I was giving an illustrated lecture in Edinburgh the other night and someone in the audience took me to task for suggesting that the Cairn Gorm funicular train should be removed. My argument was that it was a mistake to build it, the various organisations that said it would be a financial disaster have been proven to be absolutely correct and the best thing to do was strip it off the mountain before it costs the taxpayer any more money. (Given that it could cost about £6M to remove it).

My correspondent’s argument wasn’t so much about the financial side of the train but that it gave an opportunity for old people and the disabled to have “a mountain experience.” His words, not mine.

I pointed out that as far as I was concerned sitting in a train being taken up the side of a hill like Cairn Gorm was far removed from any mountain experience I had ever known but he was resolute, and demanded to know how I would offer the disabled a “wilderness experience.”

I seem to recall a television programme recently that featured some disabled people in wheelchairs, or a toughened-up equivalent, with teams of people helping through some wild landscapes, and I know that here in Scotland there is a pretty active Disabled Ramblers Group who meet fairly regularly and even have their own guidebook of routes. I know it well because I wrote the foreword to it! But these routes couldn’t be described as “mountains” or “wilderness”.

I certainly don’t accept that a train up Cairn Gorm, or Snowdon for that matter, offers any kind of mountain experience - all it offers is a train ride to a cold and windy place. A mountain experience takes in all kind of feelings and sensations, including getting there under your own steam. I don’t want to appear insensitive but perhaps there are some experiences that disabled folk, or even unfit able-bodied people,  have to forego because they don’t have the capacity to physically carry it through. I’m not convinced that funicular trains, or even chairlifts, were designed for that purpose, and I don’t believe such contrivances offer any kind of mountain experience.

But perhaps I’m wrong? I’d love to hear from anyone with ideas about how the disabled might enjoy a mountain or wilderness experience. 

A number of years ago I had an interest, bordering on obsession, with the life and times of Rob Roy Macgregor. I spent much time in and around the churchyard at Balquhidder, where the old clan chief is buried, and along the glen at lonely Inverlochlarig, where he died in 1734, and at Monachyle Tuarach, his first home. I even came up with a 60-mile backpacking route through the Trossachs that celebrated the Macgregor clan. I called it The Way of the Fiery Cross.

Part of that route involved a long walk down the glen between Balquhidder and Inverlochlarig and I described the view as one of the finest in the southern highlands; “Loch Voil has tiny wooded islands, promontories winding into the water and on either bank steep-sided hills, stretching back, fold upon fold, becoming paler and paler into the jumble of high mountains that fade into the far west.”

One of those high mountains that look down on the little hamlet of Inverlochlarig is Stob a’ Choin, a steep sided and multi-topped Corbett that, in turn, offers some majestic views of the other high mountains, Stob Binnein and Ben More, Cruach Ardrain and Beinn Tullaichean and Beinn Chabhair and Beinn a’ Chroin, hills that are more usually climbed from Glen Falloch in the north.

After a twenty-odd year absence it felt good to be back in the glen, but things had changed. Where I once had to search for skitterings of paths through the forest it seems there are now tracks everywhere. There’s even a little visitor centre and car park just before the farm at Inverlochlarig, complete with signposts pointing out the routes to the various hills. You can even buy fresh, hill lamb from the farmhouse!

I hardly needed the route for Beinn a’ Choin for I remembered it clearly – through the hamlet, past the farm and along the path (now a wide bulldozed track) along the north banks of the River Larig. A substantial bridge carried me across the fast flowing river and then it was trackless – boggy grass, reeds and fields of bog cotton made tough going of the lower slopes as I aimed for a natural step in the mountain’s north ridge, a ridge that is well protected by the crags of Amar Stob a’ Choin in its lower reaches.

It was tough, steep and hot work, great excuses to stop occasionally and gaze across the glen at the craggy ridges of the Crianlarich hills. Stob Binnein looks so elegant from here, with its mastiff of a neighbour, Ben More, mostly hidden from sight. Below Stob Binnein’s western slopes, deep in the Inverlochlarig Glen, a bulldozed track now runs up towards the high bealach below Cruach Ardrain. There’s even a bulldozed track all the way up beside the River Larig to Parlan Hill, at the head of Loch Lomond, but rather than get depressed about it I promised myself I’d come back some day soon with a mountain bike and explore the upper reaches of this fantastic glen.

The upper part of Stob a’ Choin’s north ridge is steep and stony and a northerly breeze kept me cool. Sooner than I expected I was topping out beside a small cairn above a tiny lochan and across a dip in the summit ridge rose another, rock covered, top. This, I’m assured by various guidebooks, is the higher of the two summits at 2851ft/869m, although I’d swear the first one was the highest!

I always find it something of a shock to stand on the summit of one of these southern hills and see the rugged highland hills behind me, and the contrasting lowlands in front. Only Ben Lomond and Ben Venue matched the hills behind me and away in the distance the Campsie Fells formed a last hill frontier before the flatlands of Strathclyde.

