Cape Wrath Trail: Wilderness & Waterfalls! (Day 5 & 6)
good morning folks day five on the cape wrath trail we have just left our accommodation that turned out an absolute master stroke because it rained all night so we'd have had to be dealing with wet tents this morning instead our tents were drying and so are we yeah we're all dry well fed and rested well rested so today's objective is to get up and over the pass and over to shield bridge and cantil this here is one of the stocking ponies they'll take the carcasses of the dead deer down off the hill all right so this is us up onto the hill oh this is a steep pull up to wake you up oh alrighty now on the track underneath the pylons these pylons i believe service isley sky and then we'll veer off to the right at some point up over the pass right we are at the top of pylon pass we lose a little bit of height we've got two more pylons to go and then we veer off to the right so we do drop a bit of height unfortunately that's a little bit annoying so the pylons go down that way we are going this way this path behind ian and as you can see i'll skirt around this hillside zigzags up there and over to the [ __ ] ridge which we're obviously not doing we've been going an hour and a half now since leaving the accommodation we're under the big monroe there schooner scene and there's a lot of shepherds out there i'm sure i remember from watching hounds of houndgate i'm sure he had to spend the night in there it was pretty rough that rings a bell i didn't need a watch back yeah so i've had dry feet right up until about now and my toes just dipped in crossing this river all right folks wow that was tough going i'm almost to the top of the pass now i've got a [ __ ] ridge over there it's going to ski near and i'm just going to stop for a bite to eat because there's an overlay just blown over there so that's just under 10 kilometers from our accommodation at kimilcurn so that's not too bad it took us four hours to get here and because of our late start this morning it is twenty two three so we should get in two cantile for the back at five six o'clock uh don't know where we're going to camp might use the campsite might push on just a little bit more get closer to marvik we are just scouting underneath the fork and ridge and we're on the monroe's back we're on the monroe baggers path i don't remember it being this bad but it's really rocky it's loose not much fun at all and uh i'm just on some avalanche debris as well don't watch myself if you can see just see behind me there bye the earth's been moved some rock fall as well quite impressive but anyway ian's mill's ahead of me that's tricky so i'm going to put the camera away get across it and i'll bring you back on the other side glad that section's over with so you'll see here just behind me that's the path for the fork and ridge if you're monroe bagging get yourself up there if you like a bit of exposed scrambling it's cracking anyway enough about the fork and ridge just speaking of ian there and we both kind of agree you would actually be better it's still a phone sorry i'm shooting into the sun but instead of following the monroe baggers track you could drop into the quarry under all this and then you come out here just below there and then you're back under the track anyway i don't know but anyway look at this fine view here the five sisters of kintail superboss oh i love that feather folks if i'd come on camera for a wee morning just to kill some of this track we've dropped off the forcan ridge um and we're down on the stalkers path which eventually takes you to the shield bridge campsite and the petrol station on the way down i dislodged the boulder and obviously trying to make sure the boulder never caught my ankle uh i forgot about my trekking pole and lo and behold the boulder caught my trekking pole now if you can see that bend there but uh that's a bit of a bummer so i'm gonna pull down sort of well it still holds my weight ian suggested maybe trying to bend it back but it's all in many of my thinking i i just know you'll get that hairline crack so my tech needs two poles but ian's 10 doesn't so i can borrow one of his poles later tonight it's just a bummer they're not that old always seem to destroy poles this is the path here that i was talking about it's not too bad i'm just taking my time now been going nearly six hours and we've only done 13 and a half kilometers going up and over that path was a quite time consuming well that's us pitched up now we found this lovely little sort of island we could see it fell way up the hill when we're coming down and looked flat before let's camp there and uh that's exactly what we did so uh yeah high spirits are back now i've had something to eat and i'm just avowing everything touch wood my feet are fine stop the blisters so that's good my bum cheeks that's calm down hey what else did you have i can't remember there's another problem isn't there ah new problem you know my trail shoes have got two holes in them and that's going to emerge in to one big hole at some point i've got a new pair of shoes winging my way in three days time the left shoe is not quite as bad so i'm hoping they can hold out to craig uh nothing to repair them with unfortunately i can maybe buy something in the shop tomorrow so uh oh yeah the bent trekking pole ian's like me has one um i'm not going to try and bend it back in case it snaps ian did suggest maybe heating it up but i just think if you bend it a little bit you just get that hairline crack and that will be a ghost so i managed to put the paw a little bit further up into the into the shaft we'll put the flip lock back on there and it seems to be holding my weight so i'll see how that goes but i can fall back on ian's pole at least for putting my tent up at night um other than that not much else to report i think you got anything in captain's log for me nothing from ian nothing more for me i'll see in the morning good morning campers it's literally just gone seven o'clock i uh woke up about 10 minutes ago we'll check if he ends up yeah he's up right so the plan now is to get down to shield bridge and we have uh sent parcels to the kintail craft shop and we'll obviously support them by buying some stuff from the shop as well i believe they do some hot