I was staying with friends at Banavie, west of Fort William, so it was only a short drive west along the A830 Mallaig Road to the car park on the west side of the River Finnan, just beyond the Glenfinnan Visitor Centre. We set off on bikes and cycled north along the private tarred road, under the Glenfinnan Viaduct, to the Corryhully Bothy, the last hundred metres or so on an estate track.
We left our bikes here and continued north-east on foot along the estate track meeting the gamekeeper who stopped for a chat.
On reaching a sign indicating the path to Sgurr nan Coireachan we headed up this stalker’s path and climbed onto the south-east ridge of Sgurr a’ Choire Riabhaich with good views back down Glen Finnan.
As we headed towards this Corbett Top the cloud lowered and the rain commenced so that was the end of views for several hours. After summiting Sgurr a’ Choire Riabhaich we continued to the Munro, Sgurr nan Coireachan.
After a break here we headed east over the Corbett Tops, Meall an Tarmachain and Beinn Gharbh then the Sub Simms, Beinn Gharbh East Top and Sgurr Thuilm West Top, before climbing to the summit of the Munro, Sgurr Thuilm where he took another break. Afterwards we descended south on a path which later continued south-west down the Druim Coire a’ Bheithe ridge. Initially there were some fence posts which would assist navigation in poor weather. Eventually we emerged from the cloud before continuing our descent to the bridge over the River Finnan then the short walk back to the bothy where we collected our bikes and returned to the start.
- Time taken – 9 hours.
- Distance – 22 kilometres.
- Height climbed – 1475 metres.