It’s an undulating route from Stob a’ Choin’s summit around the head of Coire an Laoigh and not altogether straightforward. I found myself coming across steep crags and gullies and I was glad of the cloud-free conditions. I confess I didn’t plod on to the furthermost tops but gladly cut the corners to reach the north-east ridge and a steep grassy descent back to the River Larig footbridge and the track back to Inverlochlarig. I had a sudden notion to buy some fresh hill lamb gigots for dinner.

Map: OS Sheet 56

Distance: About 8 miles

Approx Time: 5-6 hours

Start/Finish:Inverlochlarig car park and visitor centre

Route:Leave the car park and follow the road through Inverlochlarig. Turn left after the second house and then right at the farm. Go through a gate and follow the bulldozed track alongside the N bank of the River Larig. Cross the river by a footbridge and then continue alongside the river for half a kilometre to a sheepfold. Follow the burn up steeper slopes and make for an obvious step on the hills N ridge. Once on the ridge follow it S, steeply, to the first of two tops. The S top is the highest. From here follow the broad ridge E, SE and then NNW before descending steeply into Coire an Laoigh, making for the footbridge over the river. Return to Inverlochlarig by the outward route.

Cameron outlines the contents of the newly designed and refurbished TGO

 

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Walking past Ballachulish’s primary school I was accosted by a young lad, no more than six or seven years old, who demanded to know where I was going?

“I’m going to climb a mountain,” I replied.

“You’re going to climb a mountain,” the youngster repeated, “Why?”

I mumbled some sort of answer about needing the exercise and hoping to get a good view but the directness of the question had taken me by surprise. The previous two days had been incredibly wet and windy and as I left Ballachulish behind and climbed up the muddy footpath above the roaring waters of the River Laroch I knew I was in for a day of gusty, wet showers and very wet underfoot conditions. The wee schoolboy’s question suddenly seemed very relevant.

I was heading for Fraochaidh (try free-achy),2884ft/879m a big, bold hill that hides itself away between Glen Creran and the big double-topped massif of Beinn a’ Bheithir. Protected by huge conifer plantations the options for accessing the mountain are rather limited and while it’s possible to climb the hill from other directions the route from Ballachulish, via the old right of way between Loch Leven and Loch Creran, gives the best conifer-free choice.

The hill’s name translates to ‘heathery hill’ but I knew from previous experience that its slopes were more grassy than heathery and were invariably wet and boggy. After two days of very heavy rain the surrounding hillsides had sprouted a thousand new streams, wriggling down the slopes like long white worms. The ascent of Fraochaidh, I knew, was going to be a real bog-trot.

Ahead of me a long ridge rose up to the east summit of Sgorr Dhearg of Beinn a’ Bheithir and the sun, breaking out momentarily from the dark clouds, suddenly lit the upper crags of the ridge. For a fleeting moment I wished I was going up there, up the long and rocky ridge to familiar peaks and comparatively dry underfoot conditions. But I had left a note at home saying I was going to Fraochaidh – so folk would know where to look for me in the event of an accident, the insurance policy of the solo mountain walker. I ignored the mild temptation to change my plans.  

The day, as so often happens, turned out better than I expected. I met a hill fox on the path in Gleann an Fhiodh – he stopped, sniffed the air then bolted off in a blur of rusty gold. The Glen Creran right-of-way path wasn’t as wet and nasty as I remembered it and the undulating  high-level ridge walk round to the rocky summit slopes of Fraochaidh, although wind-blasted, gave wonderful views of the glorious jumble of big hills that surround Fraochaidh – the serrated crest of the Aonach Eagach ridge giving way to the rounded cone of the Pap of Glencoe, the Pap’s closer, mirror-image Sgorr a’ Choise, the huge bulk of Bidean nam Bian, it’s neighbour Sgor na h-Ulaidh,  Beinn Fhionnlaidh, Beinn Sgulaird and closer at hand, the bare backside of Beinn a’ Bheithir.

As I finally crossed the broad summit ridge to the cairn the reasons why I climb mountains suddenly swamped me in a flow of emotion. It was a  combination of endorphin rush mixed with the notions of freedom, the insignificance of man against the more lasting realities of these ancient glens and hills and the simple, child-like pleasure in being up high, with an eagles-eye view of the watery west laid out below.

Away below me the fjord-like Loch Creran squeezed its way out into Loch Linnhe and beyond the island of Lismore the hills of Mull lay pale on the horizon. As I rested against the stones of the summit cairn I half hoped I would meet the young schoolboy again on my return to Ballachulish. I’d be better able to answer his question now.

Map: OS Sheet 41

Distance: About 12 miles

Approx Time: 6-8 hours

Start/finish: West Laroch, Ballachulish

Route: Start from the minor road from West Laroch that runs up beside the Ballachulish Primary School. Go through a farmyard, through two gates and continue on the track that soon becomes a muddy footpath. After a couple of miles look out for a cairn on a hillock on your right and shortly after this cairn the path divides at a stream. Take the left path down to the River Laroch and follow the bank until you spot a cairn on the opposite bank. This cairn indicates the right of way to Glen Creran. Cross the river and follow this path uphill to the forestry fence before turning right along the ridge crest to ascend the first top of the long, curved ridge that eventually leads to the summit of Fraochaidh. Return the same way.