savoury food so that'll be good so i shall bring you back once the tent is down and packed up um shoes are frozen the laces i can't tighten because they're like all frozen up socks are well frozen this is current scenes then up towards the forking ridge again so all right so we're on the road now on our way to cantel the shield bridge petrol station was closed it looks like they've actually ceased trading possibly because of covert it took exactly an hour to get here and they're closed well when i see their clothes they're not open yet ten till tens are they're opening times so we've got another kill by just have some scratching out because i'm starving with an hour's weight in the nice sunshine which i enjoy our tents here's my food supply parcel let's get wired in i cannot remember what i put in it right what i've got what i've got freeze-dried meal used by meal porridge bars sarin my noodles some why food powder for my breakfast more nuts chocolate chocolate okay all right let's get this packed up okay okay it is 11 o'clock and we've just left the kintel craft centre a bit annoyed because we've kind of wasted two hours because we had to wait for the place to open their hours are 10 till 10 and then we fast about with our gear getting our parcels open and then before we know it we've been there for two hours so uh it's left us a little bit short because we've got a big day today we would like to get to mealwood buffet so i don't know if that's possible but hey we've camped at iron lodge before i don't know if you watched that video but we've pitched up just behind the old lodge there so we know that's an option because i don't think there'd be much camping available after that so we know we can stop there if needs be ian's dad is also meeting us at craig at jerry's hostel with another food parcel i've got a fresh pair of shoes i think i mentioned it already and i might swap out to my mountain terra pants because i'm not sure about the tight shots combo ah yes i've got fond memories of this place yeah big displays for my monroe completion i think there's about 30 of us all celebrated and i finished the monroe's on quiche 2 back down the glen but yeah it was a good weekend there's a few sore heads falls off glomac this way just what you don't miss me turning i'm looking forward to getting back out of civilization because i've got a total seat to attend to and there's just too many houses around here all right let's get cracking so you're here you've got a bag like a fishmongers windy all right yo folks i'm at the top of the pass on the way to the falls of glomac and the next chapter of our hike is opened up so i reckon the falls of glomac must be down here but iron lodge is just down there in there neil voo buffet will be right through that gap i think there already folks we're at the top of the the falls actually a little tad nervous about this but guess a bit of a reputation that was a knee jangler by the way you come all the way up you have to come all the way down but we're here now that is what it is alrighty we've been down we've had a look that is stunning never seen a waterfall like that elsewhere but anyway there's a little path that takes you down it's a dead end it's a little viewing platform our path is about 10 50 meters above that the contours above the crags and just below those cracks there as well i'll show you in a minute and that contours around and then i think we must drop down this ridge here in front of me i'll just show you so yeah you can see here this little path will take you down here and that just gives you the reviewing platform you view the waterfall instead hopefully the camera will pick up there's a path here above here but below those crags and this should take us around and then down this nose here so yeah the viewing path is just down there we have picked up this path just above and hopefully this is the right one and i will report back okay do so well that is a brand spanking new bridge and thankfully that's us negotiating to the whole gorge and it follows the glomac once we're on that path it's a well-defined path it's a couple of rock steps which require care and you're always sort of aware of the drop down to your right so really just take your time i'm glad it was dry today it would be a bit more tricky in the way but the yeah if you just pick up that slightly higher path it will get you all the way around so iron lodge is the second building away in the distance zoom in champion i don't know if you can see it but that looks a long way well hello there on the track ah tv so it's back out for us back into the wilderness before the glow mark is away in there right here there's iron lodge very tempting to stop there for the night i can't believe we did a few years ago i think we're just going to push on and make a go and get into male v buffy this is about eight nine kilometers a eight kilometers and it's six o'clock so we've got three hours daylight no i don't have to get there when it's still light obviously so uh i probably won't do much filming between here and melvoy so uh i'll catch you later geez oh two fighter jets just right right across what a fright of course by the time i get the camera they're long gone no warning no just boom yeah i thought the movement was coming down on us all right well i've got a camera i may as well show you the progress so we're on this track it's been really good we're just taking our time and we'll drop a little bit of height and then we climb up to this pass here and then it'll be a slow descent into the buffet so uh i'll just keep carrying on the moment bob's top of the pass it's mostly downhill from now geez oh i just hope we're having a bit off more than we can chew today knees are feeling a bit fatigued anyway we're in the shade it's getting cold so i'm going to chuck on a layer and a quick big t quick breather and then push to the buffy we're here oh my god that took us 10 hours 20 minutes he's leaving our campsite this morning 1100 meters of a cent and 32 kilometers that's our biggest day of the trip and i must admit i was a little bit worried i'd push myself too much my right knee was just a little bit sore but i think it's fatigue so i am shattered and so is down and they get sorted out and i'll seize in the morning catches
2021-06-03 00:10
