Introduction
For many years, we had talked about going
back to Skye, and always the same idea had come back as the dream plan. We would go into the very heart of the Black
Cuillin, to the JMCS hut at Coruisk, and use this as a base for a week walking
and climbing in the hill. In this plan,
one other idea kept on cropping up. The
main target for this week would be an ascent of the Dubh Ridge. This is a legendary Moderate, a regular on
any list of the best mountain routes in the British Isles, and as a result of
this, there is a great volume of literature describing the route in much more
accomplished prose than I can achieve, but a few words of explanation are
necessary, and so here goes, cribbed shamelessly from the 2011 edition of the
SMC Skye Scramble Guide.
“Said Maylard to Solly one day in Glen Brittle,
All serious climbing, I vote, is a bore;
Just for once, I Dubh Bheag you’ll agree to do little,
And as less we can’t do, lets go straight to Dubh Mhor
So now when they seek just a day’s relaxation,
With no thought in the world but of viewing the views,
And regarding the mountains in mute adoration,
They call it not climbing but doing the Dubhs”
Or somewhat less poetically, a one kilometre
long stretch of slabs running at an average angle of 30 degrees from the shores
of Loch Coruisk up to the summit of Dubh Mhor.
In the end, nine of us were up for the trip,
Alan, Paul H, Ray, Brian, Mark, Rob, Nigel and Stuart.
And so the story begins…
There we were, all nine of us on the quay at
Elgol, waiting for the boat to take us into Loch Scavaig. We were basking in glorious sunshine,
surrounded by the barest minimum of supplies for a weeks stay in the Cuillin
(namely climbing gear, sleeping bags, food, fishing rods and two barrels of
beer).
The
Cuillin from Elgol
We’d negotiated a price with the owners of
the Misty Isle of £10 each way, including everything up to and including the
kitchen sink, for the boat run in to the hut at 5:30 on the Saturday afternoon.
Eventually, the time came for us to load,
with the help of Seamus and Stuart (the father and son/ Captain and Mate of the
Misty Isle). Now the time came to cast
off, weigh the anchor, and splice the mainbrace on the luff side. (See, I know
all the naval terminology) But first Stuart had an announcement.
“This trip should take us about 20 minutes,
but we hope you don’t mind if we take a bit of a longer route today, It’ll be
about an hour, but I think you’ll find it was worth it”
Out in the bay, firstly we saw a pair of
harbour porpoises. Normally this would have been enough to make us happy, but
then,
“Thar She Blows!”
Yup.
A loud snort and a long black back appeared above the waves, a flick of
massive flukes. A Minke whale. We tried to track it round the bay from one
exhale to the next, always not quite nearly in range of the lenses.
Then we were distracted by the hooligans,
more than 150 of them shouting and running around the boat, showing off,
turning cartwheels, playing chicken under and around us. A pod of Common
Dolphins, some adults showing battle scarred sides (don’t believe their
publicity, these boys can play mean!) others youngsters probably been shown
their silly landlocked cousins.
Eventually, they got bored with the game and beggared off to find
somebody else to torment, and we puttered into the sheltered cove.
Common
Dolphins in the
After the dolphins, the Grey Seals basking on the rocks like furry slugs
were definitely an anti-climax.
We landed and lifted all the kit up the somewhat precarious landing
stage (You try lifting two full barrels up a weed and barnacle encrusted steel
staircase, without either you or the beer ending up in the deep clear waters!),
and settled into the hut. The evening
passed uneventfully apart from a random Irishman turning up in the night trying
to buy a belay plate. The only issue we
had was that there was no water to the hut – no problem there, we know all
about that don’t we folks.
Ah, we’ll sort that in the morning.
G’night all.
Off
loading the Misty Isle
Next morning, after a night lulled to sleep by the farts and snores of
everybody bar me, and by a false start at 5 am by Brian going to take dawn
photos, we got up to sort the water. As
a diversion, why does dawn have to be so early!
Anyway, back to the plot. By
7:30, the temperature was rising, already above 30 degrees. Nige and Stu set off up to the Mad Burn to
find the source of the water supply.
They found the pipe clinging an unlikely VS line across a cliff face,
ending about 18 inches short of the pool.
So that’s what that coil of blue pipe is doing in the shed! So we’ll do without, and get fresh water from
the river, and flushing water from the loch.
Had a very jolly toddle around the
And so to the main course, the Dubh Ridge. A short stroll in the sweltering heat lead us
to the foot of the route. The overall 30
degree angle I quoted at you earlier is a bit misleading, as the ridge goes up
in a series of steep steps (some more blank than a self respecting Mod has any
right to be!), with wide terraces in between.
This got very interesting at one particular bit when the guys with the
rope soloed off into the distance, leaving me at the traditional exposed blank
slab stance. On and up the route goes
till you end up on the lip of an overhanging 100 ft and with a very nasty take
off. So the continuation was a DIY route
down the South Face into An Garbh Coire.
Back at the hut, there were interesting activities going on. Out in the loch a cruise liner had moored up
and a line of Zodiacs were cutting through water to the jetty. Each was filled with a dozen old age
pensioners coming ashore. The first held
the staff, and an elderly gentleman named John who was going to lead them round
the
“You are John, aren’t you?”
“No”
“Is this the way to the toilets”
“No”
“Is there a tea shop?”
“No”
I gathered a couple of the guys from the hut to do their sheepdog
impression, and we finally got them out of the way. That night the midges were horrendous. We incinerated them in the flames of
lighters, which is not very effective in the long run, but very satisfying.
On the
Dubh Ridge
And so to the bit you’ve all been waiting for, the Tale of the Coruisk
Shit Fountain.
Next morning, Ray got up to use the facilities and found they were
backed up to the brim. After much debate
into the contents of his bowels we went (reluctantly) to investigate. No amount of scrulching with the plunger
could achieve anything, so we decided to remove the stench pipe, as you
do. This showed a solid block, with we
tried to break up by proggling it with a fishing rod, and then by rodding it
with the new roll of water pipe, all to no avail. Al went about 100 yards down the hill to the
septic tank, where all started to become clear.
The end of the pipe was blocked by a plug of moss and turf preventing
the pipe discharging into the tank. Al
said I’ll prod at this, you tell me if there is any movement up your end. Bad choice of words, the pipe was full of
movements. So he stood astride the open
tank, with a stick in his hand and prodded at the plug. Sure enough, the pipe began to gurgle, and
folk began to step away from Al. He
prodded again. The plug began to move,
and 100 yards of turds began to force their way out, in a twenty feet high, 180
degree arc of shit, with Al at its very centre, receiving a fragrant
shower. When we could stand up again,
with our sides hurting from laughing, we started to commiserate (from a
distance) as he trudged off to the loch for a bath.
A great trip, to be repeated (but we’ll leave a couple of years until we
can be sure that the new water pipe is installed and disinfected!
Martin Fagan (Age 56½)
Editors
note:-
See
also:- “The Great Coruisk Shit Fountain”
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