Strath Cluanie

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Section 10b 885 Sgurr a'Bhac Chaolais 885 Buidhe - bheinn 804 Beinn na h-Eaglaise 790 Beinn Loinne 781 Sgurr Mhic Bharraich 773 Beinn nan Caorach 913 Sgurr a'Choire-bheithe 901 Sgurr an Fhuarain 894 Sgurr nan Eugallt 887 Ben Aden 858 Fraoch Bheinn 796 Sgurr Coire Choinnichean 785 Beinn na Caillich 901 Ben Tee 835 Sgurr Cos na Breachd-laoigh 880 Sgurr Mhurlagain 838 Meall na h-Eilde 804 Geal Charn 788 Meall Dubh 909 Streap 867 Bidein a'Chabair 829 Carn Mor 796 Sgurr an Utha 796 Beinn Bhan 774 Meall a'Phubuill 765 Braigh nan Uamhachan Section 4 Section 9 Section 10a Section 11 Return to Corbett index Return Home.

Beinn Loyne from across Loch Cluanie. Beinn Loinne 790m 2555' Aptly, the boney hill.  Map Sgurr a'Bhac Chaolais 885m * Hollows of the Kyle  Map Buidhe-bheinn 885m  2900'  The yellow hill. As usual, indicates good grazing.  Map

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Beinn Loinne 790m

Beinn Loinne from the old Road to the Isles.

 

Beinn Loinne is two hills. Quite a striking landmark from the 'new' Garry-Morriston Road. From this side it lives up to its name, bare ribs of grey hillstuff poking through thin soil, a decomposing wreck of a hill. The older travellers on the Road to the Isles had a different hill , a gentle swelling of bog and brae running up from the pass at the end of the South Sheil Ridge to the equally aptly named Druim nan Cnamh. An ascent from here is a truly bovine experience with much time for chewing the cud, you will not lose your breath here.

So we have this strange doublesided hill. Stranger still it's the East that says 'come and play', and the West that is a gentle swelling with a road most of the way up it. Either way it's a deceptively long haul to the top, now that the road is closed. Some chose a third manifestation, the North Face and canoe across Loch Cluanie, before tackling steep birch clad slopes directly to the summit.

If you go for the exciting eastern side, you will need to dodge some 1980's forestry plantings, but there are ways through from above the Loinne Dam. A steep climb will also gain the East Ridge from the Cluanie Dam. I know of no climbing on the hill, but somewhere there must be the odd steeper buttress. Whilst on the subject of Loch Cluanie, have you noticed the maps always show a large island opposite the site of Lundie Cottage. I have never seen the loch cover the isthmus and that 'island' has always been joined to the North shore. Occasionally the loch floods the meadows below the Cluanie Inn, as shown by the OS, but I have yet to see the 'Isle of Lundie'.

Enough of the tough stuff, I wimped up the eastern side after a stay at Camus Luinie one New Year. It was a wild and snowy day, pure January malevolence. Some folk were parked at the Cluanie end of the old road, umming and arrhing about going out, probably set on the South Sheil Munros, an unpleasant prospect. They chose to leave, I went for less demanding quarry.

The road takes a chunk out of the distance and climb, but the bog has to be faced eventually and soon the wet snow squelch began up the deceptively easy slopes. Perhaps it was the peat hags or the snow, but I found it hard going. Occasionally the onslaught of the ball bearings would cease, and views opened up to the amazing unsung splendours of the north side of Gleoraich and Spidean Mialach. There are fine ridges there Munro baggers! Likewise the brutal slopes of A'Chralaig would appear briefly, over looking tiny Am Bathach.

There were the odd patches of steeper going and a good covering of snow at the cylindrical trig point. A short distance away one of the bones out topped the trig and gave a view to the serious end and the East Top. Then it was time to hide in the goretex and follow the compass back into the next round of meteorological combat. The canoe in on a hot day sounds such a civilised way, then there is that luck generation who could once drive most of the way up on the single track main road to Kyle and Skye. I was glad not to be tackling the cornices on narrow Druim Shionnach, just above my left shoulder.

The old experience of the Road to the Isles is still available at The Tomdoun Hotel, now a backwater sustained by fishing and hillwalking. Here you can still have the full 1960's Highland experience, its unmissable. The more accessible Cluanie is more a coach tour sort of place these days, and is always associated with past epics, so with the Tomdoun shut for winter,I legged it down to Inveroran for a comfy stay in the hotel before tackling the very snowy Beinn Tairbh, ending a very successful New Year's campaign.

 

Sgurr a' Bhac Chaolais 885m 

 

Sgurr a'Bhac Chaolais and Buidhe-bheinn continue the fine tradition of the 500' rule being screwed up by inconvenient reality. The five hundred foot separation is fine, but what if two hills, some way apart have the same height, but insufficient 'drop' to be true members of the list.

