After yesterday’s gentle start to the week, I took my group into the Fannichs today. The target was Sgurr nan Clach Geala, with the options of scaling Sgurr nan Each and possibly even Meall a Chrasgaidh as well if the group were feeling strong enough.

We started by following the stalkers path, heading south along the banks of Allt Breabaig. It’s first time I’ve walked up this route but it quickly revealed its hidden treasures. We soon stumbled across about half a dozen dear, who eyed us up tentatively before retreating further up the glen.

Having committed ourselves to the west back of the stream to start with, we knew that we’d have to cross at some point, and kept heading further upstream, waiting for the water stream level and width to reduce enough to allow an easy crossing. When it came to it, the crossing was no problem, although there were some interesting dives from the group  in an attempt to avoid damp feet!

Not long after the stream crossing, we caught up with the dear again, who had obviously regrouped with the rest of the family, as there were now about 30 of them. The scale of the mountains also became more impressive as the rock faces, particularly to the west towered above us. We also spotted a patch of snow, showing a crown wall and scoured mountain face, indicating that an avalanche had taken place. Within minutes, an impressive rumbling noise attracted our attention to the fact that even more of this snow was cascading down the mountain taking rock with it.

We then pushed on to the southern end of the valley before turning east and climbing up towards the saddle between Sgurr nan Clach Geala and Sgurr nan Each, where the group found their first patch of snow to play in. A quick decision was made to drop most of the bags and make a quick dash for the southern most peak of Sgurr nan Each before picking up the bags on the way back.

The climb up to Sgurr nan Clach Geala was hard work, and the cloud came in as we neared to summit to make things that bit harder. However, we found our way to the trig point at the top and, soon after starting our descent to the north east, we passed another group making their way up the ridge.

As the cloud began to clear again, we found ourselves in a large snow field on a suitable angle for introducing some winter skills. We bid a bit of ice axe work and dug a snow pit to look at the different layers of snow and talk about what causes weaknesses in the snowpack.

After making the decision not to push on to Meall a Chrasgaidh, we made a fast descent, making good use of slippery waterproofs and ice axes to drop about 200m in about 5 minutes, before the long way back out to the minibus.

The Fannichs is a beautiful area, and we were fortunate to have the chance to enjoy it in predominantly good conditions. We even got to have some fun in the snow to round off a great day.