Last time I attempted this one I realised I had not done proper research as the one route to the summit is on the edge of Garelochhead Training Area, where His Majesty The King’s men in green shoot real live ammunition and get exposed to all sorts of flash bangs. The maps showed the path on the edge of the MOD area but in reality to get to the path you had to enter the training area through the gate. The gate was locked, the red beacon lights were flashing and the red flags were flying. This all tells me “Andy, stay away”. I tried to walk around and eventually came to a stile but it still looked like I was entering the live fire area so I retreated.
Now I checked on the web and phone the range control officer. He told me just what you can and can’t do when the warnings are showing. But you know, there’s this saying, YOLO, and I didn’t want to end up arguing with St. Peter that the range safety guy said I could but it still went bang! I STRONGLY suggest if you want to access the summit via the range that you make you own checks on access.
Now armed with the times when there is no firing (MOD web site) all I needed was a day I could go out and play, a day with decent weather, a day with no massive X-ray flares. That day was December 2nd 2024 
The forecast was for heavy rain overnight but dry and sunny at Garelochhead till evening. It absolutely hammered down with rain on my journey across Glasgow and up to Loch Lomond which was forecast. But as I drove up past Dumbarton and Alexandria the rain stopped and clear area of sky appeared. Result! Like last time, I parked up at the reservoir access road that is the non-range route to this hill and Beinn Chaorach.
The forecast was for cloudy, mainly sunny, mainly cloudy, very sunny, cloudy. Temperature around 3-5Cm 10mph winds from the North and downright Baltic amounts of wind chill. Freezing level starting at 700m at 8am and dropping lower all day. This meant it was time to crack open the cold WX gear… down jacket and Nepalese knitted hat plus the usual stuff. I bought a Mountain Hardwear Fleece in 1998 (big bucks) and it got lots of use as a general jacket. Eventually keys in the pockets wore some holes through and I stopped using it. Now the pockets have been fixed so I’m wearing it when walking. 26 years old and still going strong apart from the pockets. That has worked out at £4.50 a year. What do they say… buy cheap buy often. Buy Mountain Hardware and you need a loan from the IMF 
It’s about 5mins walk to the entrance to the range and it was cold. Proper cold in the wind. At the entrance, no red flags, no flashing red beacons. Result! Then it’s just a long haul up the most god-forsaken boggy/muddy track ever. Lots of signs advising you of the range. After about 10mins, 2 soldiers in a tracked Polaris came up and past and waved and smiled. I took that as more confirmation no shooting today. So I was not very amused about 10mins later when I got near a beacon light and the b@st@rd started flashing. “What the…” So now I’m on the periphery of the range and the NO ENTRY light is on. Then it stopped. I hung about for a minute or so and it stayed out so off I went. I kept checking any of the beacons I could sea in case they started again. If they did I was going to ring the range office as I had the number.
Anyway it’s on and on and soon the slope becomes almost nothing. But it was wet… soft peat/grass/mud about 1cm of surface water and 2cms of gloop. It was cold and I was cold. I had the Polartec fleece and the down jacket but I could have done with another layer. SO I upped the pace to keep warm. Did I mention the snow? Well my summit had taken a good pasting as I saw once it came into view. I expected big boys like Ben Lomond and the Arrochar stuff to be white but not this much on a 709m summit.
First snow observed on the ground at 540m. Then it just got colder and whiter and gloopier 
I kept up the pace and at Maol an Fheidh the path to the summit forks right from the main path. It’s obvious but much more made with feet unlike the main path made with vehicles. Could it get wetter even though there was a good 2-3cm of snow on it? Yes, awful stuff. Anyway the last 120m of ascent seemed very easy…adrenalin power to get clear of the range. Then I was there at the top where the ground was better but the wind was silly cold. Predicted windchill of -6C. Into the lee of the hill, of course the steepest slope, on with the down jacket and Nepalese hat and setup time. It took 1hr40 including a comfort break on the ascent. That took longer because an important part of me needed for comfort breaks had gone AWOL in the cold!
MM0FMF wearing a down jacket over a Polartec fleece over a long sleeved base layer and Nepalese double layer hat. This was after 1hr30 on the summit… the cold had knocked all the smile out of me!
On to 10m (obviously) and 12 CW QSOs including GI4ONL who was just across the water but his signal was incredible multiple round the world echoes. At times 4 or 5 echoes on each dit or dah. 2 on 10m SSB including Eric F5JKK… we have had many QSOs but this was the first voice one I think. @F5JKK. 40/30/20 trapped EFHW, 1:49 unun and KX2.
10m dried up after 40mins and I was really cold. Andy G8CPZ has written a lot about getting cold as he gets older, I thought he was just a big soft girl’s blouse. But I have to admit that I now feel the cold in my toes badly as I get older partly due to Diabetic Peripheral Vascular Disease. So I have a lot more respect that someone as old as Andy goes out at all I allowed myself 20mins more. So I worked 5 on 15m CW and then dropped down to 40m SSB and worked 8 more.
Station shutdown was 1200Z and it took 25 mins to pack up, have another comfort break, take some photos and take in the views one last time. Then it was out the way I came in. A lot of the snow had melted in the quite strong Sun and so the ground was even wetter if that was possible. In fact in a black jacket in the Sun, I was hot in my torso and had to undo the zip. Not warm in the toes though It took 1hr5 to get back to the car. The amount of rubbish (Costa Coffee cups, sports drink tins, and just plain litter is appalling but I found 2 more vapes including one which should have a big beefy battery.
Drink at the car, and heated seat and steering wheel on, heat directed at my feet and I started the journey back across Glasgow as the rush hour started. This was made bearable by tunes from Matt Schofield, Larry Carlton and James Marshal Hendrix’s Blue Wild Angel with his best recorded version of Red House.
View from the shack back over the ascent route. 4.8km back to the car. The sky was quite sunny on the way up but it clouded up as predicted.
Beinn a’Mhanaich GM/SS-062 summit cairn.
Ben Lomond GM/SS-011, I still have to do this one.
I don’t know which summit this is but it looks good? Guesses?
Beinn Ime, The Cobbler, Beinn Narnain
Looking back to Beinn a’Mhanaich on my descent. As predicted the cloud lifted and it got much sunnier. If only I had had feeling in my feet I’d have stayed longer hoping 10m opened up West.
How sunny did it get? Well this is a view from the Glen Fruin Road when I got down off the hill looking back up to the range entrance. Caribbean blue sky… in Scotland. Pah!
Hey ho, 7 points for this and another unique and another 10m multiplier.