Weather/Conditions: Wet and windy! Not warm either...
Distance/Ascent/Time: 9.4km / 300m / 1h 53m
Accompanying: Alone

Druim na Birlinn is of no great height, but it is a forest top above the Corran Narrows and on the edge of Loch Linnhe. I wasn't specifically out to find a summit, but it presented itself on the way, so why not?

I've been at Arisaig rather a lot lately. The goal is to link through All The Small Things and this has required some amount of work. Stunning the effort, really: the driving, the walking in, the routine. Climbing hard seems to be built on a platform of routine. You keep as many variables as constant as you can so it allows you to better deal with the 'chaos' that would threaten to throw you off target.

I've been getting everything in order to complete this climb. Last week the winds were booming through the cave, which is good: southerly and dry. Conditions were just perfect. This week, though dry, it is much calmer and yesterday (20th), the conditions are much inferior. That's unfortaunte.



Anyway, with a day away from the climbing, I took a wander up the forestry tracks behind Corran. It was a wet lunchtime, and I went almost to the end before turning around and heading back. At times, the rain hammered down, but it eased as I made my way back. And just aboveme was Druim na Birlinn, a top covered in thick heather and studded in little pines. I clawed and grappled my way up a steep slope that never seemed to end. It all seemed a bit absurd, really. I ploughed through heather over the top of the druim, Loch Linnhe burst into view, Sgurr na h-Eanchainne on the far side. It's a great-looking hill I've get to climb (along with it's higher counterpart to the SW). (I climbed it a couple days later on the 23rd!)

The way direct off to Corran was also suitably rough, but it's always a bit easier going downhill than up. All this sucked up time and I walked back to Corran. A short day!