Help needed to put the mountains into mountain biking – riding the Munros

Timely thread resurrection as was contemplating Lochnagar tomorrow- Thanks Sanny

Did you ever bag Ben More as was contemplating it in a few weeks time? Up from the east flank and then possibly onto Stob Binnein, retreating the same way…

Did Stob Binean but too much snow to also do Ben More. I reckon from the Balqhuider side to get up then head onto the lower eastern plateau for the descent back could go.

How much track is there on the eastern flank?

IIRC, there’s a fairly decent (i.e. Munro baggers) track heading right along the east ridge of Stob Binnein/Meall na Dige as many folk do it as a horseshoe from the east. It does undulate a fair bit though. However, I should say that the last time I was there it was covered in snow and we were wearing crampons for the whole circuit. 😀

2005-03-06 104803 by ScotRoutes[/url], on Flickr

What fine weather for it, has anyone been anywhere interesting? I’m struggling to get a long day away with a new baby but will try…

With limited time on Tues evening I went up the path from the North face car park up to the back of Ben Nevis. Fair bit of pushing up at the start but was pretty good fun coming back down. Glorious evening for it.

Think this is my favourite thread. Just keeps coming back with even more inspirational stuff! Good work 🙂

Out of interest, has anyone had a crack at Braeriach? It kept winking at me from a tour we did of Ben Macdui and Lairig Ghru and looks pretty nice. Worth the effort or unrideable?

Here’s a few photos from some of my attempts this year-

Carn Ban Mhor

Cairngorm

Ben Macdui

Lochnagar

Cycled in from Loch Laggan to just above Loch na h earba, left the bike to head up Creag Pidridh. May have been mentioned, but a descent from the Gael Charn – Beinn a Clachair col to Loch na h earba looks good.

Yep – done that. There are two options. We climbed the more northerly route and descended to the southern end of the loch. I’d recommend doing it the other way!

Saturday, a couple of weekends ago: Started from Victoria bridge (Mar Lodge), up the Quoich Water, up Beinn a Bhuird (summit is only 2 hours 10 from the start, it is that ridable!)Took the steep grassy descent 100m South of the eroded path down to the Sneck; hike a bike up to the Ben Avon plateau surprisingly short lived.
The plan was to head to the far NE corner of the mountain and descend to Linn of Avon. There was quite a strong wind on the plateau so getting the map out was a trial plus on the 25000 scale map it was quite hard to work out the topography so after some dicking about (there is no path, only turf)the final descent off East Meur Gorm Craig was finally spotted and what a cracking descent it proved to be.
At this point I was only a few miles from Tomintoul but the plan was to return South via Loch Builg and Glen Gairn. The map shows only 200m of ascent over 8 miles, but the Glen Gairn singletrack whilst a pleasant challenge as an outing by itself proved (due to being fairly knackered at this point)to be the crux of the whole venture. I believe I said the two most graphic words in the language out loud at least 50 times each.
The next section is the link SW down the Quoich Water where no path is marked on the map. High above the north bank of the river is the most sublime piece of singletrack of the whole day; it leads through the ancient Caladonian forest, through burn splashes to the return leg down the lower Quoich Water.
Not that much ascent (1500m) but 55kms and quite a long day at 8 1/2 hours.

Out of interest, has anyone had a crack at Braeriach? It kept winking at me from a tour we did of Ben Macdui and Lairig Ghru and looks pretty nice. Worth the effort or unrideable?

Sanny’s done it and didn’t reckon it was that great. Those of you who know him will realise that amounts to a pretty damning assessment.

I’ve been all over it on foot and although there are ways off it that are mostly rideable it didn’t look like they justified the hike up.

Oh aye. I see the path up it from the Lairig Ghru from my window and keep thinking it would be worth a try.

The path up from the Lairig Ghru is rideable down but it’s a straight line and pretty loose so from a fun / erosion point of view I didn’t reckon it was worth it.

It would be 4″ tyres, for sure!

I wasn’t accounting for your perversion. 😉

It’s been way too long since I had any input to this thread, so, last night I decided to go for something which had been on the cards for a long time. The weather forecast was for wall to wall awesomeness so on the spur of the moment I left the house at 8pm to do the South Glenshiel ridge, with a bonus bivvy. 🙂

I’m wrecked now so will write a bit more tomorrow but for now my advice for anyone thinking of taking a bike to do the full ridge would be – don’t! Unless it’s specific training for the HTR 550 or joining the Marines or something! It is a superb walk though…

Sunrise
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Well along the rirdge
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Just what you need for 12 odd hours of hike a bike – a steel framed, Rohloff fatbike 😳
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Bed maker lovely last puck, thsnks for Sharing !

