The Fisherfield Munros ...6th to 8th July

With a kernel of an idea for a sea kayak / cullin ridge expedition being planted by Bill and a free weekend, all combined with the Beast having a weekend pass the venue of choice was Skye. The idea of another recee over the “interesting” bits and adding a few tops to the Beasts growing collection, seemed the perfect combination. Good weather was forecast right up until the Friday morning where the low winds and high cloud was replaced with high winds and low cloud.

Call me a pessimist if you will but the statistics for ridge attempts in Skye aren’t good:

1- Up Gars Bheinn late in the evening and found a great bivi site. Storm hit about 2am and we were forced to descend at first light.
2- Up from the Coruisk hut just after dawn. Slow but steady progress towards the TD gap in cold and windy conditions. Onwards towards Sgurr Mhic Chonnich by which time … time had run out.
3- Attempt from Slig – woke up to rain and low cloud. Attempted to find pinnacle ridge failed but did manage to fall in a river on the way back down.
4- Another attempt from Slig – woke to rain and low cloud … had the sense to go back to sleep.

There have been as many successful days out in the Cullin but the message is clear – unless the weather is good … forget it.

A quick discussion on the above and the Beast was convinced – a new location was needed. With a strong factor being “how many tops wuid I get” being raised and a midge avoidance strategy being just common sense, the Fisherfield was picked. The journey north was only spoiled (for me anyway) by the aftermath of the Beasts glass of prune juice which had had prior to leaving work. As we passed Inverness I was like one of those mad collie dogs hanging out the window.

The food stop at the Aultguish consisted of beer, mushrooms with garlic dip and haggis – as if the prune juice wasn’t enough. At the car park it was midge hell and even the Beast’s emissions couldn’t hold them at bay. Quick triple repack and we were off. Clear of the woods and the midges eased … until we reached the bothy just before 10pm where the conflict was resumed.

Shenevall was almost full – not that you would of noticed from the noise (everyone was in bed). We got a space in the room with the fire and after a quick beer nodded off.

6am and the alarm went off. By 7am we were heading down to the river and the first crossing of the day. Thankfully it was well down and we still had dry feet as we picked the route up to Beinn a’Chlaidheimh. Sitting on the summit at 8:30am was perfect – great view all around and only one t-shirt change of the Beast. We headed over to Sgurr Ban where we could see a couple of lasses heading up from the other side. We stopped to chat for a while – the Beast reckoned they were of “mahagow” frame of mind (i.e. more than just friends). The thinking behind this seemed flawed but it did help pass the time as we ascended Mullach Coire Mhic Fhearchair. At this point I raised the matter of a couple of wee subsidiary tops I was after. The Beast decided to continue on and leave me to it.

Heading down towards Beinn Tarsuinn, I met up with a lass by the name of Barbara. We discussed the hill, discussed living around Glasgow, discussed women in engineering until a roar of “GERMANOPHOBYYYYY” echoed across from the summit slopes opposite. This was followed by what looked like a bull fighter impersonation with a red goretex from the Beast. My initial attempts to disown him failed. The shouts continued until Barbara suggested I better go and catch him up if only to re-establish the peacefulness of the place. Apparently, the Beast was concerned I hadn’t seem him and was about to re-ascend Mhic Fhearchair.

Over Tarsuinn, the hard bit of the day began. Not only do you lose a heap of height but there is a goodly distance to cover before the climb up to A’ Mhaighdean. This was broken down to micro-stages (including a water refill where the midges were murder … again). For me the summit views on A’ Mhaighdean are the best to be had in the whole of Scotland – why this is … go and find out for yourself – you won’t regret it. Sitting about the summit were some other guys up from Glasgow. They had driven up (leaving at 03:30am), walked in, dumped gear in the bothy, THEN headed up the hill. Whilst they were only doing two of the hills we reckoned that was harder than doing all six after a night in the bothy.

Over to Ruadh Stac Mor and there was only the walk back to the bothy left before food and drink. A post dinner party with the other Glasgow boys was great – for some reason other folks in the bothy didn’t seem to want to join in.

Next morning dawned with Beast announcing (from the depths of his sleeping bag), that the walk back to the car was about all he could manage. As happens, the talk soon got round to the next hill trip and even extended to the possibility of getting a big team weekend in Gorton sometime in early December ….