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After the previous days wash out (
see here) the Sunday of my first Granite City Hillwalkers meet brought blue skies and high fluffy clouds. There had also been quite a bit of fresh snow overnight. The view of Ben Wyvis from the Aultguish Inn is excellent and it was clear that the snow line was now a good 400m lower.
After much discussion & um’ing & ah’ing another Alistair & I settled on Beinn Dearg (the Ullapool one). Didn’t get under way till 10’ish in near ideal conditions. Cool, sunny and hardly any wind. It’s a long gentle walk in, gaining height all the time. There were lots of deer on the lower part who didn’t seen unduly bothered by our presence.
I’ll let the pictures & map do the talking for the most part. The reason this report is nearly 2 weeks after the event is that I’ve been playing around with Photoshop and Photomatrix for a good part of the time. Looking back on the set I can see that I’ve gone a bit over the top at times, but hey, it’s all good experience. For those not in the know Photomatrix produces HDR (High Dynamic Range) photos by merging exposures taken at different levels. What I now know is that you really need a tripod to get it to work properly.
Meall nan Ceapraichean on left, Beinn Dearg on right (top hidden) while the cliffs of Doillaid a' Mhill Bhric dominate.
[the other] Alistair struggles up to the bealach to the with Lochan Lathail & Diollaid a' Meall Breac behind
Beinn Dearg & its crazy wall
Beinn Dearg summit (+ me)
The ascent up by the wall to Beinn Dearg was mildly icy – just a thin crust that you could easily kick through. Unfortunately just caught a bit of clag when we summated so no good photos from this peak. We also cut south of the little 886m mound in the bealach heading to Cona’ Mheall. The intention was to shave a bit of distance off the route but this backfired as we got caught up in deep drifts. The route over the mound on the way back was much easier.
Loch a' Choire Ghranda
On the way up Cona' Mheall (Beinn Dearg behind)
The views from Cona’ Meall were brilliant: you could see all the Assynt hills, most of the Fannichs and even Ben Klibreck (maybe). I also loved the views down to Loch a' Choire Ghranda from the bealach. Next time I'm this way will do the route up from there.
Cona' Mheall view looking SW with Beinn Dearg on the right with several Fannichs in the distance
Bealach between Beinn Dearg & Meall nan Ceapraichean
Back down past one of the several lochans
We also saved ourselves perhaps an hour off our time thanks to a very nice climber who had a Forestry Commission permit. On the way back the other Alistair noticed tracks leading off the path and to a narrow gully in the Doillaid a' Mhill Bhric cliff-face. Then a few metres on we spot a solitary figure negotiating his way down one of the nearby scree outflows. He catches up with us when we stop for a drink and it transpires he is a local and in short order offers us a lift from where the forest starts. He then sets off at such a cracking fast pace that I start to think he’s had second thoughts about the lift and wants to burn us off. I was just about running to keep up at times – after turning down Prince Charles I wasn’t about to let this one go (+ I had a long drive back to Aberdeenshire). I didn’t really clock him at first but trailing after him I had dark thoughts about young whipper-snapper climbers – but no, turns out he was 12 years older than me
A very fit 62 year old who just happens to know the path like the back of his hand. Not only did he save us 3k of walking he probably cut down the time for the 5k we did walk with him by half!
Anyway many thanks to whoever you are
Got nice view of Sgurr Mor from Strath More on the way back - then went and messed it up with software
All in all a most enjoyable weekend - only 250 to go now
Full flickr set
over here