KYQ4: Maoile Lunndaidh

From Maoile Lunndaidh

Friday, 21 September 2024

Ascent: 1080 metres
Distance: 30 kilometres
Time: 7 hours 11 minutes

t Carn nam Fiaclan 993m. 3hrs 38mins
m Maoile Lunndaidh 1005m. 3hrs 54mins

After the late finish yesterday we had decided to leave Anna's main objectives, Lurg Mhor and Bidein a' Choire Sheasgaich, for another day thinking we would need an early start for two of the remotest Munros. They would require a 26-kilometre return cycle ride with a couple of intermediate steep climbs reaching 350 metres before descending to 230 metres, dumping the bikes and starting the walk.

She thought we should go to her other remaining Munro in the area, Maoile Lunndaidh, as it would be easier with just one Munro and a 16-kilometre bike ride to Glenuaig Lodge. The walk traverses some boggy ground before the steep pathless ascent of Maoile Lunndaidh and would be energy-sapping in the September sunshine. I had previously climbed it along with Sgurr Choinnich and Sgurr a' Chaorachain which is longer but a sweeter round of Munros that gives an easy climb of Maoile Lunndaidh from the west. I figured that it would be a pretty tough day with both the cycle in and the steep climb but I decided to let it be.

Despite our good intentions, it was once again a late start after we chatted over breakfast and loaded both bikes onto my car taking care not to scratch Anna's much-loved carbon cross-country bike that is about half the weight of my twenty-year-old Trek mountain bike. She has an impressive cycling palmares that includes Mont Ventoux, several of the classic Alpine and Pyrenean cols and Land's End to John o 'Groats. I was worried that I would have difficulty keeping up, I had hardly cycled all year.

The single-track road to Achnashellach was chock-a-block with oncoming delivery vans so it took about 45 minutes before we were parked and ready to go. I searched for my trail shoes but I had left them back at the house and my sandals were not ideal for the adventure ahead, I was awarded a minus two for stupidity. I suggested Anna carry on and we agreed on a route up the mountain after we dropped our bikes at Glenuaig Lodge. I would return to the house to collect my shoes and serve my penance. It took an hour and a quarter even driving as fast as the roads and traffic permitted. I figured I would lose another ten minutes or so on the bike as there were two seriously steep sections that I would be pushing my bike up.

Despite the beautiful day, I was in the doldrums as I pedalled up the track. It was steeper and stonier than I remembered on the three occasions I had walked into the hills from this direction. I dumped my bike about a kilometre short of Glenuaig Lodge to avoid pedalling an uphill section on the return. I couldn't see Anna's bike, she had hidden her treasure. I felt that I had let her down on what would be a tricky ascent on a wild remote mountain. I began the tough walk over undulating boggy grass and heather, skipping over three burns and some drumlins before a stiff climb up the pathless rock-strewn hillside. We had agreed on an anticlockwise route, up one broad ridge and down another.

I had assumed that Anna would be at least an hour and a half ahead, I tried to phone or message but there was no mobile coverage on the flank of the remote hill. I thought about re-routing and going clockwise to meet her on the descent but didn't like the look of the route so made as fast and direct an ascent as possible. After 45 minutes of steady progress, there was a ping "Just got to Munro summit, 15:48". She had taken a longer route up the Allt an Fhuar-thuill Mhor (a narrow glen) to the Munro top, Carn nam Fiaclan on her way to the summit. In my usual optimistic way, I replied that I was approaching Carn nam Fiaclan and would be with her in half an hour. I only then realised it was over 3 kilometres and another 170 metres of climbing to reach the summit. I upped my pace and made it in 40 minutes. A purple-clad, possibly angry person was walking around taking photographs. However, she seemed quite content when I arrived, having retrieved her supposedly responsible adult.

I quickly ate some food and we set off down the second ridge at what I now know as the golden hour, after 5pm when the shadows and light are the best friend of creative photographers. By serendipity, we found a good line down the hill roughly along the route shown on the walkhighlands website. We found a boggy track at he foot of the hill and stone hopped the river to get back to Glenuaig Lodge and reclaimed our bikes for the descent. Despite being the responsible adult I was given a few tips for the descent on the bikes. "Keep your weight on both pedals whilst off the saddle, go low, look ahead and speed is your friend." We hurtled down the bumpy track, Anna showing me the posture as she overtook me, "Put your weight over the back wheel like this" as her posterior disappeared into the gloom. The light was fading fast and I was asked to ride past her on several occasions whilst photos were taken against a backdrop of yesterday's hills backlit by Trumpian orange skies.

As I gained confidence, I began to loosen my grip on the brake levers and tried to follow the advice, I overtook my instructor whilst reciting 'speed is my friend'. With the light almost gone I hit a large stone and performed a forward somersault on my bike that Simone Biles would have been proud of, possibly because my legs and feet were held in place by my toe straps. My landing was a different matter, head first onto the stony track, handlebars crushing my ribcage, and my hand cut and elbow bruised. Stoicism took over, "Yes, I'm fine" I muttered somewhat surprised that Anna had not captured the accident on her phone.

After a couple of minutes, we were back on the descent. I realised that 'speed is not your friend in the dark when you have no headtorch and lousy brakes' but that is too long-winded to make a good mantra. Boris would have come up with something crass like 'go slow in the glow'. It was only a couple of kilometres back to the level crossing and the car park. We were back at the house before 9pm after another sunny, hard but eventful day. It was too late to go out for a meal we had promised ourselves so it was pasta and salad followed by fruit and ice cream washed down with some wine. Tired but happy, we decided to give ourselves a day off tomorrow before a big day out to Lurg Mhor and Sheasgaich on Sunday.