Last month’s walk: Ben Kilbreck (plus others – read on)

Walkers: Alan, Myra, Di, Graham and Abbe

This week in May, brilliantly organised by Myra as usual, has now become a regular feature in the BEMAC calendar. It is affectionately known as ‘The Rollercoaster’ as it hurtles at breakneck speed from one adventure to the next. There were 10 people (members and guests) involved this year but not everybody did the same thing at the same time and there was some coming and going by members throughout the week. The first part of ‘The Rollercoaster’ was spent at Rogart in Sutherland where six of us gathered on the Saturday afternoon and took up residence in a very comfortable bunkhouse which had been converted from an old first class BR railway carriage. The first split in the group occurred on Saturday night when it was discovered that there was a ceilidh in the village hall. Three went along and the locals made us very welcome indeed and taught us all the dances as best they could. Then at a little after midnight the ‘dirty stop outs’ arrived back to find all of the ‘party poopers’ had gone to bed.

Sunday dawned with a clear blue sky and five of the party, Myra, Alan, Graham, Abbe and Di, made for Ben Kilbreck for ‘the official’ BEMAC May walk. We started from the bridge at GR537289 and made reasonable time up onto the ridge and then onto the summit. Although it was a clear sunny day it was pretty cold higher up but the views were tremendous, a feature that stayed with us for the whole week. Another feature that didn’t change for the rest of the week was the dry, bone hard ground and very low river levels. The after walk cuppa was taken at the Crask Inn. An Inn with ‘character’ to put it mildly.

On Monday, two of the party took off in the bus to explore various bits of the coast line while Myra, Alan, Abbe and Di hit the road north once again and climbed the most Northerly Munro, Ben Hope. For some reason we had a later than usual start that day and didn’t start up the path until almost 12 o’clock. We had expected the car parking area to be empty as it was a Monday after all but it was actually pretty full when we arrived. As it was a late start we hadn’t gone very far before we met people who had been to the summit and were coming down again. It was also a very warm day, much warmer than the Sunday and as this Munro is up,up,up all the way from the car to the summit without any respite, it was a bit of a hot, sticky climb too. There was a nice breeze on the summit to cool us all down though.
We planned to stop off at the Altnaharra hotel on the way back for the usual refreshments and it was Di who, on the way down the hill, said “If they have any fish and chips I’m having some”. This chip fantasy lasted for the rest of the week as the hotel was effectively closed with only the bar open for the locals. There were no fish and chips to be had and we had to make do with a bag of crispy bacon bits and some pork scratchings. Poor substitutes really.
We got back to Rogart to find that the arrival of Jimmy and Kevin had swelled the numbers to 8.

Tuesday and the pressure was telling on the group as only Alan and Abbe were up for more Munros and took off at 8.00am for the drive round to Inchnadamph to bag Conival and Ben More Assynt. The others opted to hit the fleshpots of Golspie, Brora, Helmsdale and Cromarty for reasons known only to themselves.
The weather was once again bright and sunny as we set off up the track past the Inchnadamph outdoor centre and enjoyed a delightful walk up Glean Dubh for about three miles before the climb up to Conival started in earnest. It got quite difficult after that, not technically difficult but a very rough and bouldery kind of difficult (thank god it wasn’t boggy too) but we managed to keep ahead of our time schedule as we scrambled up through the crags onto the bealach and plodded through scree slopes up to the summit. Once again the views were superb and the ridge out to Ben More Assynt stretched out in front of us. The ridge was the hardest part of the walk by far. The Munro book says ½ an hour between summits but it took us 1 hour each way and to make matters worse we had rain for a little more than an hour while we were on the ridge. The rain went off and the cloud lifted later on and we had dried out when we got back to the car 9 hours after setting off.
This time we got back to find that the arrival of Rob and Harry had boosted the numbers to 10.

Wednesday morning saw Graham get on the early train to return home and the rest of us get our backpacking rucksacks packed. We all then left Rogart and drove round to Oykel Bridge where we dumped rucksacks, Myra, Rob and Di before taking all of the cars round to Ullapool. Jimmy then brought us all back again and we set of on the backpacking part of ‘the rollercoaster’. We walked up Glen Achall for about 4 miles before turning into Strath Mulzie. About 3 miles later we reached Corriemulzie Lodge and strangely enough a walker’s car park that we didn’t know was there. It was a very warm day and the full packs didn’t help but we wandered on for another 3 or 4 miles before finding a delightful camping site where we set up tent city no 1 and settled down for the night. When camping in Scotland in May I usually wear waterproof trousers all the time as the ground should be, and usually is, soaking, but not this year. Both evenings were spent lounging about on dry grass, pretty well out of what wind there was, and very importantly, there were absolutely zero midges. There were all sorts of culinary delights eaten on the backpacking trip. The makers of ‘Smash’ potatoes will no doubt see a big jump in profits which will be all down to May’s sales figures. Kev and Di saved the day with their magic water tablets after we found a dead Deer in the river upstream. The water bottles, when opened, smelled like a swimming pool but the water had surprisingly very little taste.

Thursday saw Myra, Alan, Rob and Harry away up the track to climb Seana Bhreigh, one of the very remote Munros, while Abbe, Kev and Di packed up and walked 4 or 5 miles to the head of Loch an Diamh in Glen Achall to find a suitable place for camp no 2. Seana Bhreigh is not quite so remote now that there is a walker’s car park by the Lodge. It will now easily be into day walking territory. It wasn’t a difficult climb either, the underfoot conditions were fine, all short grass or short heather and the baggers managed to get to the summit and back to the tents in under 5 hours. This is a magnificent mountain from this side, much better than the slog from the Ullapool side. The baggers then packed up and followed the advance party over to tent city no 2 where another enjoyable evening was spent lounging about, dozing off, playing games with a rope and drinking whisky.

Friday and it was time to pack up again and walk 10 or 11 miles down Glen Achall to Ullapool. We had a night of comparative luxury waiting for us in a B&B but as the recurring chip fantasy had never been satisfied the first thing that we did once we dumped our packs was to walk down to the nearest chippy and get that one sorted out. So all in all we had a great week for Myra’s rollercoaster. The weather was superb and all 5 planned Munros were bagged. There are lots of photos on the website now, so don’t forget to have a look and all of the above may make a bit more sense.



This month’s walk: Sunday 15th June 2008

After a short discussion with the assembled members it was decided that we should continue going for Munros during the summer and revert to the Border Hills later on in the year when the weather might not be so good and daylight will be at a premium.

This month’s walk: Craig Meagaidh (Meggy). OS Map no 42. Leaving from the big car park at Aberarder GR 483873 and following the Allt Coire Ardair to Lochan a Choire before climbing up to the window and then onwards to the summit. (Standard Munro book route). 6.00am departure once again. Please let me know by Thursday 12th June so that cars and drivers can be organised.

The Aoanach Eagach has been shelved for this month. It may have to be a special one off. TBA

Other stuff:


I have contacted Tiso’s in Edinburgh to see if we can be included in their discount club nights. As far as I’m aware there are possibly 2 per year where members of invited clubs can take advantage of discounts from 10% to 25%. It would be worth a trip up if you were planning on buying a big item (or lots of small ones).

P.S I’ve just had a reply from Tiso’s and we will now get invited to their Rose Street Club Nights.
P.P.S Sheena has just informed me that I’m not allowed to spend any nights ‘clubbing‘ in Rose Street!

The website is now up and running www.bemac.org Anybody who wants walk photos posted please either e mail them to me or send prints and I will scan them. Perhaps different people might like to write the walk report from time to time to get a different perspective on things.


Alan