This was the 3rd summit I did when up at Ullapool at the start of October. After the fun and games on the previous two I was prepared for more trouble on this one especially as the WX was brilliantly sunny. It’s a 21mile drive from where I was staying but I passed an area marked as “An Teallach View” and for some reason the words described the view accurately.
An Teallach GM/NS-004 my word, what a view!
Further along to the parking area at the end of the public road, I was worried it would be full of motorhomes and van life people so I arranged a backup parking space. As it was I got the last space. Boots on, equipment check… oh dear I had forgotten to fill the water bottle 
There’s what looks like summer hut/chalet just after the car park and a bloke was watering plants and he very kindly let me fill my bottle from his hillside supply… tasted fine to me.
After that it’s along the track about 2km. I had to stop for some more photos as the views were rather good.
Looking WNW along Little Loch Broom towards the Outer Hebrides.
And back up Little Loch Broom with Dundonnell at the head on the right.
So here’s the map of the route.
(C) Ordnance Survey 2025
It’s an easy walk along the track then you reach a point where the surface switches to a flagged finish with local rocks, it drops to the right turns left and you can hear the burn and you are meant to look for the cairn which does its best to hide like this.
Instead, look for this distinctive and large rock feature and there is the path you follow after leaving the track. Oh dear, that’s a bit steep. It is a climb of 220m in 600m forward, go straight up, do not pass Go! do not collect £200
In fact you don’t go to the top but the centre of the image on the skyline. Still it’s a climb-and-a-bit but despite tired legs and warm sun I was fired up and it didn’t seem that hard. It was though.
2/3rds of the way up the first steep slope. Yes it is this steep but the path meanders at times but it does never seem to end.
Please let the climbing stop soon… well it does. But only when you are somewhat warmed up and panting do you see the scale of the final slopes…
Hmm, I knew this would be a bit of a brute. The computer said 2h20 and after the hard ground yesterday and my tired legs and the fact I’m a bit less fit than earlier in the year I decided 3h30 would be a good alert time. It took 3h20, oh dear an hour behind what I should be able to do.
Anyway looking at the ground in that picture it’s obvious that after normal amounts of Scottish rain that would be quite boggy but we’ve had a very dry summer so it was OK. There’s nothing to give any scale but the base of the final slopes is about 1.2km from here it just looks further. I stopped and removed a layer or two here as I was warm. From the top there’s a bit of a drop and a really obvious path, soft and wet in places. It runs down and close to the side of Loch na h-Uidhe and finally crosses a burn linking Loch na Coigreag to Loch na h-Uidhe. It’s narrow enough to step across in places, just wide enough to need to jump in others and in the middle, stones to step on.
I had a wee break on the far side, a good drink from the burn and 10mins chilling time. After that it was look at the never ending climb and pick a route. No paths or none I could find. I had a rest at the burn on my return. Filled up my water bottle, filled my stomach with chocolate and was amazed to have really good 4G reception (look at the picture to see how remote it is). I did some browsing whilst chilling. Applied some sun-cream as my arms were burning, about 18-19C at the beginning of October!
This was taken on the descent but makes explanation of the route easier. this is looking back. The big hill in the centre distance is Sail Mhor GM/NS-048
You climb up and appear at the top in the middle of the loch on the right. The path descends and follows the left bank of the loch on the right to the burn. Cross the burn and then up. Looking you can see a large flat shelf of rock on the left. It’s about 140m of ascent from the burn to there. It’s where I had another wee breather. Legs were faltering now.
After that it gets properly steep. At times the slope was a little more than I was comfortable with. Careful footwork now and I thought this was too much especially with the sun beating down. But if I took 15-20 paces and checked the GPS I could see I’d climbed about 10m. So it was 15-20 paces check GPS and work out how many more times to repeat. And repeat it I did till I reached a nice large flat area where the grass became very thin. In fact compared to Cnoc a’Bhaid-rallaich GM/NS-100 the previous day, the grass/ground was not that much an issue. Now at the top it was bowling green length but very rocky. And there was a path. How I don’t know but an easy to follow path and bish, bash, bosh I was at the summit.
How steep? This is 2/3rd up the final climb. Damn steep is the answer.
I didn’t believe it that it suddenly became simple to get to the summit. 10mins breather and setting up the Iridium sat spotter. I made use of the rocks in the wind shelter to support the pole. It was a bit breezy at the top but refreshing.
Antenna at the wind shelter.
I started on 40m SSB mainly for UK chaser’s benefit and worked 11 then moved to 15m CW and worked 18 QOS. No JA this time but NE4TN in Tennessee was ODX. Then 20m CW working 13 QSOs include WX1S and K4QS and I finished with 5 on 30m. I had to sit down in the wind shelter because I couldn’t work the radio as the views were magnificent.
I don’t intend to point out all the summits in the panoramas but I’ll post the reference that shows them all, click the link and display the map and labels in an other tab.
Looking East to The Fannichs, An Teallach, The Fisherfield Five and beyond.
Looking West to the Hebrides and The Summer Isles
Looking North to Ullapool. The picture is level… it’s the way the ground lies and distortions in the wide angle lens. It’s a Leica but not one of those zillion dollar Leicas 
Panorama link
The Coigach Peninsula. The long ridge is Ben More Coigach GM/NS-057
Near summit is Beinn nam Ban GM/NS-090, I planned to bag this on Saturday morning on the way home but the WX said no. The big hill behind it is Beinn Dearg GM/NS-003
An Teallach GM/NS-004 and Sail Mhor GM/NS-048. Follow the burn up and out to the far distance and there are your Genuine Fisherfield summits, some of the remotest in the UK. A’Mhaighdean GM/NS-013 and Ruadh Stac Mhor GM/NS-021
Scoraig Peninsula and The Summer Isles.
Somebody looks pleased. Drunk on endorphins and adrenalin… MM0FMF definitely smiling at the summit.
Then it was time to go. I didn’t want to the views and WX was so good. But it was packup, KitKat and then down and back the same way. As I said earlier I had a 20-25min break at the burn. Climbing back up was not difficulty but legs and feet were asking how much more of this. Then it was back down the damn steep slope.
At the start of the steepening slope. WX was awesome.
Yes, it’s this steep and that makes tired legs catch fire!
And just like that I was at the path back to the car park. It was a nice gentle plod enjoying the views. I met an nice retired older chap exploring. He was up from Lancashire in England and had never been this far North in Scotland before. I explained the WX was not normally like this or for so long and he thought it was his best holiday in 30 years especially as he had seen an Eagle the day before. Then back to the car, can or two of diet Red Bull clone and about 750ml of water and another KitKat. Then it was back to the B&B for a long shower and some thing to eat.
Wow. Wow. Wow! This was a bit of trek after 2 days of hard ground. But if you are going to do remote and hard(ish) hills then to do them in such weather is just spectacular. So I have found a brilliant B&B in the area and there are just so many more oddball summits, that nobody does unless Marilyn bagging, crying out to be activated and just so few people to come and do them.
And to finish off an arty photo across Little Loch Broom.
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