 |
Keith compleating round 5 on Sgurr Dubh Mor
|
Sunday, 5 June 2022
Keith has been a friend and regular hill walking companion for over thirty years. He is one of the most accomplished hill walkers in Scotland with 3 Corbett rounds, a Graham round and an almost complete round of the Scottish Marilyns. Today, he would be finishing his fifth round of Munros and fourth round of Munro tops, including all the ones that have been deleted from the current list. He is a hill runner, has completed many long-distance trails in the UK, Europe and beyond and has competed in numerous long-distance mountain marathons.
I had met him through a running club at work; we had half a dozen races each year, and he was part of the Strathclyde team in the Nalgo National Cross Country Championships. We hosted these in Strathclyde Park in 1990 and won the team prize. Keith asked me after the event if I would be prepared to partner with him in the Scottish Island Peaks Race, a yacht and running event of two or three days, depending on tides and winds. Each yacht has a team of three sailors and two runners, involving 65 miles of running, including Ben More on Mull, the Paps of Jura, and Goat Fell on Arran. Keith lent me a video of the previous year's race and, initially, I thought you must be joking. I had started climbing the Munros in 1989 and was a reasonable road runner with a sub-33-minute 10k, but I had never done any hill races. Keith persisted in persuading me. After we ran a 19-mile hill run from my house to Ben Lomond via Comer and back after work one evening, I decided to give it a go. The Island Peaks race was a seminal event, and we came sixth out of 57 starters.
I began to do hill races, and we partnered with each other in the Karrimor International Mountain Marathon (now the OMM). Although Keith had already completed a round of Munros, he was well into his next round. He helped John and me as we gained traction in our attempt at the Munros. He had hill wisdom and would push us to do an extra hill on long days out, and in winter conditions, he would be a reliable guide as we pushed the length and boundaries of our expeditions. Four years later, in 1993, we had finished the first round of Munros. This was in no short measure because of Keith's sage advice and encouragement. Thirty years later, he is still pounding round the hills, competing in the occasional trail race, and cycling. He remains a veritable source of encouragement and support.
He has guided dozens of others from his walking clubs towards their Munro compleations. In short, he is a totally reliable, knowledgeable, thoughtful and ultra-safe companion. He has been nudging towards his fifth round for several years as he focused on Graham's and Marilyn's. Skye, as so often in people's Munro rounds, was the place of his final Munros. When I contacted him about finishing the Corbetts on Beinn Dearg in Torrid, he mentioned that he was only two short of finishing his fifth round of Munros. We decided, given the price of fuel, to combine the two events. John and I had the privilege to climb Sgurr na Eag and Sgurr Dubh Mor with him, and although we slowed him down on the scrambles, it was a good way to pay respects to our mentor and good companion over the past thirty years.
Ascent: 1759 metres
Distance: 20 kilometres
Time: 9 hours 29 minutes
Sgurr nan Eag 924m 3hrs 38mins
Sgurr Dubh an Da Bheinn 938m 5hrs 10mins
Sgurr Dubh Mor 944m 5hrs 45mins
After two long days in Torridon and Skye and not having walked on three consecutive days since Covid interrupted life, this was going to be a big day. We dawdled a bit at breakfast, and it was a slow drive across to Skye and down Glen Brittle that was bristling with camper vans. We had to park half a mile short of the normal parking spot. The campsite that had served us on dozens of occasions was now filled with camper vans, with only a few tents to be seen. We wasted no time heading up the steep path that heads towards Coire Lagan and turned right at the first junction to cross a burn and begin the long path that circles around Sron na Ciche to Coir' a Ghrunnda. We passed 8 other walkers on the ascent and had the usual trouble tottering across the boulder field before climbing through the bolsters of gabbro that protect the beautiful Loch Coir' a' Ghrunnda.
