Date:	9th November 1997
Mountains:	Creag Meagaidh (1130m), Stob Poite Coire Ardair (1053m), Carn Liath (1006m)
Group:	Edinburgh Academy Senior Meet
Conditions:	Snow above ca 1000m, changeable although mostly dry day

The long drive to Creag Meagaidh from Edinburgh ended in a fairly typical overcast November day. From Aberarder, it is a long walk up the glen on a good path to reach the hugely dramatic Coire Ardair, a popular spot in winter (no snow on it when we were there). From here, avoiding the cliffs means turning right and going up to the very obvious window below Stob Poite Coire Ardair - which is a lot higher than it looks from Coire Ardair. Somewhere up here the straps going under the boots holding my gaiters down both managed to break. Such is the way with gaiters...

From the window, we climbed left up steep ground onto the broad plateau that makes up the summit of Creag Meagaidh, most of which was covered in not insubstantial quantities of snow. The summit itself was rather breezy, so we didn't hang around for long, instead descending back to the window along the same route.

It is perfectly possible to descend back to Coire Ardair from here and walk back down the glen, although it wouldn't make a very satisfying day. In any case, the climb to Stob Poite Coire Ardair from the window is just over 100m so it would be foolish to go all the way up and not climb it. Following that, the walk along the ridge to Carn Liath is long and not hugely dramatic, but probably better than walking all the way back along the glen.

From the cloud-covered summit of Carn Liath, in rapidly diminishing daylight, we headed off south towards Na Cnapanan (623m) and then regained the path out of the glen and back to Aberarder. Return to List