Ben Lomond
Christmas SOTA
We were staying nearby with family for Christmas and I’d been looking on the map at the summits near their house. Quite a few good ones and many are hardly activated. The weather hadn’t been great over the Christmas period, mostly wet, either raining or just very damp - although it always seems wet here but maybe that’s just because I live on the east coast. If it was nicer we would’ve all gone up Conic Hill (GM/SS-239) during the week. The family were off to Moana 2, and I was given the option of coming or not…! I thought about the two 2 pointers nearby, Beinn Uird and Binnean nan gobhar. The latter having not been activated since 2016! They’re like GM/ES summits with only 7 and 6 activations. It would’ve given me 10 points and probably taken the same amount of time. However, the draw of another Munro - the most southerly one - was too much and those two summits are maybe better with the kids in the future.
It was just 20 minutes to Rowardennan where the Ben Lomond car park is, and for £5 you can stay all day. I dread to think what this is like in the height of summer, as the car park is tiny and it was quite full on a miserable December day. There is overflow parking further away which you pass on the road in. The route is straight forward and well marked. There’s even a water bottle refill station!
I took the eastern route up to the top, and the path is very good nearly the entire way, with just a few small sections of walking up rock face. I met quite a few folk coming down and overtook several going up. Not sure all of them were well prepared… A group of young individuals from Glasgow stopped and had a brief chat with me. Whilst they’d come down from the summit, they were still pretty high! 🚬🌿
It’s quite a hike vertically, from sea level to 974m, although most is at a nice gradient. The views were non-existent, and maybe around 500 m I was in the cloud. It wasn’t raining though, so that was a plus. Pretty much after 2 hours I reached the top.
There’s a nice grassy part to the NE of the summit which drops away and helps you keep out the wind. I setup my carbon 6 with slim g there and called on 2m. Two guys and a boy, who I’d passed on the way up, came over when they heard the radio but quickly dismissed me once they saw. 2m was lively and I had several mobile stations in their cars, and then a summit to summit with Andy, MM7MOX, over on Broomy Law. After a run of 8, I called CQ a few more times but no replies. I thought about HF but I was actually soaking wet as the water was condensing on me from the clouds, and so I decided not to bother and just head back. I wanted to do the loop and so looked around for the path down on the other side.
The pictures don’t do it justice, but it’s quite a steep and rocky route on this side just past the summit. In fact this way is much more adventurous than the side I took up. I think if anyone is uncertain or with kids, then I’d suggest going up and down the eastern route only. Probably climbing up the western side is better than going down. The route was fine on the way down, again, no views for much of the way, until maybe around 400m when I came out of the clouds and they’d cleared a little on the Loch.
This way back has some flat walking along the road into the hostel and other houses right at the end of this road. There’s even a snack shop on the way! I resisted though.
Back at the car park around 1350, and then off to Edinburgh to meet up with everyone.
