherfields or Ullapool but the weather was just no playin' the game likes.So these plans were binned,on the upside though the forecast for sunday was decent so we decided to go for the long awaited visit to the Ring of Steall.Left a car at each car park in Glen Nevis and bolted up the path towards the waterfalls to escape the midge at just after half 7.The Steall falls were impressive and crossing the wire bridge was a laugh but as it had bucketed down for the last few days getting across the bottom of the falls proved tricky.
Ring of Steall 004.JPG
Jake and the Steall falls
Ring of Steall 008.JPG
watch and learn dog,watch and learn
Ring of Steall 012.JPG
Steall hut
Ring of Steall 016.JPG
hmmmmm
Got fed up trying to find a dry way and ended up just wading it,wet feet for rest of day :( .After that debacle it's up the path to An Gearanach,entered the clag soon so it was more or less head down and plod up the good zig zag path to the top,about 2 hours in and we were at the cairn.
Ring of Steall 018.JPG
claggy climb up to An Gearanach
Ring of Steall 021.JPG
Ian spending his birthday on a cold,wet An Gearanach
Spoke to 4 guys here,3 French and 1 Belgian,who were on holiday for a week who were also doing the ring,got the summit pic taken and then we were of along the ridge to An Garbhanach.This part is supposedly quite exposed,lucky for us then that we could see nothing along here and we got to Stob Coire a Chairn no probs :lol: .
Ring of Steall 022.JPG
on the ridge to An Garbhanach
This is where we almost went wrong,think the foreign lads might have took a wrong turn here, looked like they headed off ahead of us towards the ridge to Na Gruagaichean,we almost did the same as we got totally discombobulated by our compass reading,set off down the same path only for the gps to tell us we were heading the wrong way,compass was right all along :? .
Ring of Steall 025.JPG
confused.com on Stob Coire a Chairn
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looking back to An Gearanach
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towards Am Bodach
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Sgurr a Mhaim
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Binnien Mor and Na Gruagaichean to the right
Back to the top and the cloud lifted to show us exactly where we'd been and where we were meant to be going,by this time though the lads were halfway to the wrong hill.(if you are reading this boys and you did go the right way accept my apologies )The views were great now the steep climb to Am Bodach and the rest off the walk was now clear but this didn't last to long as we hit the clag just before the Devil' ridge :roll: .
Ring of Steall 037.JPG
steep route to Am Bodach
Sat on Am Bodach for a while chatting to a couple from Dunblane before setting of again.
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Am Bodach
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a glimpse at the route ahead
The clag came in about the demoted Munro of Sgurr an Lubhair so we never seen much of the devil's ridge,there was one bit we avoided and used a bypass path but apart from that it was hard to tell how exposed it is.
Ring of Steall 049.JPG
devil's ridge in deep clag
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Never seen much on Sgurr a Mhaim either so we had a quick break at the big cairn before heading down,the views to Stob Ban and down to Fort William eventually opened up for us and we got back to the cars in about 7 hours 45 mins greeted again by the midge.
Ring of Steall 057.JPG
Ian and Jake on Sgurr a Mhaim
Ring of Steall 058.JPG
Jake gets his last warning for fartin'
This is a great walk,pity the forecast wasn't quite right but we did get some good spells ,one to re-visit on a better day that's for sure :thumbup: .
Ring of Steall 061.JPG
Mullach Nan Coirean
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Ring of Steall 066.JPG
Stob Ban
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pigeon
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Re: Ring of Steall at last

Postby soulminer » Mon Jun 18, 2012 8:48 pm

Pity about the clag :( Fine, fine mountains those indeed. I would tend to agree about a revisit, cracking views from all of them. Cheers.
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Re: Ring of Steall at last

Postby rockhopper » Mon Jun 18, 2012 9:04 pm

:lol: :lol: We've done it again - missed you by a day ! Was up here on the Saturday and about to post a report when I saw yours. The forecast was certainly wrong - even worse so on the Saturday :roll: - cheers :D
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Re: Ring of Steall at last

Postby jonny616 » Mon Jun 18, 2012 9:13 pm

I would say shame about your clag, but i still think your weather was better than ours :lol: :lol: .

A great walk. Like the claggy ridge pics 8)
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Re: Ring of Steall at last

Postby gammy leg walker » Mon Jun 18, 2012 9:18 pm

Great walk this one pidgeon,good to see all the snow has gone.
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Re: Ring of Steall at last

Postby Fudgie » Tue Jun 19, 2012 12:07 pm

I was lucky enough to do them on a clear day so I would highly recommend going back in better weather.
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Re: Ring of Steall at last

Postby BoyVertiginous » Tue Jun 19, 2012 1:51 pm

Great effort. Some good "atmospheric" shots among them. Look forward to tackling these at some point in the future, mostly positive accounts whatever the weather but the views, I imagine, would take it to another level.
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Re: Ring of Steall at last

Postby Ian Bayne » Tue Jun 19, 2012 5:06 pm

Good report pidg. Photos on the ball it was a good day out pity about the views dont know about going up on a clear day shook the fist and drank the water . what hill is it for my 53rd
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Ian Bayne
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Re: Ring of Steall at last

Postby dooterbang » Tue Jun 19, 2012 10:58 pm

Shame about the views but least you got chatting to some Euro baggers :)

Aye, always trust your compass :wink:

Well done guys, and dog.
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Re: Ring of Steall at last

Postby PeteR » Wed Jun 20, 2012 1:10 pm

Real shame about the weather pigeon :(

But the Ring of Steall is a great walk and will be well worth the return on a better day :D
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Re: Ring of Steall at last

Postby fipriestley » Thu Jun 21, 2012 12:04 am

Nice one Pigeon! Looked similar a couple of weeks ago with views coming and going... at least they were there for part of the time though :)
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Re: Ring of Steall at last

Postby Johnny Corbett » Thu Jun 21, 2012 6:43 am

Did the Ring of Steall in similar weather but still a great walk :D
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Re: Ring of Steall at last

Postby pigeon » Thu Jun 21, 2012 6:46 pm

Thanks for the comments folks,had four trips to the Mamores now and 3 of them were in fine weather so can't grumble to much about Sunday,easily one of the best areas,if you've no been do it soon :D
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Re: Ring of Steall at last

Postby Gavin99 » Sun Jun 24, 2012 5:44 pm

Nice one people , pity about the cloud but looks like that wasn't too scary .
Blaming the dog is the oldest trick in the book :D
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Re: Ring of Steall at last

Postby pigeon » Sun Jun 24, 2012 7:37 pm

Gavin99 wrote:Nice one people , pity about the cloud but looks like that wasn't too scary .
Blaming the dog is the oldest trick in the book :D
It most certainly was the dog Gavin ,if that was a human smell then a visit to the docs would be required :lol:
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