Lurg Mhor is miles from anywhere… except Lurg Mhor! Frequently quoted as one of the very remotest Munros, I’d had it and its neighbour Bidein a’ Choire Sheasgaich on the radar all summer, but what better time to hit such remote peaks than the limited daylight of St Andrew’s Day? So it was up at 4:00am for a 5:00am start, arriving at Attadale on Loch Carron (nearest road access) in time for a wee snooze before it got light enough to start cycling without mounting lights at about 7:50am. And you’ve got ten miles of track just to get to the base of these hills, though it’s questionable whether it’s worth cycling beyond Bendronaig Lodge and Bothy at about eight miles… an extension I’d think slower in and quicker out by bike than walking/running, not to mention apparently discouraged by the car park sign I never read in the morning semi-dark:
Mountain bikes are welcome, however we ask that they be left at Beinn Dronaig Bothy when visitors are climbing the hills beyond.
So what can I say about these highly-prized peaks? Lurg Mhor was fantastic, with a more serious feel (greasy, chossy/mossy, care-demanding rock) to the narrow connecting ridge from Meall Mor than you might expect from its nominal Grade 1, but memorable also for the fog bow (at least that’s what I think it was) and one of the most stunning inversions I’ve ever seen (check the ‘inversion’ photo with Bidein a’ Choire Sheasgaich to the left and more distant Coulin Forest and Torridon peaks stretching out right). But then things clouded over completely, I started to get quite cold and wet for a while (one dogleg on the descent to the bealach where I lost the path and tried just following the ‘ridge’ before checking my position properly) and put the camera away on Sheasgaich. Which maybe disappointed slightly on this occasion for such an eagerly-anticipated peak simply because I hardly saw it (well, not at all after Lurg Mhor!), and is now most definitely filed under ‘revisit’. After which things started to brighten up again but not clear completely, and I was back at the bike for a late lunch and quick ride out, rolling down about half the track with the brakes on to hit the road by 3:15pm for a total time of 7 hours 22 minutes including a good hour of stops. And, while I’d seen absolutely nobody on the Fannichs the previous Sunday, I met half a dozen folk on these most interestingly remote hills.
