Weather/Conditions: Brilliant winter weather - generally pretty settled, and some warm sun ocming out in the afternoon.
Distance/Ascent/Time: 5.1km / 730m / 5h 15m
Accompanying: Kev and Rupert

The Pap of Glencoe, or Sgorr na Ciche to use the Gaelic, is a pretty striking mountain rising straight out the banks of Loch Leven. It's stuck on the very end of the northern wall of Glen Coe, in some ways a prominence of the larger Sgorr nam Fiannaidh.

Kev came up from Glasgow, and it was our original intension to climb elsewhere. I met him outside Kinlochleven and we debated what to do. The first thought was Mam na Gualainn, but it's a fair trek from Kinlochleven. Instead, we felt the Pap of Glencoe fitted the bill. Driving around to Glencoe, we parked the cars at the foot of the hill. I immediately got this bit wrong, for we ended up bashing across a field to get to the path. The hill is well signposted from the main road, we should have just driven 500m further on. Must remember this next time! It was really a day of conversation, telling Kev of my plans of moving, talking about the hills. The sun was out, the weather was good, and it was continually a source of pride to think I'd just made this place home.




I've been up The Pap once before, in 2014. That morning, I was up it in around an hour, and ran back down within two total. I recall some scrambling at the top, but Kev and I took a different route this time, following a path on the north-west flank to cut through crags to the summit. It's probably got a couple routes through the crags at the top. I got to the summit shortly before Kev, meeting a couple on top. We spent a while on the summit; the weather was just so calm. It's been this way all winter - and autumn.

With the day wearing on, we took a less steep descent south-east, curving back to descend into Glen Coe, and back down. This time we actually followed the track to the road, where a sign clearly points the way. I should have looked for that in the morning!

360° Panorama

Sgorr na Ciche