A’ Ghlas-bheinn

Friday 6th June 2014

For the last day of my two week holiday in Scotland it looked like the weather was going to be as poor as it had been for most of that week, however just like on Tuesday the weather improved significantly and unexpectedly throughout the course of the day. I was staying in an isolated youth hostel at the top of the picturesque valley of Glen Affric having walked up the valley in poor weather conditions the previous day. My plan for this day had been to walk up the Munro to the north that overlooks the hostel, Sgurr nan Ceathreamhnan, a hill that is often mispronounced. Wainwright, in his book ‘Wainwright in Scotland,’ said that since he’d never mastered Gaelic he instead adopted roughly similar English equivalents; thus, for example, Ceathreamhnan was Chrysanthemum and I was amused to hear several people in the hostel giving it this name, however the correct pronunciation is much simpler: Kerranan.

Instead of taking the path uphill from the hostel into the cloud infested mountain I returned to the River Affric and followed it upstream for a short distance before turning up to follow the stream, Allt Beithe Garbh on an excellent path. If I’d continued beside the River Affric I’d have followed the track over a low pass into Glen Lichd that would have soon brought me back to Loch Duich, but I fancied taking a more interesting route so I followed the clear path into Gleann Gnìomhaidh towards Bealach an Sgàine. The National Trust for Scotland volunteers, who had been staying at the youth hostel, had clearly been at work on this path and made my walk both easy and a pleasure while ensuring that I maintained dry feet, but later their cleverly constructed handiwork ceased only to be replaced by a wide gravel path that seemed excessive and like a motorway. This motorway didn’t last very long, however, leaving me with a boggy path that attempted but ultimately failed to make a course along the valley.

It could be that on such boggy ground gravel was the only solution and as I struggled to make my way along the valley I longed for the gravel path again, despite the over-engineering. After reaching the end of the boggy path, and thanking my waterproof socks, I passed Loch a’ Bhealaich and began climbing steeply to the top of the pass. It had become obvious to me not long after leaving the hostel that the poor weather was not going to last as I could see the clouds were beginning to break further down Glen Affric which prompted me to rethink my plan for the day. With blue sky appearing down the valley I wondered if Sgurr nan Ceathreamhnan was a possibility after all, but the clouds at the top of the valley were taking too long to begin to lift to make that an viable option. Nevertheless as I climbed the, at times, good path up to the top of the pass I was thinking about which mountain I would now climb to take advantage of the good weather.

The top of Bealach an Sgàine was thick with clouds but I was still keen to climb one of the Munros either side of the pass. Beinn Fhada is to the south, but I climbed that in 2008 so despite it being a great mountain I decided to turn right and follow a narrow weaving path north towards the smaller Munro of A’ Ghlas-bheinn. I was attracted to the rocky, undulating ridge that leads from the pass to the summit and the clear path that steers an interesting route up the ridge. Despite the low cloud I enjoyed this ascent, and I was rewarded with occasional glimpses through the clouds into the loch-filled valley to my right. There is something rather magical about these snatching windows in the clouds, like you’re being given a glimpse of a far-off unknown country. I encountered a lot of tops on this undulating ridge and I was beginning to get frustrating with the never-ending succession until finally the summit cairn loomed into view and the clouds cleared briefly once more.

This was my ninth Munro of the holiday (when I also climbed two Corbetts) and the last hill of my holiday. Last year I only climbed four Munros so this is definitely an improvement, but nowhere near the twenty-plus Munros that I used to climb while in Scotland. The reduction is not so much because I’m getting older but because my priorities while in Scotland are now slightly different, though climbing a mountain still features prominently in my itinerary. As I sat beside the summit cairn of A’ Ghlas-bheinn I ate my lunch while the clouds continued to slowly lift from the hills around me to reveal stunning views through the windows in the cloud towards Loch Duich. It is usually very windy at the top of a mountain, but it was eerily quiet at the top of this one with very little wind that made sitting at the summit a tranquil, even magical moment.

From the summit of A’ Ghlas-bheinn I headed west around steep crags and onto a saturated grassy ridge that took me unevenly down as I tried to find the path that I had seen the previous Sunday after crossing the Allt Leòid Ghaineamhaich. I thought then that it would make a good descent route, but I hadn’t anticipated how wet the ground would be following the heavy rain of the last week. I could hear splashes with every footstep and on the steep bits I couldn’t keep a grip on the saturated ground and slipped over several times. Eventually I decided that this is not a good route and I was relieved when I finally reached the bottom beside the bridge that I had crossed on Sunday, but it would have been better if I’d descended north to Bealach na Sròine. This descent brought me onto one of the forest tracks that I had walked along on Sunday and I now had a long walk in tremendous sunshine back along the tracks and the road through Morvich to Loch Duich.

Since Sunday I had travelled from Loch Duich over the mountains to Cannich and then returned over the mountains along the mighty Glen Affric back to Loch Duich. It was an interesting, though changeable week, and at least I was able to enjoy some fabulous mountain scenery at the top of the highest mountains in the area, Màm Sodhail and Carn Eighe. Since lunchtime on this last day of my holiday, the weather had gotten better and better and now that I was back down in the valley it was really warm. The clouds were very slow to lift from the tops of the mountains and would not completely clear the tops until late in the afternoon and meanwhile I had a long walk ahead of me. From Dorusduain Wood I walked for three hours into Strath Croe and around the end of Loch Duich, past Shiel Bridge and along the shore on the other side of the loch to Ratagan Youth Hostel. The weather was so good I didn’t begrudge the walk as I enjoyed the magnificent Highland scenery for one last time before returning home the next day.