ron-t climbing
23 January 2017 ................ Choinneachain Hill
A good morning weatherwise, so come the afternoon, I thought I would go for a trip up to Choinneachain Hill - last time I tried to go up it, I ran out of daylight and so didn`t get to the summit.
By the time I left the house the weather wasn`t just so good as it had been, but I decided to go anyway.
Up at the dam, and there were some great reflections looking up Loch Turret - and two views of Carn Chòis and Ben Chonzie.
Round to the right, and a double view of Choinneachain Hill -
The water board building was looking quite Chinese -
I headed away along the track beside the loch - I was wanting to see if I could find a better way up Choinneachain Hill than the route I have followed in the past, which isn`t much fun as a route.
I have seen a bit of a path going away up the ridge to the south of Choinneachain Hill, but it isn`t shown on the OS map, so had no idea how to get on to it.
I guessed that I should go along the landrover track, cross the Alt Choinneachain, then look for the start of the path.
Indeed, I did find a path heading off up to the right, so followed it on up the hill, it was good - much nicer that my previous routes up.
But after a few hundred metres or so, it just sort of faded away to not much, and started to contour round the hill instead of going up.
I followed it for a while, but it obviously wasn`t going anywhere sensible, so had to abandon it and just lump it up through the heather, which got longer and longer the higher I went, and it turned into a nightmare of a slog through it.
I just had to keep going, and eventually I got onto the crest of the ridge, and there was the path that I had been looking for coming right up the crest of the ridge.
Life got much better once I was on the path, and made good progress, until I met a sort of steep rocky slope, and the path didn`t know what to do, and rather faded into oblivion.
So I scrambled up through the rocks, got past them, and then it was back to heather until I got up to the cairn.
I have been at this cairn before - and you get a good view from it - but not today.
Just as I was getting to it the cloud came down and I dissappeared into the grey clag.
So this was my view -
A quick cup of tea, and time to head away.
Now I wanted to go back down the same path, so I could see where it started from, because I certainly hadn`t seen it as I headed out along the bottom landrover track.
The cloud had other ideas - I started off back down the way I come, but it was increasingly clear that I wasn`t going to find the path, the cloud was dropping the whole time, and getting thicker, this was not a good idea.
So I had to climb back up to the summit, then over the top and down onto the high level landrover track that I followed on my bike a while ago.
It isn`t a good way down, the track swings away round the top of a big corrie, so it is a long way round, then you have to follow the track until you are away past the dam, climb down a quite steep and very rough long drop down the flank of the ridge, then head back to the dam.
So I didn`t really want to go that way, but didn`t feel I had much of a choice - trying to use a map and compass to find a path that isn`t shown on the map with not an infinite amount of daylight left didn`t seem to be a good idea.
I followed the track for a while, and eventually got below the cloud, and could see the dam - so I headed off down through the corrie, eventually crossed right over the corrie, climbed up the far side, and found the path that I had wanted to come down.
It is a good path, well used, so could make good progress.
Eventually I got back to the Alt Choinneachain - but the path didn`t go down to the low level landrover track - it crossed the river, and then continued at the same level, contouring round the side of the hill, about 300 or 400 metres away from the landrover track.
And it never went down to the landrover track - it just went on and on round the side of the hill, past the dam, and away into goodness knows where.
I gave in, and slogged down through more heather down to the landrover track.
No wonder I couldn`t find the start of the path when I was starting out - it doesn`t have a start.
It is really weird - here is a good well used path that goes right up to Choinneachain Hill - but it doesn`t have a start.
So that was my trip up Choinneachain Hill - it didn`t really go according to plan, I didn`t get a view, and I found a path that doesn`t exist.
It was a good afternoon though, and I guess I was actually quite lucky with my timing.
By the time I was back at the dam the cloud base was well down almost to the loch, so the mountains were well hidden - quite surprising just how fast the cloud base dropped.
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