Meall na Fearna

This weekend we’d been forecast good weather on Saturday, so we decided to get back in the swing of things with a mountain walk. It would be the earliest in the year we’ll have checked one off; another of the many benefits of living in Scotland.

We chose one of the easier Munros in Ben Chonzie and set off in what we thought was good time, leaving my camera behind as it was going to be a ‘boring’ hike. When we got to the parking area it was full and, after helping to push one car off the muddy verge we decided against parking there ourselves. Plenty more hills to climb in our new backyard.

I quickly looked up some of the hills on the way back home and decided on Meall na Fearna, just north of Ben Vorlich near Loch Earn. We’d climbed the bigger hill years before and were quite happy to be tackling a Corbett on our first outing of the year.

I soon regretted not having my camera with me. We followed a decent ATV path, with great views of Ben Vorlich in the low cloud and intermittent sun. Gutted, we diverted straight up the open ground toward the summit of Meall na Fearna. iPhone shots would have to do.

Bog all over, route-finding became an exercise in avoiding wet feet but we soon made it up towards to higher slopes where bog was replaced with leftover patches of snow and ice. Those patches made the landscape look more like somewhere in Iceland than the southern highlands of Scotland and getting across them at times was difficult. More so when we got within metres of the summit. We kicked and stamped a rough trench through the final steep snow patch to get across safely.

Summit done and a simple, yet boggy walk back to the car. Time to purchase crampons and a pick axe I think…