On April 13th 2013 I went up onto the ridge of Buachaillle Etive Beag in Glencoe and bagged its southerly munro, Stob Dubh, in decent winter conditions – or at least I think I bagged it. That climb was my first big hill day since having arthroscopic surgery to repair a torn meniscus in February. On the day I was very much focused on my knee, praying I would get across the ridge, up the munro and down again without pain. Alan Kimber from West Coast Mountain Guides led the way and I scarcely looked at a map – which is why I say I ‘think’ I bagged Stob Dubh. I wasn’t really paying that much attention to our route or location at all because I was so focused on my knee. I know we crossed the first top on the ridge (around 902m) and then followed the ridge southward, climbing again until the slope levelled off and the ground appeared to drop away. We returned across the ridge, leaving the northerly munro, Stob Coire Raineach for another day.
Almost a year to the day later, I found myself on Buachaille Etive Beag again but this time alone. The weather was dreadful. Several days of warm temperatures and rain had stripped the hills of snow below 900m and I climbed up to Stob Coire Raineach in a howling gale with rain lashing at my face. (I’ve found that in these conditions, snow goggles provide excellent protection from the elements). The summit was not a place to loiter and I headed straight back down to the col. My original plan for the day had been to continue along the ridge to Stob Dubh and make certain this time that I really had bagged it. Despite the low cloud I actually had pretty good visibility from the slopes of Raineach across the first top and all the way towards Stob Dubh – but it didn’t take me long to decide that the prudent course of action on this occasion was to get off the hill and back to the car.
Stob Coire Raineach, April 2014
Crossing a narrow, snow capped ridge, alone and in gale force winds would have been an unnecessarily stupid risk. Yet the decision not to proceed onto that ridge still left me disappointed. I had really wanted to make it to Stob Dubh last weekend and my fixation on that goal reveals something, I think, about the obsessive compulsive nature of the typical munro ‘bagger.’ For me, heading back to Stob Dubh would have been the winter walking equivalent of turning round, 50m from the front door of the house, to check whether I’d forgotten to switch off the iron or perhaps left the stove burning. What can I say? No matter how many times you check, the iron is never left on, and the stove is never burning. I’d crossed that ridge a year before, with a guide and walked as far south-west as possible before the contours dropped. In any sane person’s book, I’d bagged Stob Dubh in 2013. But the munro bagger wants to be sure. These days, he or she probably carries some sort of GPS device too, so there need be no uncertainty as to whether one is actually at the summit or not.
Two days earlier, I had witnessed something similar at the summit of Ben Vane in the Arrochar Alps. I had taken an early flight from London City to Glasgow and was at the car park at Inveruglas by 11am. Excitedly (this being my first solo munro) I made my way past the power station and on up the slopes of this diminutive but very steep munro. Near the top I met another ‘bagger’ – a delightful lady from Inverness who was close to compleating (only 20 to go I think – not to mention that she was even closer to finishing the Corbetts and Grahams!) At the summit I happily plonked my axe into the cairn that I assumed must be marking the high point. I was struck when I noticed my fellow bagger skip over to a nearby rock that did appear to be perhaps as much as 50cm higher than the cairn! Who wants to leave anything to chance? Naturally, I wandered over to stand on that rock too.
Ben Vane, April 2014 – This is the summit right?
Munro baggers are a funny bunch. Many mountaineers deride any form of peak bagging, comparing it to stamp collecting. I can understand these criticisms. It shouldn’t really matter how many mountains you climb or how high they are. There is certainly something peculiar about ticking off peaks in a list. And the highest mountains aren’t always the best. But for me, and many others, there is something deeply satisfying in peak bagging. By chasing the munros and furths, there’s a structure to my enjoyment of the mountains and an easy way to measure my progress over a period of years. One thing I realised on my most recent trip though, was that the moment chasing those peaks starts to feel like a chore, then you know it’s time to ease off. The day after I’d been up Buachaille Etive Beag in the rain, and two days after Ben Vane, I was scheduled to return to London on an evening flight. Staying in Crianlarich I had enough time, with a sufficiently early start, to take on one or two of the Crianlarich munros on Monday morning. On Sunday night I was thinking that if I hit the trail by 6am I could probably make it round the An Casteal horseshoe with time enough to get back to Glasgow for my flight. After giving it some thought I decided that I wouldn’t set an alarm for Monday morning after all. I was tired, and climbing mountains should never feel like ‘work’.
