With afternoon rain forecast as a certainty, we chose to walk from Rowanlea (our apartment), and aim for the summit of Meall Mor, aka Ullapool Hill, an easy morning’s walk.
We were somewhat surprised to see our view of Loch Broom dominated by a cruise liner - Saga’s ‘Spirit of Adventure’, which caters for 999 guests, served by over 500 staff.
The route to our hill was up a well maintained path through plantations and across easy ground with good views. Some of Saga’s many guests were seen later in the ‘foothills’.
Lousewort (below) lined the path, and butterwort was also in flower in places.
The heady aroma of gorse was also in strong evidence, providing a foreground to views across Loch Broom. Hereabouts we also watched a blackcap for a while, a rare pleasure, and we noticed pale blue dog violets beside the path.
After an encounter with an Australian lady from Byron Bay, who had strolled to the summit in open sandals, we reached the cairn where the footpath ended. A muscular, topless chap from Stornaway chatted briefly an took our photo before running back down the hill for an important engagement.
Far below, free kayaking lessons were taking place as part of the festival, and yellow boats were ferrying passengers to and from the cruise liner.
Meanwhile Sue and I continued on a pathless route to our main objective, the 301 metre summit of Maol Chalaisgeig, where Sue took this picture of me with a backdrop of Ben More Coigach, Cul Beag and Cul Mor; wonderful hills.
A Brummie called Phil had seen us make our way to the summit, including our finding a way through a deer fence and had followed. A chatty fellow who was having a day off from a guided version of the Cape Wrath trail involving gear being transferred by van, and hotel accommodation every night. Not quite my take on the CWT, but he seemed to be loving it. I think it was a Thistle Treks venture. Good luck to them.
After a while, Phil returned ahead of us, and we all used the way through the deer fence - grateful to whoever had installed the ‘dog flap’.
On the descent we took a direct route that afforded good views over Ullapool and Loch Broom.
The festival was winding up, with all the food stalls dismantled, so we wandered along to The Bothy, a nice little cafe next to the campsite, for a light lunch.
On the way back to the apartment Sue spotted a slow worm that I had nearly trodden on.
Earlier, we’d also seen a Drinker Moth caterpillar - spotted by Sue as it rushed off to find a drink. (It was very dry up here today, our sometime boggy route could have been done in trainers without feet getting wet.
Bluebells were another feature of today’s walk.
Here’s our route - 11km with 330 metres ascent, taking 4.5 hours.
The expected rain did arrive. At around 5pm.
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