11.07.26 Meall Feith Rabhain (NG 883 948)
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| Meall Feith Rabhain (NG 883 948) |
To the north-west of the small community of
Laide lies a rounded peninsula of small heighted hills and lochans which are
interspersed with a few minor roads, tracks, rocky coves and sanded beaches. It gives an appealing sense of space and
peacefulness, where the course of life is slow.
We now had limited time for hill walking as
other necessary duties called. A walk combining
two 400m hills was considered as indeed was visiting a 500m hill, but having
passed a small hill two days before on our way to the sanded beach of Camas a’
Charraig and the two hills to its north, Mark had indicated a small qualifying
P30 hill just to the west of the minor road that would fill an hours
wander. However, even from the road the
fairly large summit erratic could be easily seen. Reports on the Hill Bagging website gave
varying accounts of reaching its top, and more where unsuccessful attempts were
made and some where reaching the ground at its base was sufficient. This did not bode well for three people whose
bodies are no longer as young and lithe as they once were. The question was asked to Mark ‘have you a
ladder?’ When the reply was ‘yes’ and
when the ladder looked more like a futuristic science experiment compared to
the bog standard wooden ladder of norm, it was all systems go for our little
trip, with our extendable ladder in hand heading to the summit of Meall Feith
Rabhain.
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| The ladder resembled a futuristic science experiment |
A convenient pull-in place gave us easy access to
the hill over the wired fence straddling forlornly just below the minor road
where we parked. John took the ladder
and as Mark and I veered north-westward around the northern flank of an
intermediary bump, John headed with ladder under his arm over it.
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| John heading off with the ladder |
Either side of the small bump was an option for
the main summits critical bealach. As
the hill is listed as a relatively marginal P30 Mark was enthusiastic for this
to be surveyed along with its summit. By
surveying its summit first it gave us an opportunity to assess its bealach on
the way, both on the ground as we walked over or near it and from above as
height was gained so we could look down upon it. By doing this we all concluded that the lower
of the low options and therefore its critical point was the most easterly, the
one close to the wired fence adjacent to the minor road where John’s car was
parked.
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| Taking divergent paths with John and the ladder in the background |
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| Mark heading for the summit |
By now Mark and I had gained the steepening
northern flank of the main hill, whilst John had found a path that gave him
relatively easy access to the high point and the large erratic boulder perched
at the summit.
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| Steepening ground |
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| The large erratic at the summit |
Before John and Mark erected the ladder and put
it in place we all had a good look around the erratic boulder. There seemed to be just one place for a
foothold that for those lithe in body and enthusiastic in spirit may be
sufficient for an ascent. We of course
had our ladder.
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| Having carried the ladder to the top John enjoyed its convenience to reach the summit |
As John made his way up the ladder to the top of
the erratic I stood back and took a number of photographs of him suitably posed
on its summit. After he made his way
down, Mark then went up, and once down it was my turn.
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| John on the summit |
My time perched on its high point was gong to be
much longer than John’s and Mark’s as I wanted to gather data. This was complicated by it having a relatively
large cairn and a metal spike, come cross stuck in the numerous rocks that constituted
the cairn. These were too numerous to consider
removing, however the metal cross could easily be put to one side and proved
useful as an aid to take a measurement offset between the highest rock of the
cairn, which was used for the Trimble placement and the highest part of the
erratic still on show at the base of the cairn.
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| View from the top |
Once the offset was noted I set the Trimble up
and waited for the 0.1m accuracy level to be attained before data should be
logged. Once this appeared on the screen
I pressed ‘Log’ and hunkered down on the erratic making sure not to slip off
and importantly making sure my body was below the Trimble so as not to disturb
satellite reception. Curled up in this
position at the top of a large erratic is a novel experience, one that I’m sure
I’ve done before but as of now cannot remember where.
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| The Trimble set-up position at the summit of Meall Feith Rabhain |
As the minutes passed I wanted to stretch one
leg but remembered where I was and thought keeping the edge of this legs walking
boot on the erratic to be a safer option.
The five minutes of data collection was finally up and I emerged from my
curled up position to close the equipment down.
I now wanted to take a few photographs which proved rather difficult as
I had little room to manoeuvre, but once done I then made my way back down the
ladder which had been removed during data collection and was now back in place
and held by John and Mark.
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| Hunkered down and waving for the camera. Photo: John Kirk |
We left the summit with me carrying the ladder
following John as he made his way down his ascent route toward the path
crossing the second option for the bealach, whilst Mark headed down the way he
and I had ascended. Once over this
bealach John carried the ladder over the intermediary bump toward where the
three of us considered the critical bealach to be positioned.
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| Leaving the summit |
As John headed down to the bealach I waited for
Mark, this gave us opportunity to assess John’s bealach position from
above. We then joined him. As I set the Trimble up to gather data Mark
and John and the ladder where back at the car waiting for another five minute
data set to be gathered and stored.
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| The Trimble GeoXH 6000 gathering data at the bealach of Meall Feith Rabhain |
It felt good to be standing in a bog laden col
again, something I had not done in a long while. These times standing in bogs are unusually
fulfilling, with time to look and take in one’s surroundings. As the Trimble beeped away gathering its
all-important individual datum points I scribbled all necessary information in
my surveying notebook, and once the allotted data were gathered and stored I
squelched my way back to the equipment to turn it off.
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| Cloud capped Slioch |
It had been a fun experience visiting Meall
Feith Rabhain and proved a good hill to end on, as this was our last full day
in Scotland, and all that now remained was a meal out in Gairloch before the
next morning’s packing of the car. Leaving
Laide we took a different route from our inward approach and headed south toward
Loch Maree for views of Slioch and its cloud cloaked summit, it proved a
beautiful and fitting sight to end our Scottish trip on.
Survey Result:
Meall Feith Rabhain
Summit Height: 89.4m (converted to OSGM15)
Summit Grid Reference: NG 88388 94829
Bealach Height: 55.7m (converted to OSGM15)
Bealach Grid Reference: NG 88607 94730
Drop: 33.8m
Dominance: 37.76%
My thanks to Alan Dawson with
help processing these data
For further details please consult the Trimble Survey Spreadsheet
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