Geez Bedmaker, that’s got to be the most bonkers thing attempted from this thread. Did you do all seven munros? I thoroughly admire your spirit of adventure. Great photos.

Braeriach? I rode it by going up Glen Einich then doing the steep path up onto the shoulder where I had a trauma getting above an ice field…..cue giving myself a stern mtfu talking to. From the topping out point, there is no path as such until you get to the summit. The descent down was worth doing if a wee bit overly rocky in a couple of sections. A memorable day but better rides to be had. Planning the 4000 footers in the Cairngorms in the next few weeks.

For a good day out, I rate the Drumochter Munros. Not technical but great views and surprisingly rideable up. Keep it for a clear dry day and it might just surprise you.

chicken man

I have pondered that route for a while and knew about the secret singletrack. Great ride eh?

Heading out for a big ride tomorrow. Will report back on this thread. 😀

This is the sort of picture of the ridge which suckered me in, looks like it’s going to be a great ride doesn’t it? Gently undulating with a good path.

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There is some rideable stuff down off some of the tops, but not much. Only a few short sections of really nice descending. Lots of the other sections were steep, walking pace on the brakes downhill with ‘stoppers’ of rocky steps or deep gullies.

The only bit I’d go back for is the run off Creag a Mhaim, which I pushed up at the start. It would make a really nice descent.

My favourite pic of the trip, looking down Glenshiel. The Saddle on the L and the five sisters on the R, Loch Duich in the distance and the Applecross hills beyond that. My old house is just above the back wheel, on the shores of Loch Duich.
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There were deer all over the place, every corrie had herds of them. Here’s some chillaxing by the pool.
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I’m trying to decipher a fun route up Beinn Ghlas/Lawers. Would you suggest going up from the car park / visitor centre, nor-east up towards coire a chonnaidh and along the top ridge to lawers, then back along the ridge and descend nor-west off beinn ghlas then back along the westward path to the car park?

I did it a about a month ago and just headed straight up to the top of Beinn Ghlas followed by a short descent then up to the top of Ben Lawers. For the descent we just retraced our route, the descents are some of the best I have done. The switch backs on the way down from Beinn Ghlas are fantastic. There is not much riding time on the way up and is a good push/carry to both summits but well worth it.

We did it on a Friday evening to miss the busy crowds the mountains attract at the weekend. We managed to ride all the descents apart from one tiny section.

Planning on doing this on Friday coming Dan, if you fancy it. Going up from car park, up over glas onto lawers, then turn back, but instead of heading all the way back down, captain mainwaring reckons heading up and doing the two Munros as an out and back is a better option.

Went up to the Cairngorm car park today and it was so nice I decided to ride/push up to the summit. Nice descent past Marquis’ Well.

Cairngorm by ScotRoutes[/url], on Flickr

So Carn a Mhaim, MacDui and Derry Cairngorm today in an unofficial Messiah memorial ride. Took a notion to try the ridge as I had picked his brains through this thread and in various e mails about riding in the Gorms over the years and it was really rather wonderful. A stiff but short carry up was rewarded with a terrific ridge line descent to below Macdui.

From there, we did a steep hike a bike topping out on a boulder field on the shoulder of Big Mac which was only a few hundred metres from the summit. The descent to Loch Etchacan was as brilliant as ever.

We then headed onto Derry Cairngorm. The boulder field at the top is a bit of a pain but the loooong ridge descent is bloody marvellous. Hopefully Messiah would approve! 😀

I should add that the carry up to Carn a Mhaim has been path improved on the way up and is very easy to follow. There is a longer section of steps that would be a pita on the way down if you chose to try it as a descent but not so much as to stop me from wanting to give it a go. The ridge is marvellous though the climb up onto Macdui is tough and not one for those who hate carrying over boulder fields near to the top. I strangely enjoy that sort of thing as the resulting descent is a peach.

Has anyone ridden or walked the Corrour Bothy descent off of the Devils Peak? Looks like that has been redone too.

