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24th August 2007 – Inbhirfaolain, Glen Etive Attendees: Robert McMurray and Michael Johnston There was little interest in this years Inbhirfaolain meet. Some hummed and hawed (as usual) but in the end only myself and Mike made the trip west. This was a welcome return for Mike, following on from his wrist-break induced semi-retirement. It rained from Friday night until around 1.30pm on Saturday when the sky suddenly cleared and the sun even made an appearance. This was deemed a good time to start (the avoidance of an Alpine one being in no part due to a 3.30am finish the night before). Full waterproofs were rapidly removed for a quick nip up Sgor na h-Ulaidh from Glen Etive. Unfortunately though, our intended descent to the Clachaig for more beer was hampered by Lorna’s decision not to turn up. It's hard to get a taxi in Glen Coe you know! Due to this disappointment we descended the same way and drove round for a beer in any event. We returned to the hut with wood for the stove and enjoyed a night of beer, wine and much ‘slideage’. Yes – we may be getting older, but its amazing the fun you can have on a Saturday night with some slides and a projector!! Sunday morning was again wet and our plans to climb on the Buachaille rapidly receded. In the end the drizzle receded too and it actually turned out fine and sunny albeit a little nippy on the tops. We traversed Buachaille Etive Beag from Etive, dropping down into the Lairig Eilde for the walk back to the car. A great weekend was spectacularly ended with a visit to the Kingshouse Hotel on the journey home. This (un)fortunately coincided with, wait for it... a stopover from ‘the Rangers Ramblers Club’!! This surreal experience began with one of the clowns jumping out in front of my car ‘for a laugh’ as I drove into the car park. It is fair to say that never before have so many neds been seen in the Scottish hills. The place was awash with matching Rangers’ ‘shell-suits’ and folks wandering around in baseball caps with trousers tucked into their socks!? Whilst enjoying a pint we were (un)lucky enough to witness a raffle and speech with prizes for best (most ridiculous) outfit and lots of references to ‘the sash’, ‘flute bands’ and ‘Donald Findlay’ thrown in for good measure. There were some great quotes too including “I’m not Scottish, I’m from Strathclyde” but the best had to be whilst “the £5 bottle of champers”, was being handed out. “It’ll dae fer yer carey-oot on the bus Tam”, “dinnae look so worried its jist like Buckfast but fizzy”. Happy days. RDM
Glen Etive in the background - if I'm not mistaken
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