free to be able to rate and comment on reports (as well as access 1:25000 mapping).
We set off early to go up Ben Vane, the mountain was hiding in a cloud as wee walked up the approach road toward the Dam, it was an enjoyable stroll before the real work began, the slopes of Ben Vorlich to our right were towering steeply and we could make out A’Chrois appearing thru the mist and clouds to our left, Stil Ben Vane clung to its misty cape right until we were at the start of the path.
BEWARE. . there is a folly, ignore the path that goes off from the culvert as it takes you thru a bog to attain the shoulder, there is a better path ( although faint to begin with ) 50m up from the culvert on the right hand side which is dryer and well established ( it is marked on the BMC Harvey map ) and takes you up to the shoulder more or less inline with the path ahead. From the shoulder the going is like the song “ the only way is up” and for the most part quite steeply so
, you pass a small cave and several other rocky crags and formations as the path continues up, the views looking back over the Three Lochs are spectacular and are a good excuse to stop for a few seconds for a breather.
The route itself is fairly straight forward but there are one or 2 bits where you have to get your hands involved in the accent towards the top, some could say bits of scrambling but i would say scrambly walky bits especially just before the last false summit when you find yourself walking down for a few yards before heading back up. The summit is a small plateau with a couple of small cairns and a small lochan (or large puddle dependant on your point of view) it was immersed in a cloud when we were there so we didn’t stay long and started to head back down the way we came, there was a couple of chaps that were heading on to Ben Ime which im sure would make a great very full day of walking.
The return was better as the weather had started to clear up somewhat so the views were even more spectacular, there was plenty of places to stop and have a piece and enjoy the view, once back on the approach road we kept turning round to see if the cloud would leave and allow us to take a pic of the mountain in its entirety but this didn’t happen, a great day however and im looking Forward to going up Ben Vorlich ( loch sloy ) next in a coupla weeks .
ive put a description on each of the photo's as there in no particular order