The Crianlarich hills will wait and my legs needed to rest. I was pretty tired after three days of walking – in between Ben Vane and Stob Coire Raineach I’d spent Saturday walking both of the munros on Buachaille Etive Mor with Max Hunter. Together with my solo outings on Ben Vane and Stob Coire Raineach, the day on Buachaille Etive Mor was a big one for me. My first route combining two munros in a day (though earlier this winter I strung together 4 furths on a longer route in the Carneddau in Snowdonia). Parking on the A82 opposite Lagangarbh, the cloud was hanging low over Glencoe. I’d planned the route with careful regard to dangers: the obvious route onto the mountain, through Coire na Tulaich, has claimed lives in previous winters. Just looking at the corrie on the map, the potential avalanche hazard is obvious. Last Saturday, in late winter conditions, the avalanche forecast from the Scottish Avalanche Information Service indicated ‘low’ risk on the slopes. But in these thaw conditions, however safe the slopes, the danger of cornice collapse was real and, as the SAIS text forecast noted, quite independent of avalanche risk. We decided that the only sensible option was to climb the buttress to the west of the corrie. This was a steep and tiring slog but as we reached the top, the enormous fracture lines behind the rim of the corrie confirmed that we had made a wise move. If and when this thing goes (hopefully it will just melt away gently) it will drag an enormous amount of snow with it.
Coire na Tulaich – Glad we didn’t try to climb up this
Atop Stob Dearg I broke open my hip flask, a really thoughtful Christmas gift from my girlfriend Jennifer who is so tolerant of my increasingly frequent solo forays into the mountains. Unusually perhaps, my flask is filled not with a fine single malt (though I’m certainly partial to a Glenlivet or a Talisker) but with an absolutely superb, aged rum from Guyana – ‘El Dorado’ (seriously – give this stuff a try, it is super smoky and the most ‘whiskey-like’ rum I’ve ever tasted). Before taking a sip myself, I poured a little drop onto the summit, a votive offering to appease the mountain gods. The ridge south from the first munro of the day gave me a good opportunity to test my navigation. While Max has been up to Stob Dearg dozens of times with clients interested in the exciting climbs at the northern end of Buachaille Etive Mor, this was his first complete traverse of the ridge as well as mine. In the poor visibility, our map and compass skills were important in making our way to Stob na Broige which, at 5km from the road, feels reasonably remote. Reaching the summit, I was pleased with my achievement. Three munros in two days. It might not sound like much in the grand scheme of things but given my injury troubles in 2013, the start to my 2014 campaign is going really well.
Stob Dearg (1022m) – Cheers!
Our plan for the descent was to head down Coire Altrium but we both knew that it would – like Tulaich – be heavily corniced and potentially dicey. Worst case we would have had to return all the way to the buttress at the top of Coire na Tulaich and climb down from there. Thankfully though, we were able to avoid the worst of the cornicing and access the corrie more safely by crossing into it from the east. At the base of the corrie we could see a large amount of avalanche debris from earlier in the winter. Above us there were patches of blue sky. Walking along the river Coupal back to the road I had a real sense of deja-vu. I suddenly realised I’d walked into this valley before in 2012 with my Dad. I remember at the time admiring the peaks of both the Buachailles. It was great to be walking the same path two years on knowing I’d bagged them all.
Buachaille Etive Mor, April 2014
All in all it was an intense weekend. In three days, I doubled my munro count to eight. This was also the first time since 2012 that I’d done consecutive days in the mountains and my knees held up perfectly well. In fact, I think that the increase in activity in 2014 is only strengthening my legs and this hopefully bodes well for the rest of the year. Adding together all my routes so far in 2014 in Wales and Scotland, I have climbed five munros and six furths, completing a distance of around 80km with a total ascent of almost 6000m! I have a few weeks off now and will return to the Highlands in May. I’ve realised that all my 8 munros to date have been completed in winter conditions. With any luck, I’ll have fine weather in May for my next few. Thanks for reading, and happy hiking.
The Incompleatist, 12 April 2014 – 8 down, 274 to go
incompleatist 