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Carn Mor Dearg Ben Nevis Map I had driven up to Scotland with Andrew the day before and we'd managed to get some accommodation in Spean Bridge at a B&B called Oak House. By chance this just happened to be located right next to Braelea where I'd stayed the previous month. When Andrew knocked on the door at Oak House he was greeted with a raucous din of barking dogs which just about managed, for a moment, to outdo the steady background racket of squawking, caws and whistles coming from the various birds housed in an aviary in the garden. Someone had been busy teaching the parrots to do wolf-whistles. It seemed the landlady, Mrs Ferguson, used the proceeds from the B&B to fund her own bird sanctuary, taking in damaged wild birds as well as parrots and cage birds. One of the long term residents was an owl with one wing - I think he was called Alfie. She told us that she could put us up provided we didn't mind the noise from the dogs and the birds - oh, and there was 'the captain' who was apparently likely to come stumbling in at 11.30 pm. I rather expected the captain to have a large black beard, a wooden leg and one of the parrots on his shoulder but when we saw him at breakfast he seemed normal enough - mid 30s, lank, greasy, longish red hair. He kept himself to himself and spent most of the time standing in the garden chain-smoking and muttering 'shiver me timbers' into his mobile phone. (I couldn't actually hear the words but I expect that's what it was) Mrs Ferguson's son had been playing for Fort William in the Scottish Shinty Cup Final that day - they lost to Kingussie 4:2. There are 2 pubs in Spean Bridge: the Aonach Mor Hotel and the Spean Bridge Hotel (which includes the Commando Bar). We got a mushroom stroganoff at the Aonach Mor, having had it recommended to us by Mary, a chatty 19-year-old Glaswegian barmaid. She had short dark hair, a flirty eye and a wee tum which curled over her jeans. After a few games of pool we moved on to the Spean Bridge Hotel where we had a few pints and were entertained by an ageing duo singing numbers from the 60s - 80s. The next day the resident cock was kind enough to rouse us from our slumbers at the fine hour of 6.00 am. Turned over and went back to sleep. The day started cloudy but dry and having parked at the North Face car park at Torlundy, just off the A82, we set off up the track through the forest at 9.50. It was an easy, fairly level path for most of the way then a short uphill stretch before we emerged into the open countryside of the Allt a Mhuillinn glen.
It was a pleasant and undemanding walk up the glen with the impressive north face of Ben Nevis looming before us, although unfortunately cloud kept curling around it and obscuring it for much of the time. About a mile and a half up the path we turned off to the left and headed directly up the side of the Carn Mor Dearg ridge. This was a steep haul and when we got to the top of the ridge thin cloud was gathering and the visibility was down to about 100 yards. The crest of the ridge was covered with the broken red rocks which give the hill its name, but it provided an easy route to the first top of the day, Carn Dearg Meadhonach and after that it was a straightforward progression to the top of Carn Mor Dearg (13.10).
The cloud was getting slowly thicker and wetter and at some point the wet mistiness tipped over the edge and became rain although it was hard to tell exactly when the one stopped and the other began. We carried on along the arete, a wonderfully long and sharp-edged ridge which connects CMD with Ben Nevis. It was quite narrow in places but never really difficult - as long as you don't mind a wee bit of exposure. As we continued the left side of the ridge fell steeply away whilst the right-hand side simply went straight down in places - very entertaining. Eventually we came to the end of the arete, however, and after a gruelling slog up a steep scree slope we reached the summit plateau of Ben Nevis, the highest point in Britain.(15:00)
It was 18 years since I'd last been there with Andrew and my third visit to the top in total (the other time being with my daughter, Amber) and every time it's been the same - damp, misty and a bit of a mess. There's always someone else there on Ben Nevis though, so we were able to get an Irish lad to take a photo of us by the trig point, striking roughly the same pose as we did in 1988.
No views or coffee machines to detain us so we didn't linger. We crossed the plateau and descended via the tourist route - it's like walking down a slag heap. Cairns at the top mark out the route and then there's the zig-zag track down the mountain which took us to a point above a large lochan, Lochan Meall an t-Suidhe, where the track turns sharply SW and heads back down towards Glen Nevis. We left the tourist track at this point, however, and carried on along a fine path which took us to the northern end of the lochan then simply stopped. Well-laid sandy path one minute, trackless wastes the next. Still, from the map it looked as if we should be able to just head north and eventually rejoin our outbound path, so that is what we did. There was no path at first, just long grass, streams and bog but after a while we saw some ancient fence posts off to the right and there's often a track of some sort close by such things. Sure enough when we got there we found a half-hearted path which we were able to follow back down. There was still the obstacle of the Allt a Mhuillinn to cross but when we reached it there was a sort of iron grid/filter thing spanning it and we were able to carefully edge our way along it and get over without getting our feet wet. Or wetter. We were pretty bedraggled by this time.
After that it was an easy track back down to the car (17.40). Altogether quite a demanding day physically and we got drenched, but the arete is a good scramble well worth the effort and we did get to see some of the better side of Ben Nevis, a side which you miss completely if you stick to the tourist route.
The forecast was for the same weather the next day but (as usual) better in the east so we decided to head for Blair Atholl and have a go at Carn a Chalamain. Drove back to Spean Bridge and followed the Kingussie road, then, just after the turn off for Dalwhinnie, we pulled in at the Monadliath Hotel (£25). There weren't many options for it was getting late and we needed feeding. Once the local drunk had left we were the only ones in the bar that night (I mean the only people, not the only drunks). We had an uninspired veggie burger and chips but the breakfast next day was good and the staff did go to the trouble of drying our boots out for us which was very nice of them. | ||||||||
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