Bidean Nam Bian, Stob Coire Sgreamhach - Glencoe - Oct 2003Bidean Nam Bian, Stob Coire Sgreamhach InformationBidean nam Bian is one of the more popular hills of Glencoe and quite rightly so its a fantastic climb and the views are tremendous. The start of the trip goes up through the hidden valley, until the mid 1700's this valley was used the hide The McDonalds clan's stolen cattle is it is very secluded area that cannot been seen from anywhere. Its a very creepy place, well i think so anyway and Bidean nam Bian towers up at the head of the valley, brilliant place though. Stob Coire Sgreamhach never used to be a Munro until 1997 when it was recognised it was far enough apart from nam Bian to hold its own status, however nam Bian is definitely the peak of the day sitting at 1150m its the highest peak of Glencoe. If you get good weather the day you do this, I can pretty much 100% definitely say you will not be disappointed, I certainly wasn't! Bidean Nam Bian, Stob Coire Sgreamhach Routeplease keep mind I done this climb 7 months ago so I'm trying hard to remember my route so bear with me. I parked the Car at Allt-na-reigh car park, which is considerably larger than Altnafeadh you use for Buachaille Etive Mor. Head of down the path over the wooden bridge heading in a westerly direction. Keep following this path and you will start to go upwards following a river. Try and get across this river and find another path on the other side as soon as you can I paid for this at a later stage. If you do what I done ( I felt it was much better fun ) keep following the path up the right hand side of the burn until you get to a completely covered scree slope and have a right laugh trying to get up there. It was fun but took ages. After your up the scree slope there's a sort of plateau walk you do along the right hand side of the Hidden Valley with amazing views down it. After so long I'm not sure if you could go any further along the plateau thing your walking on you will need to make your way down into the valley. That can be difficult so watch out! Down in the valley you'll see what I mean about it being very creepy, it never seems to get light and the hills around it seem to block out sounds so it is silent. After a few pictures of Bidean nam Bian in front of you head over to the other side of the valley and join the path you should have taken before. This path is available pretty much the whole way up if I remember rightly and after half an hour or so the climb begins to get tough. Its a case of boulder jumping as for some reason there's a few hundred big beasty boulders on your so called path , who put them there? anyway that's fun and you after that its a another bit of strenuous climbing to you get out of the valley and once you peak your head out wow what a view. I don't really want to spoil it too much here but it is not expected that's all Ill say and when you get out of the valley you will get a bit of a shock ( we did and the cameras got brought out straight away, well I forgot mine so Alex had his amazo camera with him, there his photos below ). You can see the summit in your sights and although you may be knackered the views will pull you on. Another path starts up and takes you right to the summit. Being the highest peak in Glencoe has its advantages and you can see a jungle of peaks below you, the terrifying Aonach Eagach to the north and further North Ben Nevis is unmistakable. To put you in perspective here the weather was so good the day I done this hill I could also see the Cullin ridge in Skye. Also the to north just in front of you, you can see the ridge taking you over to Stob Coire Sgreamhach. It is a good looking ridge to say the least. On your way down to the ridge there's a small bit of scrambling over rocks required so be careful but its not a problem. Once your on the ridge I don't know if we were walking fast or what but we got to the summit of Sgreamhach in less than 20 minutes, I was shocked when I saw the cairn in front of me. Yet more brilliant views lie in front of you and you get a brilliant view of the Three Sisters. Now here comes the fun bit getting down and I don't think you really want to follow my route here, but we made our own which is fun I must admit. Down the northern side of the summit you will see a lot of large scree and a sort of path ( might not have been a path ) runs through it. We took this and edged our way through the scree. once you get past the scree you will see many drops on the right hand side of the path, one of which we went down. I think its the fourth drop was descendible and we went down there passing a fairytale Lochan. It really was like something out of a fairy tale. Good place for lunch if you can wait that long ( I was starving at nam Bian ). Just after the Lochan we found another path, this led us all the way down. It follows down the side of a river and even though the weather that whole week had been amazing the ground was still very boggy so must have been one of those bogs that's always a bog ( does that make sense?) anyway after you get back down to the bottom of the hill I'm sorry but its a pretty boring walk back to the car. it follows the road all the way but you do get amazing views of your days climbing. The weather like that for Buachaille Etive Mor was absolutely amazing ( we met an old guy at the top who's done all the Munros and even he said he's never had weather like this before. That was just to make you jealous, did it work?. We got amazing visibility and I don't think there was a cloud in sight. Yip why cant they all be like that? Bidean Nam Bian, Stob Coire Sgreamhach Photos / Images / Picturesforgot mae cam this day trying to get some off one of the walking crew!
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