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A very wet trip.
It's quite a shame that it was so because my willing to bet that Ben
Wyvis is a great hill, just not on this occasion. The initial plan was
to do two days walking with Michael - Ullapool as our base - but the wet
forecast, the cold I'd coughed across from the Western Isles and
Michael's weekend tally already of three Munros decided that we cut the
plan short and head home after Wyvis.
On the Saturday I took the boat over to Ullapool with family, saw them
off as they left for Glasgow and went for a meal with Michael, Pete and
Dorota. Michael and I camped in the Ullapool campsite for a comfortable
night, although the weather the next morning left much to be desired.
Sunday morning in Ullapool is easily depressing and we found nowhere to
have breakfast. Cereal in the car then. I was coughing continually, the
rain fell hard and cold in the wind. This didn't feel good and we'd
almost have gone home to Glasgow empty handed.
But we drove to Garbat to meet up with Pete and Dorota. The weather was
a bit kinder, the rain gone but cloud remaining. The hills looked bleak
with felled forestry, their grey slopes and a monochrome sky above. Well
at least the rain was off - no reason not to go now. My cold seemed to
have subsided since the previous day, so we packed up and headed out of
the car park.
Physical effort and the relative warmth of the day had us in t-shirts
and we sweated our way out of the forestry. Above some hillsides
revealed themselves but there wasn't anything to see. We climbed into
the cloud, passing a couple others on their way down the mountain. With
a "tourist" path to follow and no views to reward effort, the hill
verged on boring, although I counted on my old hunch of having early
grunt-work paying off higher up.
Sadly the grunt work didn't pay off, but near the top of the rock
staircase that makes up the path, the waterworks switched on and we
continued to get soaked all the way to An Cabar. The high, flat walk to
Glas Leathad Mor was only windier and wetter. By the time we arrived at
the top I felt like a drowned rat. And now as the rain continued to
fall, we turned around and left the cold grey summit, down past An Cabar
and out of the cloud. The horrendous weather eased, but the hill had
been featureless and sadly not all that fun.
Nevermind though. A few more heavy showers hit us as we made our way
down to the car park. Michael and I decided to pack up and head for
home, so we headed back down the A9. In a cruel twist, no more than 15
minutes had passed when the sun started coming out, and within the hour the skies were
beautifully clear, with a sunset in full swing from Drumochter to the
Central Belt. Such is the deal with Scottish
weather.
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