Nearly forty years ago, I invited a group of skiing friends up to the Lake District and dragged them round a number of walks. This was repeated twice a year for a considerable time. I found however, that the "whinge factor" was greatly reduced when a lunchtime pub was included on the walk The group eventually christened itself The Reluctant Ramblers" and owing to a business connection of mine we acquired a "logo" drawn by a well known cartoonist.

The Reluctant Rambler
At the end of May this year two of the surviving members Boo and Bill came up to Scotland for ten days walking. The weather in the last few weeks has been pretty dire, but we managed to make the most of it and kept mainly dry. The question "where are we having lunch?" - a meal I have long given up - was however persistent, and today when the weather was set to improve in the late afternoon, we headed for the newly refurbished Kingshouse hotel, with Beinn a' Chrulaiste planned for later

Kingshouse hotel - I thought the refurbishment had been done very tastefully and we had nice panninis in the bar.


The tromp across the exceedingly wet bog is best forgotten, but once on the SE ridge both the weather and the going improved and we made good progress.

Creise and Meall a Bhuiridh

Closer view from a bit higher

South East across Rannoch Moor to Achaladair and Dothaidh

Down Glen Etive

The weather slowly improving

We climbed the steep part of the ridge quite quickly, but there are a lot of false tops before the cairn is finally reached

Views from the summit

Summit pic - cloud over the Mamores behind

Down the Blackwater reservoir

Still pretty gloomy in Glen Coe

Stob na Cruaiche with Schiehallion on the horizon



Two views North - patches of cloud still floating round

To the West the Buchaille dominates

South East again to Achaladair etc.
The original plan was to traverse the two subsidiary tops of Meall Bhalach, but that meant returning over the awful bog so we headed down towards Altnafeadh planning to return along the WHW - dull but dry.

On the descent: Glen Coe looking a bit brighter: Bidean and Stob Coire nan Lochan out of the cloud

Looking through the Lairig Gartain between the Buchailles

Looking down to Stob a'Chrulaiste; We hoped to head down to the L from here, but the steep slopes are convex at the top, it was difficult to see the best line and we decided against it and followed the standard route

But there is a route down the ridge immediately W of the big gully ( detail from a stock photo)

We stopped for a rest - face to face with the Buchaille

Creise and Meall a Bhuiridh again

And straight through the Lairig

Clouds to the N finally clear Eilde Mor on the R - Na Gruagaichean and Binnein Mor on the L - Binnein Beag through the gap

Reluctant ramblers - "last of the summer wine" perhaps

Another view

We pushed on down the rather muddy track to reach the WHW: near the bottom

The 4.4km walk back along the Way took nearly an hour: view from the hotel in the evening sun