Decided to go for Curved Ridge. It turned out that Don Clarkson, a retired guy from Dunnet was going to climb Buachaille Etive Mor on his own, so I invited him to accompany me. He was a bit reticent about his abilities and speed, but I said we could take a rope, and he could use my harness and helmet, which he accepted.
We had a leisurely walk in and scramble up to the ridge, several rests on the way. The ridge was a pleasure under a Mediterranean blue sky. One other person was ahead, and one overtook us. We met one coming down as we approached the summit. There was no activity on Rannoch Wall, perhaps because it was a bit chill on the hands. We had a longer stop at the summit, admiring the hills from Schiehallion to Ben Nevis. (This part of the day was recorded under trad climbing, but was only a scramble).
As a second expedition we had a pleasant hill walk over the tops of the Buachaille. I continued alone to Stob na Broige for the view down Loch Etive, and returned to the path in Coire Altruim which I scampered down following Don. There has been serious erosion, probably initiated along the damaged path line by snow melt and rain, so most of the vicinity of the path was covered with scree overlying grass. The path started down steep slabs, sometimes wet, and I was reflecting how unsuitable this was as a coire for access to the summit ridge when suddenly I arrived at top quality path repairs, quite unexpectedly. Shortly after this I caught up with Don, who was descending very slowly. The path petered out in the peat of the glen and we joined the glen path.
The walk back along the Lairig Gartain was a bog trot of fairly unpleasant proportions. I thought this might have been the priority for repair before the Munro baggers’ path but no. Again, the crossing of the River Coupall within sight of the hut showed evidence of some dramatic drainage events.
Lovely and sunny all day, shorts from the summit onwards. Delicious to go and return to the hut without meeting a road.
Area :
Glencoe South (Loch Linnhe To Loch Etive)
The southern side of Glen Coe includes some very well-known mountains and can be split into two groups; the ones you can see from the A82 and the ones you can’t. Included in the former group is Buachaille Etive Mor, Buachaille Etive Beag, the Three Sisters and the Ballachulish Horseshoe, and in the latter, three Munros between Glen Creran and Glen Etive (Sgor na h-Ulaidh, Beinn Fhionnlaidh and Beinn Sgulaird). With huge amounts of climbing and walking in summer and winter, this area is also home to a large cairn built for Queen Victoria, or so the story goes. Includes all major peaks above 600m.
