Undiscovered Scotland

 

Stac Pollaidh means "peak of the peat moss", and has a character out of all proportion to its mere 612m or 2,008ft height.

Better known to its non-Gaelic speaking friends as "Stack Polly", Stac Pollaidh is a spiky little beast which rears up immediately to the north of the single track road from the A835 to Achiltibuie. The usual starting point is the car park on the south side of the road, and unless you're an early riser you'll probably find the spot easily enough by the collection of cars already there when you arrive. This is not a mountain for the solitude-seeker.

As mountains go, this one is extremely accessible, and over the years this had led to heavy use and severe erosion. As a result the southern side grew to resemble a peat-bog, and its rear a very large sand dune. In more recent times, a great deal of work has been done to retrieve the mountain from the effects of our boots, and an extensive path building programme has taken place.

You may or may not like made paths on mountains, but anyone who ever fought their way up the back of this one to reach the summit ridge in a cloudburst driven by a southerly gale on literally shifting sands will welcome the idea of better underfoot conditions.

We have to admit that this experience left us with no great fondness for Stac Pollaidh. But we are probably doing it an injustice, and a return trip to enjoy rather more of its spectacularly rocky ridge than we managed on our last visit certainly features on a crowded "to do" list.