KYQ4: Lochnagar and Some

Lochnagar Buttresses and Loch from Meikle Pap

Wednesday, 14 August 2024

Ascent: 1310 metres
Distance: 30 kilometres
Time: 7 hours 50 minutes

m Broad Cairn 998m 2 hrs 36mins
t Cairn of Gowal 991m. 3 hrs 10mins
m Cairn Bannoch 1012m. 3 hrs 21mins
m Carn an t-Saggairt Mor 1047m. 4 hrs 01min
t Carn an t-Saggairt Beag 1044m. 4 hrs 26mins
m Carn a' Choire Bhodheach 1110m. 4hrs 50mins
m Lochnagar Cat Carn Beag 1156m. 5hrs 31mins

After last week's long walk on Ben Starav, I thought that I should revisit Lochnagar and if possible some of the nearby Munros. A good day was forecast for Tuesday but then drifted back to Wednesday. I drove up late Tuesday afternoon and had some tea in Ballater before driving the 10 miles to the Spittal of Glenshee. The road on leaving Ballater had barriers saying that the road was closed but it was after 7pm so I went anyway and discovered that it was the south Glen Dee road to Crathie that was closed for repairs. The single-track road to Spittal of Glen Muick was open. The rains of the day had departed and the sun was out, as were the midges. I pitched my tent at the end of the car park, there seemed to be about half a dozen camper vans parked up and one other tent. The man parked next was wearing a midge net and had decided to sleep in his car.

It was a reasonably comfortable night although I was told the next morning by Ludo, the man who slept in his car, that 3 large stags had been very close to my tent in the night, it must have been my snoring. I was fully awake by 6:30am and decided to get up, the sun was out and there was a nip in the air. The midges were hungry so I packed my gear, dropped the tent and was in the car in double quick time to have some breakfast - muesli and a blackcurrant roll. I was ready to roll by 7:30am after paying my parking fee - £5. I had decided to make the round of hills from Broad Cairn to Lochnagar in a clockwise direction, strong south-westerly winds were forecast for the afternoon and I would have them at my back when walking over to Lochnagar which would be the last of the five Munros if I managed that far.

The walk alongside Loch Muick in the early morning was perfection, still, cool, with blue skies and total solitude. After 3 kilometres the good track ramps up, climbing 250 metres by a series of zig-zags. Too steep for vehicles but a couple of Polaris six-wheel trucks were parked at the bottom. I had climbed the steep section and was enjoying the views whilst walking on the flatter section through the flowering heathers when I heard the distant whine of an engine. After another half a kilometre, one of the Polaris trucks was behind me. I stepped aside to let it pass but it pulled up and one of the three men jumped out and headed towards me. I thought he must be the head stalker about to tell me that there are restrictions on the hill. Instead, to my great relief it was Ross, my niece's husband. He works as a pathmaker so he can spend every day in the mountains. We had an animated chat for five minutes or so before he jumped back into the driver's seat, he was going another couple of kilometres in my direction to a shed/bothy from where they were collecting stones for some future path work. I didn't ask for a lift and he didn't offer, we both know that hillwalking means hillwalking.

It is over 10 kilometres from the Spittal of Glen Muick to Broad Cairn but on mainly excellent paths, the last 250 metres of climbing is over ground with rougher granite boulders creating some scrambly sections. There was a man with a dog at the summit who had got there 5 minutes in front of me. He had ascended from Glen Clova, a slightly shorter ascent. I had my first rest to take a drink, check the route and take photos. I was more than 20 minutes ahead of my ambitious schedule and I had set off half an hour earlier than planned. I scrambled down the jumble of granite blocks and made quick time over to Cairn Bannock, making a minor detour to go over the top of Cairn of Gowal.

