Shaz and I headed up to stay at the Station Lodge bunkhouse http://www.stationlodge.co.uk at Tulloch on the Friday night with the prospect of variable weather i.e. light drizzle and rain nae doot. A note of caution - the proprietor had informed us that her licence to sell liquor would expire on the 9th August and she would not be renewing it. Fortunately, we are professional jakies and we arrived with enough drink to send us into easy slumber for the day ahead after discussing drink, hills and finally God. Isn't that how it goes? Great breakfast the next day and would definitely stay again as it sets you up for the surrounding hills. We were initially lazy and drove round to Fersit rather than skip along the train track. We were glad we had done so because a wee bridge going across a ravine was quite something and we held up traffic while impersonating David Bailey. We parked up at an area which said 'No parking' but we were in good company as other cars had done the same.
The view across to Stob Coire Sgriodain gave us a good view of what lay ahead and we proceeded to head through Fersit, past a proper parking area (typical) and past a wee rusty-coloured dog which happily greeted us in canine custom. The poor thing had no back legs and it seemed to have metal testicles - fetch Sparky! Once past the farm, the trek South was over quite boggy ground but it wasn't long before we began to ascend and attempt to avoid the suicidal Fersit frogs, which did their best to fall under our boots. As with most Munro's, once we had cut through and up on to the crags (this took about 90 minutes from the farm), we were still quite a bit of a walk until the summit (about a km) but the cloud cover had descended and views were non-existent.
e had lunch at the top, I got the compass and map out and we set off for our 2nd objective du jour, Chno Dearg. D'ye know Chno? I remembered the book saying it could be tricky in bad visibility and this proved the case. After 500m S on a path which petered out, Shazcam thought she had a path but she was descending North towards crags and I knew this wasn't right. I told her so and we headed due SE instead. Cue torrential rain. 
We descended over quite rough ground and passed a cairn, before descending to a col with some lochans - at this point, I knew we were on course. I then took a compass reading NE to ascend Chno Dearg and it was a matter of re-checking the compass while slowly ascending. Finally, after an hour from Sgriodan we topped out on a level summit after a bouldery last wee bit but it still took us 5 min to find the summit cairn. We were glad to get then 2nd hill of the day in the bag but it once again reinforced how important it was to navigate effectively. The compass was such a great wee companion, I gave it a kiss and agreed to buy him a drink when we got back down.
We descended over quite rough ground and passed a cairn, before descending to a col with some lochans - at this point, I knew we were on course. I then took a compass reading NE to ascend Chno Dearg and it was a matter of re-checking the compass while slowly ascending. Finally, after an hour from Sgriodan we topped out on a level summit after a bouldery last wee bit but it still took us 5 min to find the summit cairn. We were glad to get then 2nd hill of the day in the bag but it once again reinforced how important it was to navigate effectively. The compass was such a great wee companion, I gave it a kiss and agreed to buy him a drink when we got back down.The descent N to NW off Chno Dearg is tedious, fairly long and boggy and I cannot imagine anyone ascending the hill this way. I'm sure there are masochists out there who will have done this. Flagellation - ye cannae whack it. Eventually after 6 hours we got back to the car just as the cloud lifted and the sun shone down. F****** typical! Still a great day though and I sincerely hope you get better views than we did. Such is life on the hill.
