James Stone (Clach Liath)

Mountaineering and the Volcanic Seven Summits

  • Home
  • About me
  • Volcanic Seven Summits
  • Top 50 Ultra Prominent Peaks of the World
  • Contact
  • Privacy Policy
You are here: Home / Blog / Beinn Bheula

Beinn Bheula

23rd January 2016 by James Stone Leave a Comment

For the past many many years, Sue, Cozi, John and I have had a winter “meet” in Scotland.  Occasionally others have joined us, though not in recent years.  Last year we stayed near Crianlarich (though Sue was not able to make it then) and I wrote about our two days out here.

This year we thought we would try an area we had not previously visited.  We went to Lochgoilhead.  It is only a little over an hour’s drive from Glasgow but has a real feel of remoteness.  We found a nice self-catering house down by the loch.  Unfortunately, as has largely been the case this winter, the weather was rubbish.  So we only managed one day out on the hill.

Beinn Bheula was just across the way and seemed a suitable objective.  It is a Corbett at 779m (or 2,555ft).  The forecast was not promising with strong winds and the summits covered.  But there was only a low risk of precipitation.  The night before we started our preparation…

Climb preparation

We had an unsuitably leisurely start and drove around to Lettermay where we left a car.  The ordnance Survey maps (at least the ones we had) have not caught up with the tree felling and forestry road construction around here and we duly took the wrong route because a forest road had been re-routed!  We we never lost.  We knew where we were but were just taken the wrong way.

Anyway, once we had crossed a bridge, we battled a short way across some rough ground to another forest track that took us in the right direction.  The river was in spate as the air temperature was well above freezing.

Beinn Bheula

We had a view back to the loch and Lochgoilhead.  Things were looking promising weather-wise as similarly high hills were intermittently free from cloud.

Beinn Bheula

Our road ended and we scrambled up wet ground to the foot of a waterfall and crossed the river, this time without a bridge.  I managed it keeping boots on and remaining dry of foot.  Cozi took hers off and paddled across.  John followed my example.  Unfortunately Sue here decided to turn around and walk back to the house.

Beinn Bheula

There was a path of sorts, very wet under foot, marked by small stakes which is in fact the Cowal Way.  We followed this for perhaps 500m before breaking off to the south west and a faint ridge.  The way remained wet, but having crossed a fence and with the ridge becoming more defined a bit of a path again appeared.

The hill brooded ahead but the summit seemed to be clear.  I hoped it would remain so.

Beinn Bheula

The map, and what we could see, showed some crags to be navigated.  As it turned out this was a lot easier than I thought might be the case.  There were some nice breaks and we found a ramp trending up to the left.  At one point there was a short exposed section made more “exciting” by the slushiness of the snow.  But it was soon passed and consistent snow led across a final shallow bowl to the summit ridge.

Beinn Bheula

A final 50m of ascent to the south led to the summit trig.

Beinn Bheula

and a happy John.

Beinn Bheula

The western slopes had been largely stripped of snow by the moist westerlies.  But we had our summit clear and the wind, whilst brisk, was not as strong as forecast.  Result!  It was not a place to stay though.

This was the way ahead with a subsidiary top (Creag Sgoilte) to go over.

Beinn Bheula

And this was the view back down to Lochgoilhead.

Beinn Bheula

Here is the view back to the summit from Creag Sgoilte.

Beinn Bheula

It was time to descend and find somewhere for a late lunch.  The southern slopes of Creag Sgoilte have aircraft wreckage strewn over them, a relic of World War 2.  There are a few websites that give the background story to this aircraft such as this one.

We did locate somewhere to sit and eat which was largely out of the wind before continuing down to a path by Lochan nan Cnaimh.  For a lochan, this was quite large.

Beinn Bheula

In fact it has been tamed by man in that it is damned.  Here are John and Cozi walking across the dam.

Beinn Bheula

It was not obvious why the dam had been created though there was a sluice at an outfall.  The path then veered to the edge of the forest and went steeply down following the stream on its left bank.  At times we were forced into the trees.  Part way down the slope the path crossed the stream and contoured north only losing a little height before breaking out on to open hillside still shown as forested on the map.

A path of sorts continues and passing through an obstacle course of felled trunks eventually hits a forest road.  This took us back to the car with a view back over the valley to the waterfall we had passed by earlier in the day and, behind us, Beinn Bheula.

