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Another calm morning (the weather not us!) but no sun this time. Low cloud, damp – ideal midge conditions.
Same plan as yesterday – breakfast, pack, run. But this time we had to take the tent down. Spray on the magic potion, trousers tucked into socks, tops tucked in to trousers, collars up – go!!! It wasn’t too bad til we started to take the flysheet off. Then we were black all over.
Never has a tent come down so quickly. Stuffed it into our rucksacks and scarpered. Over the bridge and along the river towards An Caorann Mor. A short distance into the glen, near a ruined building, we left the track and headed for the burn. Unfortunately it was quite deep and we had to remove our boots and wade across and then put them back on again, all the time being attacked by clouds of midges.
Then we escaped them as we climbed up Ciste Dhubh.
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- Looking back towards the midge zone
At about 700 metres the steepness eased a bit and we continued on to a narrow, rocky ridge with deep corries on either side.
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- Narrow ridge
Then very steeply up to the summit of Ciste Dhubh.
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- Up to the summit of Ciste Dhubh
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- Made it!
By this time we were in the clouds and after a short break we dropped down towards the Bealach a’ Choinich.
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- Going down to the bealach
This is a very, very long way down.
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- An awfully long way down
My knees were complaining bitterly. The clouds parted briefly and I glimpsed the Promised Land – the Cluanie Inn!!
And I saw the bealach and the climb up to Sgurr an Fhuarail.
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- Option 1
“Why not just let’s do the Corbett?”
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- Option 2
Katie said.
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- Option 3
What would you do? About an hour and a half of bog trotting later we were eating jacket potatoes in the Cluanie!
