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70% chance of cloud free Munros yesterday
Left car park at 9:30 and wandered round the glen, there were a couple of Germans and a bloke from London there too. They were heading for the ring so I pointed out the impending terror of the cable bridge
Walking round further, I think it might be easier to cross upstream if you're doing the ring, missing out the cable bridge, falls crossing and swamp.
Got to ruined cottage and headed up towards Sgurr a'Bhuic:
There's a path on the right of the burn, it disappears/reappears further up. Bit muddy but not too bad:
View back down to Ring of Steall - which were clear of clag!
Rockier towards to top of Sgurr a'Bhuic:
Bit of a slog to get here, 963m but no Munros bagged yet. Cairn and eastern Mamores:
Back down and follow the path up the shoulder:
Sgurr a'Bhuic looking more dramatic from this side:
Close to the edge:
Sheep chillin out on the path:
Now it's up and into the clag. The cloud base was about 1100m and the ridge doesn't really drop below that from here so not much chance of views:
I followed the top for a while, then noticed an easier path round the side so went for that. Soon noticed that this was traversing the top so I cut off and went straight up instead, quite hard work but got to the cairn:
Big round top, went onwards to the drop down to the bealach. Wasn't difficult to find despite clag:
Bealach and path leading up Aonach Mor - this path is well defined and easy to follow:
There had been some light hail up to this point, turned into snow as I got closer to the cairn. Another 3 walkers appeared here, they'd come up the other side and seemed to be taking rock samples.
Returned on the path, looking for the point to cut off towards Carn Mor Dearg bealach. Nothing marks the spot, found it using my handy GPS
Then went straight across to the cairn that starts the descent to the bealach. Met a couple here, we'd seen each other earlier as they were on the bridge while I was wandering up Sgurr a' Bhuic. They said the descent was pretty steep, and the path was eroded:
Was a bit dodgy going down, rocks and red earth giving way as you stand on them. Looking back up:
Return path from the bealach:
As advised by the other couple, I kept to the right of the burn. There's a path, indistinct in places and a bit marshy at times. Nice view onwards though:
The Ben:
Bit bouldery here, with pools of water around too - someone has taken advantage of this and used the area as a toilet, with plenty of bog roll left around too. I would have a good look at any prospective route, to make sure there aren't any unwelcome surprises
Then it's straight down to the wooden bridge:
Was quite busy on the walk back to the car park, plenty of folk out for an afternoon stroll. Left about 4:30 and had a big empty road ahead of me all the way through Glen Coe till just before Crianlarich, scenery looking amazing