The solution was that both hills were to be included until such a time as the highest could be determined. Originally the awkward squad was Carn na Saobhaidhe and Carn na Laraiche Maoile in the Monadh Liath (section 9). This is still a problem area with many far flung 'summits' all about the same height. By 1981 the OS had taken a metre off Laraiche Maoile and added it to Saobhaidhe, but the anomaly had not gone away all together as another pair had been found, again in the Monadh Liath. (Corryairack Hill and Gairbheinn) Eventually this pair was resolved in favour of Gairbheinn only for another pair to appear. Of course the OS published a new map in 2002 showing Gairbheinn and Corryairack as the same height. Ten years on from the survey and still no correction of the error.

Back in 1981 Buidhe Bheinn above Kinloch Hourn was the listed Corbett, this was then out topped by Sgurr a'Bhac Chaolais an inconvenient lump separating the seven Munro switchback of the South Sheil ridge from the Saddle pair. So now Buidhe Bheinn was cast out and folk started extending their South Sheil days westward.

By the 1990's many of us were scouring the maps looking for errors and hoping to outsmart the SMC's listings. Charles Everett doggedly pursued the OS on the case of Buidhe Bheinn on account of seeing what could be a 880m contour on the 1:50 000 OS map. The OS later confirmed the height at 885m thus reinstating Corbett's Anomaly. This is unpopular with some who like a tidy list, but there is no real alternative with two separate hills like this. (There is the other case of the twin summits of Carn Liath/Creag an Dail Mhor near Braemar, but these are clearly on one hill). In 2002 as with the Corryairack pair, the new OS 1:25000 map was published. This was long awaited, as it may have split the pair and we would then know which one was the Corbett. Unfortunately, nothing was settled. There was no spot height on the summit of Buidhe-bheinn and to compound the error, there was a typo on the 'old' summit, now shown as 897m instead of 879m. There is a conflict now between those who say there are 220 hills on the list and those who say that there are 219. The current edition of Munro's Tables claims 220, ie both Bhuidhe Bheinn and Sgurr a'Bhac Chaolais count, but this conflicts with the new SMC Corbetts guide which claims 219. I think they are both correct. When you start out you have 220 hills to do as you dont know which of the pair is the one.(and they are both worthy of an ascent) Once you have done them all then you will have climbed 219 Corbetts. Hopefully the OS will sort it out soon. Read Dave Hewitts account of the conundrum.

So we have the very public twin, Sgurr a'Bhac Chaolais overlooking the busy Glen Sheil. It's a rocky rough peak, very much a typical South Sheil summit. There is apparently a tricky step on the East Ridge, but I must have sneaked around this on my ascent.

Most folk will attack the hill from the convenient Bealach Duibh Leac, a pass supposedly used by C.E. Stuart when on the run, although personally I suspect that it was not so easy, Such a pass would have been a well known trade route and probably guarded. The Prince probably went by a harder route. You will find a good path here, and a well trodden one as it is a popular end to a South Sheil Ridge Munrothon.

Near your starting point is the narrow throat of Glen Sheil, the site of the end of the 1719 Jacobite uprising. This was an attempt to follow up the fiasco of the '15 and was well supported by France and Spain. An advance party of Spanish troops captured Eilean Donan Castle after rallying Jacobite sympathisers throughout the Highlands, including Rob Roy MacGregor. The Royal Navy bombarded the castle, and after a couple of days the Spaniards and Jacobites abandoned the castle and took up positions in Glen Sheil. Meanwhile the main Spanish Armada reenacted the 1588 invasion by being scattered and wrecked in a storm. Isolated and short of supplies, the troops in the Glen only put up a token resistance. After a short engagement, the Spaniards took to the hills and fled over the Sisters ridge. A corrie and peak still bears their name. Before long the survivors were forced to surrender and were treated well and repatriated. Twenty-seven years later another Jacobite rising would end with its leader fleeing over high passes, this time there was to be no leniency.

I remember little of my visit to this hill, it was in a very wintery April 1984 and I was staying at Ratagan Youth Hostel. As always in these parts, the weather was foul. I wanted to bag Sgurr na Sgine, and thought it would be a good ploy to take in the Corbett that had been conveniently moved nearer the road. At the snowline I made a direct line for the summit, leaving the zig zag Duibh Leac path and making a steep scrambly ascent to the ridge near the summit, thus bypassing the bad step. It was a thrilling ascent, on good snow, but in frequent squalls. The summit was a sandblasting experience, and I swiftly descended the West Ridge to come face to face with the East face of Sgurr na Sgine. I knew nothing of this infamous obstacle , and soon decided not to try my luck on it. I was expecting a continuous ridge, not to come face to face with a crag across the ridge. Many have finished a big traverse of the South Sheil Ridge here. Besides the weather was getting worse. I was glad to slide off steeply back down to the path after a demanding and serious short day. I was quite new to the Corbetts then, just growing out of the brief "if it aint 3000' it ain't worth it " phase, and I was already aware that there were those days when its best not to go too high. (I still got a good doing over on Sgurr na Ciste Duibhe the next day, so the lesson had not fully sunk in.)

Buidhe-bheinn 885m 

 

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revised 21/11/02