About two hours in from the start we came to an old stone dwelling, presumably made from all the boulders that tumble down the mountain side. Likely abandoned as the only way there appears to involve a number of hours hopping between seemingly dry tufts of grass in a very wet peat bog, having forded a number of small rivers. I took shoes especially for the crossings - to keep my walking shoes dry - but that was also marvellously beside the point as from within minutes of setting off across the bog I stuck my foot in a not dry tuft of grass up to my ankle. The tried and tested method of black bin bags over the shoes looked just as good - with the added bonus of a home made sledge for the little runs of snow on the way down from the summit - but I get ahead of myself.
Once we climbed out of the bogs and started up the mountain things got a little drier. It was a slightly hazy warm summers day in spring, but there were plenty of pools of water with amorous frogs (amorous with each other) and brilliant green frogspawn. We even saw a large brown adder curled up on a rock warming in the sun. And plenty of deer heading up the hill above us.
After 4 hours we stopped near this waterfall to consider our way to the summit and eat our sandwiches. We opted for curving up the left side and over the back of the whelk, rather than the sheer drop to the right and the cornices of snow. This shallow picture doesn't do justice to our fearfulness, nor to the hour of scrambling up over steep boulders to meet the top.
Once we got there we met a fellow sitting in the sun, around the other side of the cairn. He said we had climbed the wild side and kindly took a number of out of focus photos of us three mountaineers. It seemed like we had climbed too soon and should have followed the river down at the base for longer, and we tried to put this right on the way back down; what we gained in a quicker descent (scarily quick when speeding on a black bin bag towards some very jaggy looking rocks - at which point I was very happy to have asked the salient question earlier - how do you stop?) we lost in a longer walk back across the bog and lots more hopping across twisting turning streams and water channels.
The sky was moody on the last gasp and we seemed to be getting no nearer to the car for hours. When we came back to the first river we were straight across in our walking boots. I say straight across - I looked more like a scuttling hermit crab as bent double and holding on to rocks for balance I gingerly felt my way across the slippy river bed.
And then it was a ravenous race back to the hotel before the kitchen closed and a very fine dinner of steak and chips was washed down with pints of beer, guilt free.
I don't believe there is a better way to spend a day in the Scottish Highlands. And I'm filled with a longing to go and do it all again.
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