My trek up Ben Ledi might have been of the biggest treks I’ve ever done. From the moment I woke up I knew it was going to be a challenging but marvellous day. Just take a look at the view I was treated from my tent of the mountains behind Loch Achray.
The circular route started with me crossing about half of the Trossachs Way from the campsite to the base of the mountain.
Then I took a rather treacherous route across a landscape filled with heather and rabbit warrens, which showed signs of dangerous collapses.
A lost path
It started with a marked path but this did soon disappear apart from a couple of scattered posts that still remained, it was pretty clear that this was a path that no one else had followed in quite a while. So I traversed the contours as best as I could to reach the main mountain path….
Once I was on the main route it was much either to follow. The weather did take a bit of a turn as I walked into the clouds and received a bit of a pounding of snow and sleet, and some very cold winds.
False Summit
On Ben Ledi there is a summit before the summit, I knew I was heading for a trig point so when this wasn’t at the top of the first incline I knew that I needed to go a little bit further. It was visa Le at this point though and that almost always gives me a little adrenaline boost when I can see the trig point in the distance.
Poor weather at the summit
Unfortunately the weather wasn’t shifting much. The clouds were really starting to take over the top of the mountain so I didn’t hang around for long. I started to head back down I knew I wasn’t going to take the same route back. I don’t think that it was really even that possible, so I followed the main path back down to Callander knowing that it was going to add a few miles onto my trek back to camp.
The clouds had started to disappear and the views were absolutely stunning so I did take a few breaks as I was coming down the mountain. I had been out hiking for about 8 hours when I rejoined the Trossachs Way path and saw the sign which said 6miles back to Brig o’ Turk.
Knowing that there was a pub in the village did keep me going for the last stretch of this path. I had ran out of water at this point and I could start to feel the early signs of dehydration kicking in…
An almost empty pub
When I did reach the pub, unfortunately the door was open but they were undertaking some renovations to be ready for the upcoming bank holiday weekend. However even though nothing was on tap the landlord was an absolute legend sorting me out a free bottle of beer. I don’t know if I have ever enjoyed an ice cold Coors quite as much.
Then there was only a mile back to the tent. Where I simply collapsed into my camping chair and spent my even keeping a fire going. Drenching my stomach with a few litres of water and a healthy serving of Brewdog. Stuffing my face with chocolate and marshmallows whilst I looked back at the mountains I had conquered that day over the gorgeous Loch Achray.