Wednesday 11th August 2021
The conquest of Beinn Tharsuinn with Charlie (9.9 miles).
It has been over 15 years since I have been up Beinn Tharsuinn. I last did it with my two sons Hugh and David (Charlie). I did it on July 12th 2002 and have a previous webpage about this. Follow this link – Beinn Tharsuinn 02.
I went the three miles up the road to collect Charlie and got a great welcome from the ‘gang’.
We drove to the car park just below Loch Dubh, beside the new Ardross Distillery. The last time there was no car park and Ardross Distillery was a dilapidated Ardross Mains Farm. We started walking about 9.10 and it was a nice day. That would change.
This is Loch Dubh, a really bonny spot. The way ahead is showing.
And looking back across the loch and over to the Novar Windfarm..
We pushed on and caught up with a young man walking ahead. That’s the first time I’ve met someone on this walk. It was just at the dead tree at the edge of the forest. The dead tree is still there! That’s where I wanted to stop, but I am so sociable we pushed on. I had wanted to get a photo there. After going up just a little bit we stopped to eat.
These were our views. Looking to Fyrish and Cnoc Ceislein.
Looking to the Cromarty Firth.
This is at the first summit – Torr Leathann.
The weather is starting to threaten as you look out West. The forecast was not good.
The first sight of the windfarm. That was not here in 2002. I wrote on my website then how unhappy I was that it was to be built. I am still unhappy. Our Scottish Government’s green policies are ridiculous. You can hardly go anywhere now without these intrusive windfarms. I hate them. The calculations are that you will never get the energy out of a windfarm than it takes to construct it.
We met the young man again on the top and he took this picture for us.
Then we headed to Beinn Tharsuinn itself. This is the top. We made it here by 11.20. My GPS recorded the height as 2285 feet. I had forgotten how hard going it was on the top getting through the peat haggs that are between all the summits here. It is a good thing we had wellies on.
And then the weather closed in. It became very wet.
We headed out to the cairn here. The cairn is marked on the OS map but the hill is not given a name. It was the furthest out point of the day.
We stopped at 12.20 on the pass between Beinn Tharsuinn and Cnoc an t-Sithean Mor for our lunch. We were navigating the old way, by compass. The visibility was awful. Back in 2002 you could see out to Suilven, Canisp and Cul Mor way West in Sutherland. My glasses are off as I couldn’t see through them so I am straining to take a ‘selfie’ and see my phone’s camera. Charlie looks happy.
This is on top of Cnoc an t-Sithean Mor.
We then headed down.
Finally we got below the clouds and the rain eased for a wee while. We can finally see the way down. We were aiming for a track on the edge of the forest to the right of the hill.
Looking back.
We finally got down to the forest and found the track. It took a bit of juggling with the OS coordinates from my GPS and the OS paper map. I don’t know how old the map was. Possibly 20 years! It did not have the windfarm on it. Once hitting the track the rain came back on after we had taken jackets off. We put them back on and just kept going down till we got to the car. We got there about 2.30. I put Charlie home and came back to my own home. It was great to get dry clothes on.
It was lovely to be back out for a hill walk with Charlie.