That’s Perthshire’s Munros bagged then!

I had one last Munro to bag in Perthshire and it had been niggling at me for a while. The only problem was that I knew exactly what I’d need to do to reach the craggy mountain and I wasn’t too keen.

The Munro was one that I had sadly had to miss out when walking with Munro Round Compleatist Tansy earlier this year. We had set out to bag the pair in Glen Lochay, Creag Mhor and Beinn Heasgarnich. Difficult conditions and darkness meant that we only reached the summit of Heasgarnich and we were forced to walk the long track out of the glen and leave Creag Mhor for another day.

Since Tansy was on a mission to compleat this summer she ticked off Creag Mhor with another friend in the summer and on a day that I couldn’t make.

The last Munro in Perthshire

Having bagged all the other Munros in the region, that last one, Creag Mhor, was really bugging me. What was even more annoying was that it was close enough, near Killin, to be a potential day’s outing from my home. Yet, somehow, I could never find the time or the weather window.

It appeared that this festive break was the right time to hike Creag Mhor. With the G-Force on holiday from work and a day put aside from his number one love of climbing in which to spend time with me, we decided that this Munro was the thing to do.

We also decided that a mountain bike ride in to the bottom of the mountain would be a far better idea than the long, long walk along the valley track.

Unfortunately, the weather didn’t look good although it didn’t seem so bad that we should give up our aim.

Bike-hike-bike of Creg Mhor

Setting out from home at 7.15am we arrived at the car park for Glen Lochay a couple of hours later. This did include a stop in  Callander, where er can never resist the call of  the fabbie Mhor bread shop for pies, sandwiches and cakes.

The G-Force was confused by the Glen Lochay car park, however. When he did his first round of Munros, walkers were allowed to park further into the glen but the landowner has put a stop to this. This means an additional one or two kilometres of access by bike or on foot is required.

Leaving the car park there’s a short stretch of tarmac road before heading steeply upwards to the right on a zig-zagging road/track. The road is falling apart due to poor maintenance and weather and it might not be there in a few years’ time.

At the top of the zig-zags an upper valley track heads off along the base of the mountains. The first mountain to be seen is Heasgarnich and it seems like Creag Mhor will never come. In fact, this is one of the reasons why Tansy and I didn’t summit Creag Mhor in the first place.

We misread the map and started to climb upwards too early. This meant we bagged Heasgarnich first and didn’t have time to walk back across the mountains to reach Creag Mhor.

This time, the G-Force and I made sure we reached the right point to walk the ascent. We even double checked by cross referencing with my  Garmin. There was no way I was going to get this wrong a second time!

We left our bikes near the track, swapped shoes, added more clothes and started the very steep climb. We could not see any kind of path and we simply had to stomp over uneven terrain right from the off.

With the clouds building, intermittent rain and a sore back (I have had this for a few weeks), I admit I was none too thrilled by the start of the hike.

Things did not improve too much although we did find a narrow path to follow as we reached higher ground. Then, having clambered over some tricky crags, the wind started to really pick up.

The weather forecast had indicated strong winds by dusk but it appeared they had arrived earlier than expected.   The gusts of wind rose to what we estimated to be about 75mph and this was enough to make me crawl at some points.

I have become familiar with the strength of wind that I can cope with and anything over about 60mph is hard for me. I do not weigh a great deal and I find I get thrown about in strong gusts.

In places, where the wind was whooshing up and over a ridge, I worried was going to get blown over. I held on to the G-Force for support and he also acted as a wind break (and an edge stopper!) where required.

Almost but almost not…

Although I could see the summit in the distance I was worried I would not make it. There were very, very strong gusts of wind and I said out loud that we should turn back. I didn’t want to because I could not face the thought of this Munro still niggling at me but I was also concerned that the higher we climbed the worse the wind would be.

Strangely, although the gusting was strong it didn’t get much worse. There were even some sheltered parts when the wind completely dropped. However, it was still a bit of a crawl-shuffle for the final few hundred metres of this Munro hike.

Eventually, I was able to touch the summit cairn and after a quick photo we quickly made our retreat. The clouds by now were balling up overhead and the rain was splattering our faces.

The wind was just as strong on the way down but I stayed focused and kept pushing onwards. I didn’t have much choice, really! Thankfully, for me, the descent usually feels easier in strong winds for some reason.

In normal conditions this would not be a long or a hard Munro to climb but when you add the long hike/bike via Glen Lochay in and out and the wind and rain it felt like a tough day out for both of us.

We took the lower track, alongside the winding river, back to the campervan and we were grateful that we had a tailwind to speed us along.

As an additional hassle, my bike pedal fell apart and I had to cycle with only one pedal for all of the return ride.

Perthshire Munros all bagged

Back at the van and while getting changed I allowed myself a small congratulations. As I bagged my 197th Munro I also enjoyed the thought that I had walked every Munro in Perthshire, too.