ABC Wednesday--E is for Beinn Eighe

This is the description from Walkabout Scotland of our first day's hike on our walking tour: "Your first full day's walking in the Torridon area will be spent hiking up into impressive Coire Mhic Fhearchair. This is one of the finest corries in Scotland, with an amphitheatre surrounded on three sides by the imposing cliffs and buttresses of Beinn Eighe - part of the first National Nature Reserve to be designated in Britain. There is a good steady path most of the way and the views across the Torridon wilderness to the surrounding peaks are wide and expansive."

or sometimes not.

Beinn = mountain, so Beinn Eighe is Mt. Eighe

Coire = a rounded sort of a valley with steep sides formed by glacial action

The Coire Mhic Fhearchair is around the back of Beinn Eighe. Above are triple buttresses. It is a very impressive mountain--when you can see it. It is impressive as a hike, as well. Our goal today was not the summit of Beinn Eighe. We were on a "warm up" hike to "get our feet wet". We did that literally--I think it was supposed to be figuratively.

Beinn Eighe is one of the munros.

munro= a Scottish mountain more than 3,000 feet in elevation. There are 283 mountains that are designated as munros, named after Sir Hugh Munro, who created the authoritative list. (A mountain between 2500 and 3000 feet is a corbett, and one between 2000 and 2500 is a graham. Guess who made those lists.)

It was a very wet day. Incredibly wet. Elizabeth (law student from Austria) and Alexander (math student from Moscow) look like they are really enjoying the rain. Not! But hey, if we had wanted a tropical paradise, we would not have chosen hiking in Scotland, would we? By the end of the day we all looked like drowned rats.

The drowned rats of Beinn Eighe: My husband Ranney, myself, Nicola (from London) Elizabeth, and Alexander made up our hiking party, along with our guide Shaun.

Some more views from the hike:

Water crossing

Frog's eye view:

At the top of the waterfall:

Is that blue sky beyond the loch? Quick, take a picture before it disappears.

loch = lake

This visit to Beinn Eighe is part of ABC Wednesday--is it now the seventh round? or is it the eighth? I've lost count--I've been on vacation. Click on over to the ABC Wednesday site and check, and have a look at what others have found for the letter E. While you are clicking, there are more close views from this hike over at 365 No Themes No Memes, my photos only blog.