#an socach

[skinks]

Walked 12 miles up An Socach and back today, I think it’s either my 12th or 13th munro

[benvironment]

With seven months to go before I leave my 3yr post as Ramblers Scotland President, on Saturday I reached a new milestone in my attempt to walk with all 55 of Scotland's Ramblers groups before my time is up - I finally edged into the 40s courtesy of a Cairngorms foray by Glasgow Young Walkers. 15 groups to go! It's a bit like munro bagging.....but with significantly more cake ;-)

The walk itself was, as Bilbo Baggins would say, a simple 'there and back again' jaunt from Glen Clunie up onto An Socach - a massive rocky plateau with airy views over to Glenshee, Glen Ey and the central plateau. I last climbed the hill 15yrs ago and didn't remember anything about it, so it was nice to feel like I was climbing the hill for the first time :)

There was wildlife aplenty - Toads, frogs, lizards, grouse, an oddly unfazed mountain hare, and several eagle sightings including a close golden flypast at the summit cairn. And thankfully, in a summer oddly characterised by steamy air from the south, the thunderstorms stayed away for a change and left us with almost perfect walking weather for the enjoyable high level walk across the plateau. Lovely! And of course, yes, we ended up having sumptuous cake afterwards in Braemar ;-)

Glasgow Young Walkers are one of our five walking groups for folk aged 18 to 40 in Scotland, and they do a range of stuff from easy strolls along the beach to multi-munro days, and were even over here in Fife last month doing the Chain Walk. A really friendly and knowledgable bunch, feel free to give 'em a go! :) Their website is at https://glasgowyoungwalkers.ning.com/

[last100munros]

#189 An Socach

Route: SMC route going along Baddoch Burn from Glen Clunie, ascending to the East Top

Height: 944m

Date: 14th February 2016

Time to summit: 3h 38mins

Total walk time: 6h 15mins

With: Dominic

Weather: Snowy underfoot all the way, initially quite sunny, cloud built up, low cloud on the tops some of the time, very windy, several snow showers, particularly later in the day.

Notes: It was blizzarding as we pulled up to park at the end of the track, but by the time we’d got our boots on it had got out quite sunny. The first part of the walk was along the snowy track following the river. There were warnings (even from just four days previously) that the bridge a couple of kilometres on was still not there following the storms at New Year, however the estate worker who was coming out of the track said it had got planks on it now, they just weren’t nailed down. We decided to trust him, and continued  past the quite dodgy looking alternative footbridge (probably would have been better than wading), and indeed there was a good new bridge there.

After continuing along the track for a while longer, we crossed a subsidiary stream and then immediately started to go up. It was okay going, although the snow was quite quite deep in some places. The wind also began in ernest - I decided that snow-goggles were the best option to cope with it and the sunshine, and didn’t take them off for the rest of the day. We stopped at the cairn for a couple of sandwiches, but the wind didn’t make lingering longer a particularly attractive option. Continuing on we took a wide-ish loop around the col to avoid the softer snow, and then then began ascending more steeply again towards the East Top.

As it was getting a bit icier we got our ice-axes out, and not long after put crampons on - they made it so much easier to go up the quite steep slope. It flattened out quite a bit when we got to the summit ridge, and even windier. After not too long we got to the snow covered cairn at the East Top, and saw the summit in the distance along the ridge. We continued along the snow-covered stoney slopes until we eventually reached the top. The wind shelter was curving directly into the wind and had completely filled with snow.

The top wasn’t quite in the cloud, so we had bits of view, however as we turned back towards the East Top it came down and started snowing, which wasn’t much fun with the strong winds. Our decent route followed the way we’d come up, although there wasn’t much sign of our previous footprints. We kept our crampons on until we were almost back at the lower cairn, which made descending off the ridge quite easy and quick. Back down in the valley, it was still quite windy with occasional snow showers as we made our way back to the car.  

[chrismcmorris]

The Cairnwell Munros

My folks are over for a long weekend and Emily and I are staying with them for two nights in the Dalmunzie Castle. As usual, Dad was keen to bag a hill of description but we didn't want it to be the main focus of the weekend either, as we were staying in a rather nice hotel for the weekend after all!

Saturday was looking like a decent day, but it wasn't looking too good while we were having a late breakfast. However, as we headed towards Braemar, the clouds lifted completely and were replaced by a blazing sun and bright blue sky. As the weather was favourable and we didn't have much time, I set our sights on the easy round of The Cairnwell Munros from the Glenshee Ski Centre.

