Exploring The Edge Of Scotland: A Hill Walking Story

For the majority of our stay on Harris we'd been looking out on this small rugged beautiful mountain just to the north of Northton where we were staying and I was really keen to get up it and yeah the morning light was amazing this particular morning so I decided to head up it but little did I know that when I got to the top there was a really sad tale to tell from this Oh good morning from the cottage and it's going to be another beautiful day so I've decided to start today with a hill walk and go up a mountain. We will be doing other stuff later on which I'm really excited about but for now I'm going to be heading up Mudal, Mudal I think it's called which has got a number of meanings which I'll come on to but you can see it from the front window of the lodge so I'm going to head up there there's no path it's going to be steep but I think it's going to be spectacular um and I think there's something at the top we've been seeing a little I don't know it's a cairn or something on the top of the hill there's no paths up it so I'm intrigued to find out what's at the top of the hill so yeah the sun is rising over Chaparral and the North Harris mountains are looking amazing so yeah let's go and do this before the heat of the day builds up and um yeah we'll do something more appropriate for that later for now let's get moving all right I'm halfway up well according to my altimeter I'm probably a third of the way up I'm going to go up the one next to Mudal so Mudal is here I don't know if you can see it behind me um the sun early morning sun's catching it but there's by the time I'd walked up the road from Northton that's Northton down there where we're staying I was almost neither the second hill which is higher which is called Greval so it's straight up here behind me so I'm gonna head up that one first why not it's just under I think 300 meters but what a spot the views are just out of this world it's an amazing place there's no path as expected but um just a steep heathery trudge through uh yeah through the heather funnily enough but look at the other thing I was going to say look at this lichen that's proper fresh air lichen look how big that is I mean you see lichen back home but it doesn't get to grow to that height it's wonderful so anyway let's go on and report at the top of Greval right let's go in terms of height these two hills aren't the highest but do not underestimate them to get up onto the ridge here took a bit of effort because it was short sharp and steep ah the summit oh nice wee cairn here actually and this is Greval what a view though look at this it's stunning absolutely stunning wow what a place I'll sit here for a while I think what a place this is just lovely I've got the uh camera sat on the wee cairn still intrigued to find out it looks bigger than a cairn on Mead Hill the other hill the first hill I was going to be going up and so I'm intrigued to see what the if it's just a cairn up there or whether it's a trig point or a memorial or anyway what a place um I've thought I've actually been watching the ferry leave um I think that'll probably heading to the Uist's and that's the rest of the outer Hebrides I don't know if you'll make them out on the uh on the camera but I can see them quite clearly it's just it's just a spectacular morning there's a wee breeze it's later in the year so there's less midges anyway I've not encountered one yet which is which is great but what a place and these hills on I suppose this is South Harris they're not that high this is just under 300 meters I think 260 270 but because you've got that prominence from the scene the views all around they're great and don't don't um mistake them for easy hills because they've not got a lot of elevation there's no paths and that was steep coming up there but yeah what a place so we head over to Meadal I'm intrigued to find out what this uh this cairn is on the top and I'm going to tell you what the different names are for Meadal I've been looking at the the Gaelic meanings and there's a few there all of which I think are quite apt I don't know which one I know which one it'll mean but yeah I'll come on to that later on but what a morning what a morning see sky now actually the Uist down here in that sky that's the uh you can see the Coulan mountains just about through the haze what a place right let's get going I need to get back to the family I almost don't want to leave there's some of the views are so nice but let's head over to the second hill I think the views from there are going to be just as spectacular might get some sort of beachy views and yeah let's go all right on to Meadal after soaking up the views from Grieval it was time to head on to Meadal and it was just a lovely walk across there wasn't much steepness between the two hills and the morning light and those views across the sea were delightful and I could hear I could hear like that sounded like voices on the hills but I was just probably voices from down in the village wafting up up on the breeze uh but it was lovely and it didn't take me too long before I was approaching the summit of the second hill I can see the summit now oh strange looking cairn this is going to be interesting I'll spin you around and show you just about there look at this I've never seen anything like this before it almost looks like a wee uh a wee lighthouse oh there's a plaque here what does this read oh it's a memorial erected in memory of the 10 men 10 man crew of RAF Shackleton WR965 Dillon who died tragically here on the 30th of April 1990 their friends family and fellow servicemen of the Royal Air Force Lossiemouth will never forget wow wonder what happened I've just come a short distance from the memorial oh my god look at this what a spot definitely going to take some pictures here I'll show you in just a minute what a spot I might just go a wee bit further down right I've um I've just been taking on what a viewpoint this is but um I didn't realize I honestly didn't realize it was a memorial up there and I've done a wee bit of um research and on the internet it was uh it states that the memorial was for an air crash as indicated by the the plaque and on the 30th of April 1990 a Royal Air Force Shackleton MK2 aircraft of number eight squadron RAF based at Lossiemouth crashed into this hill on the Isle of Harris whilst attempting to land at RAF Benbecula all 10 crew on board died in the crash which included the wing commander the Shackleton was the last of the fleet yeah pretty sad really sad and it's not that long ago really usually the Scottish Highlands are littered with wreckage from um crashes but I don't think I've come across one from the 1990 I mean that's well within my lifetime and Heavy Wally who was the leader of the RAF Kinloss mountain rescue team at the time in the description below. Right um time to go I think um I've bought a new piece of kit and I'm going to use it later on you'll have to wait and see what that piece of kit is so um let me just phone I'm actually going to phone and see if the the guys can see me my son let's see if he's going to wake up I might wake him up it's only quarter to 10 in the morning none of them are answering they must both be sleeping shocking let's go I eventually managed to get in touch with my family and um we'll see how good the iPhones are because my son's new iPhone he's just videoed me on zoom from the uh the cottage down in Northern right let's get back down and um oh the suspense must be killing you what's my new piece of kit oh the excitement oh dear god right I'll bring you back in a wee while let's go I eventually pulled myself away from the summit and I was I was conflicted it's such a beautiful beautiful place but having read the information of what happened here in the not too distant past it put me in a somber somber mood a very sad sad tale for sure anyway back to the the series of videos and as I've been doing with all these videos I've posted some pictures that I took from this location at the end of the video here