Nice one Sanny. We’ve been squeezing in a few memorial rides over the summer and it’s nice to know others are thinking about Brian too. He was very much at home in the hills 🙂

Hi Yetiman

It’s funny although I only met Messiah once many years ago at the Dark Side at Mabie, I would often speak to him through this forum and by e mail, picking on his expansive knowledge of what I regard as proper biking. He always responded in good grace and no little bit of humour so I was gutted to read of his passing earlier in the year. As we climbed up onto MacDui, my friend Shearer spoke about how when he rode Sron Riach with him and watched in awe as. Messiah tore up the climb others struggled to push up. I thought of how we wouldn’t be riding the frankly brilliant ridge of Carn a Mhaim had it not been for him tipping me the wink nor even MacDui again having been first inspired by a pic he posted of his bike on the snow peppered summit of MacDui on a beautiful Spring day. I think it’s fair to say that Brian had a fantastically positive impact on many people more than he knew. It makes me sad not to have had a chance to ride with him in the big mountains.

Sanny

Hi folks

So has anyone had any mini epics they can add to the thread?

What is everyone planning for the New Year? What mountains are on the radar?

Cheers

Sanny

Lowther Hill and Great Dun Fell?

Hi Sanny,
I emailed about this, but not sure if that actually works to your singletrack email address!

You wrote some time ago about riding Coniston Old Man and along the ridges and down wet side edge.
Q1. You said you rode to the col of walna scar then made your way to The Old man. Would that be from the summit of walna scar and up over Dow crag, or did you drop down and up the path to goats water?
I’m thinking of starting at Coniston, so would probably work our way up more directly perhaps to goats water. Unless there is a better route up.

Q2. What was descent like from wet side edge. I assume it’s fairly steep with some hiking down maybe? to start with, but then easier lower down but then less defined dropping down to greenburn beck.

Also I wondered if you’d ridden along Hole Rake. This runs from top of Tilberthwaite gill and back over to copper mines valley. It would be cool to drop off wetherlam and pick that route up but wetherlam looks like a boulder fest – or is it?

Any other advice on decent mountain routes in the Coniston area that are worth the hike up. I prefer to have longer XC descents than straight down DH style iif possible as we have fairly mixed group skill wise.

Thanks,,,

We headed up from Stevenson Ground. At the saddle, we headed up the zig zag path which is rideable up to the point where there it gets rocky. After that, there is a bit of hikey bikey followed by a short but techy rocky descent before the last carry to the summit. The riding after that over to Wet Side edge is easy going with the descent down into the valley mostly grassy and non technical. It is a wee bit boggy at the bottom. Look out for the remains of the Handley Page Halifax bomber on the traverse over.

Wetherlam is very good by all accounts according to my mate Pete who has ridden it.

Parkamoor on the other side of the valley makes for a lovely traverse and descent starting in Grizedale or from Coniston, you can head up Lawson Park. The descent is typically Lakeland rocky but not a full on steep tech fest.

Thanks Sanny. very useful. I remember the Bomber – about 30 or so years ago by Dad took me up that gully, as a winter ice climb. We saw the other half that’s at the bottom of the gully below Great Cars.

I’ve trawled through all the posts here, but if you could do just one ride, which would it be?

I want to do a big day out ride when I;m up in the Highlands later this year…

Macdhui loop is ace as is Beiin a Bhuird / Ben Avon. If you head off the back of Ben Avon heading north on a dry day, you are riding over easy ground going from tor to tor.

The Lochnagar loop is great too. Once you are up, you ha be some great plateau riding with stunning views to be had.

So many good options! What kind of riding do you like?

It’s that time of year again. The snow is disappearing, days are long and the weather is improving at long last. 🙂

What have we got planned ladies and gentlemen?
A repeat of Macdui is the one I want to do the most, must be six years since the last go at it.
And a look at the Fannichs.
And something Lochaber flavoured, I never seem to get down that way.

And Macdui again it is!

Parked Glenmore monday morning, up the ski road to the Ptarmigan for a rancid coffee. Cairngorm- on to Macdui dodging some huge slushy snowbanks across the path- down the sublime trail past Loch Etchachan – Glen Derry – B&B in Braemar. Weather gorgeous all day.

This morning left Braemar and on to Tomintoul for lunch via Loch Builg – over the braes of Abernethy to Ryvoan and back to Glenmore.

Good effort

Good style and on a fat bike too! That must have been a hoot!

Sooooooo……planned.
A return to the munros above Kinlochleven.
Glen Affric.
Gorms 4000 loop in a day.
A cheeky Glen Nevis ride.
Ben Lui and Oss.

Not bad for starters.

ygm Sanny