We parked up at the Ski Centre and were soon making our way up the stoney path to the summit of Carn Aosda. It was very easy going and straightforward. Not the most interesting of summits but on such a nice day we had a great view of the hills all around us. Herbie even recognised the An Socach ridge from earlier in this year - I was most impressed.

We pressed on quickly, as it was extremely windy on the top. The wind continued to hammer us as we made our way down to the bealach above Creag a' Choire Dhirich and past Loch Vrotachan. Here, we had a good view of the way up to The Cairnwell summit - which we would be back for later on. The landscape was more dramatic and far more scenic than I had expected, as we first headed to the top of Carn nan Sac and then on to the summit of Carn a' Gheoidh (passing a couple of Arctic Hares).

We paused at the summit to slap on some more suncream before retracing our steps and heading for the ugly summit that is: The Cairnwell. It wasn't long before we were heading up the steeper scree and approaching the summit buildings. However, it was a bit of a struggle as the wind was absolutely hammering across us and made the final few metres quite challenging indeed. As soon as we reached the top, we took shelter behind the buildings and admired the view to the East across the Cairngorms.

As we headed back down to the car over the grassy, we passed more hares darting around. Herbie was buzzing that he was able to increase his Munro tally by 3 so easily and I was really happy with how the short day had gone. The walk was actually a great deal more enjoyable and scenic than I had expected - very underrated. On the way into Braemar for some grub, we spotted a large heard of Red Deer in the heather at the side of the road - a great day.

[chrismcmorris]

An Socach

After sucessfully bagging Clisham last summer, Herbie was keen to get his teeth into something bigger and more challenging. With the time fast approaching, a few weeks ago I was a little concerned with the large amount of snow on the ground. But in the last few weeks, the temperatures had risen dramatically and spring was now in the air. I had set our sights on An Socach, near Glenshee in the Cairngorms. It was one that I hadn't done before and I mainly picked it because it looked quite a straightforward day and there weren't any slopes on the map that looked particularly steep.

We left Edinburgh before 7:30am and were walking by 9:30am - we made good time on the roads without the traffic. We parked by the bridge at the side of the A93 at the head of Glen Clunie. Looking around, the hills were black and the ski runs were very patchy and far from complete; I was quite shocked at just how quickly the thaw had taken place. I was beginning to regret only packing my winter boots and leaving my lighter summer ones at home.

We crossed the bridge and set off up the track past the old farmhouse in Baddoch Glen. We made good progress along the track and we raced along chatting and enjoying the clear skies and mild weather. After about 4km we arrived at the Alt Coire Fhearneasg and, after crossing it (needing walking poles to do this), headed up the gentle slopes of Coire Fhearneasg. We were still yet to encounter any snow and I was keen for my Dad to get a taste of what it was like walking in it. The guide books suggest following a worn path up the East shoulder to gain the summit but I had other ideas. From the map, I could see that we could continue up the more gentle slopes of the corrie to the bealach just North of the main ridge and I could see from looking up that it still had a generous amount of snow covering it.

As we neared the bealach, we finally got stuck into some snow - allbeit quite thin and 'crispy' on top. To make things interesting, the ground was mostly peat hag and covered in heather: not at all uniform underfoot. Herbie had a great time laughing at me leading the way and falling through the snow into every hole possible, while I was not ammused...

On reaching the bealach, we were treated to spectacular views North into the Northern Cairngorms - still quite snowy but clearly thawing. I pushed on and kicked steps as Herbie followed behind; cursing more and more with every step he took. One final push saw us at the first stoney top admiring the views all around. Herbie was delighted to hear that the climbing for the day was now finished and all we had to do was dander along the wide ridge to the actual summit.

We soon got there and celebrated with the traditional father and son embrace at the small wind shelter made out of stones. The wind had now picked up and we were getting blown around a little so we didn't hang around too long - but the view was truly spectacular and uninterrupted all around. We retraced our steps to the col halfway along the main ridge and then followed the Allt Boruiche back down to the main track and back towards Baddock.

Herbie was over the moon to have bagged his first Munro and was beaming all the way back to Edinburgh. I was really pleased with how the day had gone and it was great that Herbie got to experience some snow (what was left of it). A fantastic day.