Beinn Sgritheall Again
9:41 pm on the 31st of August, 2002I said I would write a wee account of the route we took but I haven’t really had time this week with work and other things but here is a brief summary.
We left Dunbar at about 7ish and drove up past Edinburgh, Perth, Dunkeld and a whole load more towns always getting smaller and smaller untill we got to Invergarry where we stopped for a quick pint before the pub closed and then pitched our tent at the side of the road. The next morning we awoke to find ourselves being eaten alive by midges so quickly broke the site and headed to Glenelg then on to a small farm called Balvraid where we parked. We started along the track at 8.30. The route was to take us along the side of a small burn (Abhanm a Ghline Bhig) then across a bridge but it turned out that the bridge was no more so we spent about 15 minutes trying to cross the burn, once over though it was an easy stroll along the bottom of a glen untill we reached the foot of the hill when it got a lot steeper and scree-e (and if that isn’t the right word then I don’t care!)
We gained a lot of height very quickly and then made our way along the top of the ridge to the summit where we met the only people we saw all day, so we had a nice wee chat with them, they’d been in Skye the day before and had just come back from Mexico or somewhere where they had been up at about 15000ft (not bad considering a scottish hill only has to be 3000ft to be a munro). At this time our hill was completely surrounded by cloud which really spoilt the whole day as it had been clear and sunny right up to then, what made it worse was that the views that were obscured would have been really spectacular (south to Knoydart, east to the Five Sisters of Kintail and west to the Cuillins on Skye).
All that was left was the descent, we took a slightly different route which took us round to the bealach between our hill and another top, Coire Min, and then gently back down to the burn and then - after further investigation of the bridge which crossed over two huge potholes cut in the riverbed that Mr Borthwick, my old geography teacher could have enthused about for weeks - along the track to Balvraid and the car. We finished by 3.
It was a really enjoyable walk, that was only spoilt by the bad weather at the top and the 4 hour drive. Well worth it if you’re in the area for a week or so and only in good weather - it looked like it would be a pretty boring hill in snow even with the views.
Nothing better than a bit of sibling rivalry.
