Ben Challum

The others in the dorm were all up and away before 6. I was still catching up on sleep and was happy to wait. Most people in the hostel were doing the West Highland Way, some of them covering long distances each day. I had a quick breakfast, packed the backpack and was off at 10 to 8 in beautiful sunshine, heading along the A82 towards Tyndrum, which was fairly quiet at that time in the morning. It took me less than half an hour to get to Inverherive.

In order to shorten the road walk I had planned to use the track up past Inverhaggernie as far as it went then head up across the slopes from there. I wasn't too hopeful that there would be any path on this route but it seemed fairly direct. The track took me over both railway lines and the river and well up onto the hillside.

Beinn a’Chroin and An Caisteal from above Inverhaggernie

When the track ended it was time to head up on a bearing, the summit being hidden from this point. It was fairly steep at first, and entirely pathless, but the going wasn't too difficult. There were good views all around but it was the snow on Ben Lui that was most impressive. I was unfamiliar with these hills, and as can be seen from my summit video description of them, I was unaware that it is Ben Lui that dominates the group.

It was nice to crest this steeper part of the ridge I was on and see Ben Challum come into view, with a very obvious path up. I headed directly for this.

Lochans below the summit ridge

It was still quite a long climb once I'd got onto the path, but definitely nicer than negotiating a pathless hillside.

I got to the south top shortly after 11 and pushed on. The path is helpful at this point as it is necessary to get over to the left hand part of the ridge in order to avoid crags to the right.

Snow patch on the south top

I reached the summit about 11.30. It was surprisingly busy - I saw a lot of other people during the day. I did however have the summit to myself for a short time during which I managed to set up a timed photo of myself and also took a 360° summit video.

Summit video from Ben Challum

By this time it was clouding over so I didn't hang about at the summit too long. I decided to follow the main path all the way down for a bit of variety. There would be a longer walk back to Crianlarich but I reckoned that not too much of it would actually be on the A82.

Marshy ground with Ben Lui beyond

It seemed like a long walk down anyway. The path came down at Kirkton Farm and the ruins of St Fillan's Priory.

The West Highland Line by Kirkton Farm

There were several information panels by the path about the history of St Fillan's, the priory and some extremely old gravestones in the cemetery nearby. I realized that all this information was because I was now actually on the West Highland Way. Looking at the map I realized that, with a little extra distance and quite a bit of extra ascent, I could walk all the way back to Crianlarich without getting onto the A82 at all. I had plenty of time and my legs were holding up OK, so I decided to do this.

On the West Highland Way

The first part of the walk was through an area where there had been a lot of recent tree felling - never a particularly attractive sight, but I suppose it's all part of keeping the local economy going.

I finally got back to the hostel at about 20 past 4, making it a mammoth 8h30 day, although I had not been going too fast and had had plenty of stops. The rest of the day was spent planning for the next day and making another simple meal of baked beans and pork sausages with more left behind pasta. The weather forecast for the following day was still looking good, so my plan was to take the train to Tyndrum and tackle Beinn Dubhcraig and Ben Oss, then have dinner at the Real Food Cafe before returning to Crianlarich.