We halted at the Loch to have some food and top up our water. The day had heated up, and there was no breeze to cool us. After taking an anti-clockwise route around the loch, we found the steep rocky path that heads towards the Sgurr an Eag ridge. Finding the right route to clamber through the rock outcrops and boulders requires a bit of care. There is then a path along the ridge to the summit, and as I found out, it is better to keep to the right when the path splits. It is about a kilometre from the bealach to the rocky summit that overlooks Loch Coruisk and Rum. It was time for a break and to replenish our food, rehydrate and absorb the spectacular views of the Cuillin ridge.
The walk, scramble and climb to the top, Sgurr Dubh an Da Bheinn, is a complex route finding exercise, but ultimately not too difficult if you find the right lines. We undercut Caisteal a' Garbh Choire to the right before being slightly delayed by following a couple of climbers who had a detailed climbers' handbook but kept getting it wrong. When they peeled off for the Thearlaich-Dubh gap, we thought that "using ideas as our maps we'll meet on edges soon". We did edge our way to the top and settled our nerves before dropping down to the bealach before Sgurr Dubh Mor. The route from here is notoriously tricky as it corkscrews upwards by chimneys, ledges and rock bands, but with Keith in a determined mood, we made the summit without too much hesitation. I felt a bit guilty about having nothing but a handshake to offer Keith. Five rounds and it was 5pm. We lingered awhile, reflecting that this could be the last time on this Munro, which is one of the hardest Munros to reach because of the long walk in and then the complexity of the topography and exposed scrambling. John and I were anxious to make the downclimbs from the summit before any false sense of feeling that we had done it seeped in.
We still had a long and tricky ascent over Sgurr Dubh an Da Bheinn and then down to the Loch Coir' a' Ghrunnda. Our earlier ambitious thoughts about climbing Sgurr Alasdair had receded given the time. We made the mistake of attempting a fairly direct descent through the rock bands instead of heading towards the T-D gap and finding a more relaxed route down from there. By the time we reached the Loch and gorged ourselves on water from the burn, it was 7pm with another 7 kilometres to get back to the car beyond the campsite.
A party of four, three Irish and one French, who had ascended Sgurr Dubh Mor from Loch Coruisk via the Slabs and who had topped out a few minutes after we left the summit, found a better descent route and caught us as we descended the gabbro boulders below Coire Ghrunnda. When they heard we were a group of seventy-year-olds, they charged off as we sauntered on. The evening light was perfect, but by the end of the gabbro and the start of the vegetation at 500 metres, we had reached the midge level. The midges were out for vengeance after two years, when they had missed their victims. The seventy-year-olds upped their pace, and we had caught up with the Irish/French party by the time we reached the campsite. It was full of people moving gingerly whilst wearing midge nets, whilst their dogs were chasing their tails in a vain attempt to escape the beasts. As we reached the car, a welcome sea breeze scattered the midges and we were able to change shoes and socks, remove unwanted clothes and start the 90-minute journey back to Achmore.
Arriving at the cottage at 11:30pm meant that I was too tired to be bothered with a meal. A celebratory beer with Keith and a shower were my only activities before turning in. Three long days on the hills had taken their toll, and we had agreed to make a leisurely journey home tomorrow. Yesteryear, we would have been plotting another few days of hill bashing, but we were so much younger then; we're older than that now.
 |
Keith and John on the path from Glen Brittle
|
 |
Ascending the brutal Gabbro boulder field below Coire Ghrunnda
|
 |
Coire Ghrunnda and Sgurr Alasdair
|
 |
Coire Ghrunnda and Sgurr na Eag
|
 |
Summit of Sgurr na Eag
|
 |
Looking north to the Cuillin Ridge from Sgurr na Eag
|
 |
Coir' a' Ghrunnda from Sgur na Dubh Da
|
 |
Keith on Sgurr Dubh an da Beinn, his final top
|
 |
Climbing Sgurr Dubh Mor
|
 |
| Bruach na Frithe to Sgurr nan Gillean |
 |
| Sgurr na Eag |
 |
| Sgurr na Eag from Sgurr Dubh Mor |
 |
Rum on the descent
|
 |
Coire Lagan peaks in the late evening
|
