with an excellent forecast we actually had a difficult decision as to what to do with our final day (given that we had to drive home as well)..Doing a round of Cairngorm, the mountain not the plateau!! was one option, with the possibility of some ice-axe braking practice and more snow experience for Claire. Another thought was to do Mullach Choire a Blair in Glen Feshie, however this is a long round with a potentially arkward river crossing towards the end...so we elected to go to Drumochter.
There was one munro of the 7 around the pass that I had not done, and Claire, who does not bag munro's of course (despite having the book) was not too upset at the thought of doing two new munro's. So with that in mind, we set off for the layby - only to have me move the van 1 layby too far and give us an extra 1/2 mile on the road....oops - not an auspicious start to the days walk!
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| Sgairneach Mhor |
Today was the opposite - a still day with very clear visibility. We came upon a bridge with a stalkers path off it - not on the map - and Claire's eagle eye spotted a path off the stalkers path which went in the correct direction towards the peak. Finding some footprints made us feel even better and we began a slow but steady plod uphill. Underfoot conditions actually improved as we gained height as the ground became more frozen and there was more snow. We eventually hit the ridge of Sgairneach Mhor and plodded uphill to the summit. After a lunch stop and a chat with a gentlemen doing all 4 of the Munro's (the other way round) [who was the only person we saw all day] we had another decision to make.
Due to taking the wrong bridge/path (which we only discovered later) and stops for Claire, me, to take photo's! time was getting on a bit. Going back the way we came was possible, however we elected to carry on and traverse over Beinn Udlamain.
To do this, we descended quickly to the three-sided col between the peaks, Claire finding a very good line through the peat hags, and onto the ridge that climbs to Beinn Udlamain. Views over Ben Alder forest opened up, including the lovely Loch Ericht which goes to Dalwhinnie. It was noticeably cloudier to the west than it was to the East as can be seen by this shot from the summit looking east. In another (happier) slight misjudgement I thought Beinn Uldamain was 1100m as opposed to 1010m, so we were quite surprised to find a large cairn in front of us and a height of 1010m on my altimeter watch. Another glance at the map explained the situation, and a quick halt was taken for photo's..which are on the photobox website. http://www.photoboxgallery.com/3436739
Descent was accomplished very easily, with the boundary fence to follow along over a couple of minor bumps and we soon descended to the col between Uldamain and A'Mharconaich (another unprononceable Munro!). We had spotted a little path descending down from the way up, and we were able to find it and make a quick descent to the stalkers path in the valley. This descent was quite slippy and quite steep, yet Claire went down it very well - and we were soon on the main stalkers path. Walking back along this was quite tiring for me - it's not the kind of path my knees enjoy - and it did not exactly go totally downhill the whole way either!! So, I was therefore rather chuffed to see a bridge fairly seen - and then somewhat less chuffed to discover it was a different bridge, complete with path that led right up to near the summit of Sgairneach Mhor! oh well - it wasn't on the map either. Eventually we made it down, and a quick scramble up a bank cut about 1k off the road walking section and two happy campers were back in the van - an amazing day with great views and really enjoyable walking. These hills don't have the scale of the Cairngorms or the sheer grandeur of the NW, but they are worth a visit.
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