I had hoped to be at Carn an t-Saggairt Mor by 1pm but made it before noon and I was still feeling frisky. The cool breeze, sunny conditions and superb visibility were a walker's dream. I decided to have an early lunch and was finishing when a young woman turned up, she had already completed 5 Munros including Lochnagar after starting from Glenshee and she intended to do a couple more on the way back. She was attired in lightweight equipment with a small rucksack that she assured me carried all that she needed including an emergency bivi. We had a long chat about hillwalking, she regretted that she had never been taken on walks as a youngster despite growing up in Aberdeen. She was now totally drawn to the hills and living in Glasgow. She claimed not to be good at running but her speed on the hills told me otherwise. I suggested she join Westerlands Hill Running Club in Glasgow and she seemed open to the idea when I explained some of the crazy excursions that they organised.

She told me she had passed a man with a large rucksack and bottles of water and wondered why people did that. I said that would be Ludo, the man in the next car to me, he was doing my round in the opposite direction and we thought that we would probably pass each other about here. Sure enough, Ludo's head bobbled over the convex slope and the three of us had another conversation. He had ruled out doing Tolmount and Tom Bhuidhe on his round but the two of us encouraged him to give it a go. He had his tent and otherwise, he would complete the walk in a day and what was the point of lugging a tent around in those circumstances. I directed the young woman down to see the Canberra Bomber. I had spent 25 minutes and needed to catch up some time,

I decided to go over the nearby top of Carn an t- Saiggirt Beag and took a route past the Canberra Bomber on my way across. There was a man in a yellow Goretex jacket tramping up and down the bealach between the two hills that was quite boggy. I passed another two families of Ptarmigan and there were quite a few hares about making me feel like a tortoise. Maybe because the man in the yellow jacket collected his rucksack and began to follow me. I thought I was going at a fair pace but he was slowly catching me. I made the top of the next Munro a couple of minutes ahead of him and we stopped for a chat as he was arriving. He had lost his glasses at the bealach and had not been able to find them.

I waited for him whilst he visited the cairn, he was German and had walked over the hills from Pitlochry in 3 days, carrying a pack with all his provisions whilst bagging all the Munros and Tops. He was the first German to complete the Munros in 1993 and was now walking all the Munros and Tops again after his twin daughters had grown up. He explained his obsession with Scottish hillwalking - the lack of paths in many areas, bothies, the diabolical and changeable weather, and the navigation problems. He loved the challenges and preferred these conditions to what he described as the over-Swissification of mountains in south Germany and the Alps - well-made paths, mountain huts that sold food and drink, and happy wanderers. We walked together towards Lochnagar until he realised that there were probably a couple of tops on the White Mounth, I checked on my phone whilst he found an impeccably neat OS sheet that had all the tops marked. I directed him towards the two tops, his vision was quite impaired by the loss of his glasses.

I continued to Lochnagar, climbing the cairn of Cat Carn Mor en route to the inversely named Cat Carn Beag with its fine granite tor topped by a trig point and mountain indicator. I half expected to meet the Old Man of Lochnagar, or the King as he is now known, at the summit. He was staying at Deeside and this was probably the best day of recent weeks but maybe he was hosting Sir Keir for their weekly chat. There were several other walkers at the summit where I spent another 10 minutes rehydrating and taking in the splendid views. I remembered the stories from an old neighbour who, when he knew that I was climbing the Munros, used to regale me with his stories of weekends as a student on what he thought was the best Munro, Lochnagar. They would climb the Black Spout before drinking themselves silly, it was the start of his alcoholism.

I had figured it would take a couple of hours to get down but had forgotten what a long and at times slow going it is down stone staircases and for the last three kilometres on a track that has a surface even worse than the average Scottish road. I was back by 4:15pm but with all the stops for chats and breaks, the walking time was less than 8 hours and I had managed over 49,000 steps, the best of the year so far.

I wasted no time changing shoes and starting the 110-mile journey home. The road back into Ballater was empty of traffic and even the A93 through Crathie, Braemar over Glenshee to Blairgowrie was quiet with quite a few cars parked by the starting points for the Glenshee Munros. I travelled back via Stanley to avoid the snarl-ups in Perth and called into the new M&S at the Inveralmond roundabout to gather something tasty for supper. After 24 hours of surviving on rolls, oranges and energy bars, I needed some Swissification nourishment.