Beinn Bheula

Beinn Bheula

Unfortunately, that was that so far as venturing into the hills was concerned.  The weather the next day was worse.  We managed to sneak out down the coast to Carrick Castle where we parked up.  Carrick Castle is more like a tower house.  It is a ruin in private ownership but was once owned by the Earls of Argyll.  It had scaffolding around part of it so some repairs were being undertaken.

Beinn Bheula

And walked a couple of kilometres down the coastal path to the junction with Loch Long.  The view back up the loch was grim.

Beinn Bheula

And the dot to the right of that last photo is a seal.  A group of 4 or 5 watched us as we wandered along the beach.

Beinn Bheula - 16th January 2016

But as was only using the camera on my phone I was not able to get any decent zoomed shots.

So it is a location definitely worth the visit but it would have been so much better if the weather had been better,  Never mind the company was great!

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: Corbetts, Marilyns

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Links

  • Walkhighlands
  • Parkswatchscotland
  • Peakbagger
  • Alan Arnette
  • Mark Horrell
  • Ted Fairhurst
  • Cookie policy (UK)
  • Terms & conditions

Tags

8000m peaks Aconcagua Antarctica Australia Ben Nevis Bolivia Corbetts Damavand Dan Bull David Hamilton Francois Bernard Giluwe Hewitts Humour Iran Iztaccihuatl Katie Sarah Kilimanjaro Kosciuszko Llullaillaco Marilyns Mount Bogong Mount Elbrus Mount Hagen Mount Mukal Mount Rainier Mount Sidley Munros Ojos del Salado Pico de Orizaba Ruapehu satyarup siddhanta Scottish Mountains Seven Summits Taranaki Ted Fairhurst Teide Tochal Toubkal Ultras Volcanic Seven Summits Volcanoes Yorkshire 3 Peaks Zhang Liang

Recent posts

  • Volcanic Seven Summiters – January 2022
  • Mount Sidley – December 2021 (updated)
  • Three Ultras in Crete
  • Top 50 Ultras
  • The Top 50 Highest and the Top 50 Most Prominent Volcanoes in the World

Archive

  • January 2022 (1)
  • December 2021 (1)
  • November 2021 (2)
  • July 2021 (2)
  • March 2021 (2)
  • December 2020 (1)
  • November 2020 (2)
  • July 2020 (1)
  • May 2020 (2)
  • April 2020 (1)
  • March 2020 (1)
  • February 2020 (2)
  • January 2020 (6)
  • December 2019 (1)
  • November 2019 (1)
  • October 2019 (1)
  • September 2019 (1)
  • July 2019 (1)
  • January 2019 (2)
  • December 2018 (3)
  • November 2018 (2)
  • October 2018 (1)
  • September 2018 (1)
  • July 2018 (1)
  • June 2018 (3)
  • May 2018 (2)
  • April 2018 (1)
  • March 2018 (1)
  • February 2018 (3)
  • December 2017 (1)
  • October 2017 (4)
  • September 2017 (4)
  • August 2017 (2)
  • June 2017 (2)
  • May 2017 (1)
  • April 2017 (2)
  • February 2017 (1)
  • January 2017 (1)
  • December 2016 (2)
  • November 2016 (4)
  • October 2016 (3)
  • September 2016 (1)
  • August 2016 (1)
  • July 2016 (1)
  • May 2016 (7)
  • April 2016 (4)
  • March 2016 (3)
  • February 2016 (1)
  • January 2016 (2)
  • December 2015 (3)
  • November 2015 (4)
  • October 2015 (4)
  • September 2015 (2)
  • August 2015 (1)
  • July 2015 (5)
  • June 2015 (1)
  • May 2015 (5)
  • April 2015 (2)
  • March 2015 (4)
  • February 2015 (1)
  • January 2015 (2)
  • December 2014 (2)
  • November 2014 (25)
  • October 2014 (3)
  • August 2014 (1)
  • June 2014 (1)
  • April 2014 (1)
  • March 2014 (1)
  • February 2014 (2)
  • August 2013 (1)
  • July 2013 (7)
  • June 2013 (3)
  • May 2013 (1)
  • April 2013 (1)
  • February 2013 (3)
  • October 2012 (1)
  • June 2012 (3)
  • April 2012 (2)
  • March 2012 (2)
  • February 2012 (3)
  • November 2011 (2)
  • August 2011 (1)
  • July 2011 (2)
  • April 2011 (1)

Copyright © James Stone 2014-2022

Manage Cookie Consent
I use cookies to optimize this website.
Functional cookies Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
Manage options Manage services Manage vendors Read more about these purposes
View preferences
{title} {title} {title}