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Lat/Long: 56.832430, -04.223266
OS
Grid ref: NN 64362 73404
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The night felt quite cold and when I emerged outside when the
alarm went off the sky was mostly clear and starry and probably
around -1degC with frost on the outside of the car. I had my
breakfast and set off around 06:15am in the dark. Across the A9
i it was pitch black so I needed my headtorch. I went through
the gate where the mast is, passed it and headed up through the
heather to the line of the old military road. |
Frosty climb. |
Sunrise. |
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There was a substantial dip where Gen Wade and his men had cut
the Military road into the hillside on its descent to the bridge
down to the right. The bridge is long gone. I turned left then
soon turned right to follow a quad bike track heading up the
hillside to service the line of shooting butts. It was fairly
easy to follow the route by head torch but it started to become
indistinct and eventually vanished after about 2km. It was now
coming light and I was treated to some nice views of the sun
trying to break through the cloud, with little success.. After
3km I reached the dilapidated post and wire fence where I
followed it to the right towards Bhuidheanach Bheag. The cloud
was still low and no distant views. The climb had been steady
and easy and it didn’t seem long before the shape of the summit
trig post appeared out of the mist. |
Bhuidheanach Bheag trig post. |
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The temperature was down to -5degC with a strong NW wid. There
was a slight dusting of snow on the ground and the chord under
my left gaiter was balling up with a hard snowball. It was
annoying having to keep stopping and knocking it off. Eventually
I took it off. The right gaiter wasn’t a problem. I reached the
trig post which was encased in a thin layer of ice. The last
time I was here there was a covering of snow but I had my
snowshoes so the going was easy. My route now turned SE across a
rough area of boggy patches and a descent to cross around a km
of flattish ground before a short descent to the source of Mhic
Sith which forms the main gorge down to the A9. Directly ahead I
had a short steep climb to the summit of Glas Mheall Mor. The
summit was relatively flat with a reasonable cairn in the
middle. |
Towards Loch Garry. |
A bit closer to Loch Garry. |
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I now started my descent to the SW to head towards Glas Mheall
Beag. There were some interesting rocky outcrops and some white
quartz outcrops. I climbed up and over the next summit then
looked down into the river below to see if there was a way down
and a descent along the bottom of the valley. I decided against
it and continued along the high level that I climbed up last
month. |
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Below and in the distance I could see Loch Garry whose water
level was much higher than last month. At the end of the ridge I
turned right to take the easiest descent through the heather to
reach the site of the old military road bridge. Then it was down
to the very busy A9 where I had to wait a long time to get a gap
in two streams of traffic travelling at 60mph. Once across it
was a short walk back to the car. |
River under the A9. |
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