Beinn Sgritheall

Thursday 1st September 2016

Before this year I had not been to the top of a Scottish mountain for two years and even before that I had already begun favouring long distance walking as opposed to climbing mountains. However on my last holiday in Scotland, in May/June, I was fortunate to get good weather that gave me the opportunity to go up a few mountains and I was in awe of the experience. I had forgotten how great it is to be at the top of a Scottish mountain in good weather, so when planning for this holiday I wanted to go up as many mountains as possible, but I have found that the reason why I had fallen out of favour of going up mountains is because in Scotland the weather is often poor. The top of a mountain in good weather is the best place that anyone can be, but in bad weather it can be the worst. On this holiday I got some rather poor weather that put my memories of good weather earlier in the year firmly into the dim and distant past. I was in Scotland specifically to go up mountains, but I was experiencing weather that didn’t make me want to be up there.

When I left Torridon at the beginning of this day the weather was pretty awful and after driving over several mountain passes on single track roads I eventually reached the delightful, but isolated coastal village of Arnisdale on the shores of Loch Hourn. It was still raining with low clouds everywhere, so there wasn’t a soul in sight. This is the sort of miserable weather where no one in their right mind would go out and I was sitting in my car also not wanting to go out into the terrible weather. I questioned my sanity as I finally got out of the car and set off up the footpath that begins near the village climbing the steep hillside above. My bold move was rewarded as the rain soon stopped and held off until the end of my walk and afforded me with a much better day than I had feared. I was climbing Beinn Sgritheall, a Munro that has very steep slopes that fall precipitously all the way down from the summit to the shores of Loch Hourn.

The path above Arnisdale was very steep, very boggy and badly eroded, which made this quite a struggle for me to climb the grassy slopes even as the views slowly began to improve across Loch Hourn towards the beautiful Knoydart peninsula. Ladhar Bheinn though, and the other Knoydart mountains, were firmly enclosed in clouds as I slowly dragged myself up the steep slopes into the mountain pass of Bealach Arnasdail. To my right were the steep, craggy slopes of the Corbett, Beinn na h-Eaglaise, but my attention was on the Munro, Beinn Sgritheall, to my left, that was showing steep grassy slopes and looked impregnable. A thin path took a good route up the steep slopes until it deteriorated into a crawl straight up the steep slopes, but the climb was more than compensated by the improving views as the clouds lifted from the surrounding hills to reveal the quintessentially Scottish view of row upon row of mountains as far as the eye can see. By the time I reached the 906 metre eastern top of Beinn Sgritheall, the views east over the top of Beinn na h-Eaglaise and towards the mountains of Kintail were amazing.

The views all around me were fabulous despite the grey, overcast skies with even the Knoydart mountains now clear of clouds. Ahead of me Beinn Sgritheall was beckoning me on with a seemingly easy ridge to traverse, but as I neared the bottom of the col between the two tops I was blasted by ferocious winds that knocked me off the top of the ridge northwards and forced me to desperately find some shelter in order to recover from the shock. I took this opportunity to have my lunch in this cold and windy location before girding my loins for another attempt at the summit. I may have had clear views but the weather was still very poor as I struggled against the tremendous winds on the narrowing ridge. I was still battling against the strong winds when I reached the spot where the ridge becomes precipitously narrow and exposed falling three thousand feet almost straight down to sea and forced me to be very careful as I fought against the wind up the steep, narrow ridge until eventually I reached the summit of the Munro of Beinn Sgritheall.

The best of the views were now west out to sea towards the Isle of Skye with the ridge below me descending steeply with a good path that weaves cunningly through the steep crags. It was an absolute pleasure for me to make my way slowly down this great path with those fabulous views before me. I was now sheltered from the wind so the hardships that I had endured during the ascent were forgotten as I basked in this wonderful descent down the craggy slopes with that great view before me towards Skye. Eventually I reached the small lake of Lochan Bhealach Ràrsaidh where I veered left off the ridge onto a path that heads down the steep slopes below Beinn Sgritheall. Initially this was a great path through gorgeous purple-flowering heather with good views looking up to the top of Beinn Sgritheall showing off its sheer slopes dramatically, but it wasn’t long before the weather began to reassert itself with clouds slowly descending onto the top of Beinn Sgritheal once again. I was fortunate to have had clear views from the summit on this poor weather day.

Lower down the path enters a young wood and weaves a fascinating, though steep, course through the trees, but on the other side of the wood the path deteriorated becoming boggier and was dominated by bracken so that it was with enormous relief that I eventually reached the road some distance west of the village of Arnisdale. This had been a challenging walk on paths that were not in the best of conditions, though the descent was not as bad as the ascent. Many guidebook writers had recommended doing the walk in the other direction, but I had decided to stick with Ralph Storer’s route and I’m glad that I did because the walk benefitted enormously by having that view across to the Isle of Skye on the descent. Beinn Sgritheall is a good mountain with a memorably steep climb and sheer slopes that were quite an experience, especially in strong winds. Poor weather at the start of this walk had not made me want to go, but once I was on this steeply-sided mountain I was richly rewarded with stunning views that reminded me that Scottish mountains can be great places to be even when the weather is poor.