Suilven from Lochinver

Suilven is only 731m high, but its outline, a long sandstone ridge rising almost sheer from a moor scattered with lochans, makes it, in Walkhighlands’ words, one of Scotland’s best known and most easily identified mountains, and one of the finest peaks in Britain. It stands on the Glencanisp Estate, part of the roughly 18,000 hectares bought from the Vestey family in 2005 by the Assynt Foundation, a community body whose purchase was the first major landholding bought under the Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003. Lochinver, where the walk begins, is around 34 miles north of Ullapool by road, a drive rather than a day trip on foot.

From the end of the public road beyond Glencanisp Lodge, now owned by the community following the buyout, the route follows a track past the lodge, crosses rugged, undulating ground with Suilven’s western dome ahead, and passes within reach of Suileag Bothy, maintained by the Mountain Bothy Association. A well-made path, rebuilt by the John Muir Trust and the Assynt Foundation after the original ground had eroded badly, crosses the open moor and climbs to a grassy gully leading to the ‘nick’ in the ridge; Walkhighlands describes the gully as a very steep walk requiring care rather than technical climbing, though there is some very easy scrambling higher on the ridge. Near the top of the gully the path crosses the remains of a drystone dyke built along an absurdly steep line, thought locally to date from famine-relief work during the Highland potato famine, before the final slope reaches the grassy summit dome of Caisteal Liath.

Walkhighlands gives the round trip from Lochinver as 20km with 947m of ascent, reckoning seven to nine hours; there is no shorter loop, and the whole route is retraced back to the road on the way down. It suits a fit, experienced hillwalker prepared for a full day on this isolated ridge, with no way off it other than back down the ascent gully; it does not suit anyone wanting a half-day outing or uneasy on steep, loose ground, for whom Stac Pollaidh, reached from the same Ullapool base, gives a comparable Assynt summit view for a fraction of the effort.