A Munro is a mountain in Scotland over 3000 feet high. These were first listed by Sir Hugh Munro in 1891, and although the list has been modified several times there are still 282 to go at. The best time to get started on the Munros is now!
It was the book that came first. After completing the Lake District Wainwrights in 2019, some friends bought us Cameron McNeish’s book ‘The Munros’ and suggested this could be our next endeavour. Consisting of 282 Scottish mountains, each ‘Munro’ is over 3000ft (914m) in height and are spread from the shores of Loch Lomond in the South, to Sutherland in the far North with 13 on islands (Mull and Skye).
Whilst a much-appreciated gift, the initial thought was ‘nice idea but not that feasible’. For a start, they were all so far away. Living in The Lakes, the Wainwrights were all on our doorstep and everything was very much in familiar territory. Despite residing fairly close to the Scottish border, most of the Munros would entail a minimum 5-hour drive (each way) just to get to the start. Some were 7-8 hours drive away and a round trip of 15+ hours just wasn’t feasible for your average weekend. When on earth would we get to actually do them?
On top of that, unlike the Wainwrights, where you can tick off several in one small area, many summits near Munros are classed as ‘Munro Tops’ because they are slightly shorter than the official Munro. So you may have to scale their peaks to get to the Munro proper, but they don’t count, even though they’re over 3000ft. Confused? We were and soon realised this was going to make getting all 282 even tougher.
Still, our friends had been kind enough to buy us the book and to be honest, that seemed as good a reason as any to give it a go. It wasn’t for another 5 years, however, that we’d actually get around to starting them and then, it was only after being shown up by a 10-year-old child! Whilst camped next to a family of fell runners on a recent trip to Torridon, we realised the said 10-year-old had so far ‘bagged’ 157 of them and the entire family were eagerly squeezing in a Munro or two on each day of their short holiday. Admittedly, this was no ordinary child (the entire clan being biking/running/mountaineering superstars), but still…
So the very next day, we got cracking. The Munros of Torridon are perhaps not the best place to start if you’re not used to the mountains. Long, steep and with a few exposed scrambly bits, there are definitely easier ones to warm up on but we were in the area and didn’t think it was anything we couldn’t cope with. Indeed, that first outing round the summits of Beinn Eighe, although not physically easy, didn’t present any real difficulties (except perhaps the 2km jog on the flat road back to the van which, on tired legs, felt way harder than scaling any of the peaks!). Others in the area such as Liathach, require a better head for heights, but this one really wasn’t too bad with just a little straightforward scrambling down a scree gully.
At some point in the next few years, we’ll have to visit Skye and tackle the Cuillin Ridge, a collection of Munros that require not only fairly advanced scrambling skills, but also rock climbing and abseiling. But for now,…back to Torridon.
Beinn Eighe has 7 summits over 3000ft but only 2 are classed as Munros, again proving that this was going to take us a long time to tick them all off the list. Still, it felt great to have started and you quickly start to think differently about your next trip North, seeing how many you could feasibly squeeze in during your week’s holiday. Unlike the Wainwrights, we won’t be knocking these off in 6 months but it’s actually quite a nice thought that this challenge could keep us going for years.
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