For our final Corbett we had decided to have a leisurely holiday on Jura and complete on Beinn an Oir. However, FMD came along and we were able to access Jura before restrictions were lifted on the other summits left to do. Thus fate intervened and Ben Aden became our final Corbett. Rather than walking in to Sourlies bothy and making the ascent from Carnoch, we decided that it could be done in the day by kayaking down Loch Quoich and approaching over Meall a'Choire Dhuibh.
The day in June arrived and at 5am we launched our canoes at the nearest road point at the western end of the loch. As the most experienced paddler I pushed Syl off and proceeded to lash my rucksack to the deck before setting off. In my haste to catch up I mustn't have tucked in the spray deck properly, and after a short time it came out of the groove at the back of the cockpit. With a 9km paddle I didn't want to get wet before we started walking, so I carefully placed the paddle across the foredeck and, using both hands, proceeded to sort out spray deck from cagoule and tuck the former in properly. Whilst doing this my hat blew off, and the action of making a sudden grab for it, together with the weight of the rucksack on the aft deck, capsized the canoe. I was immediately completely inverted.
At this point I must have let out some sort of yell, and by the time Syl turned round there was nothing to be seen - the upside-down canoe was lost in the waves. While she was panic-stricken above the water I was having great difficulty recovering myself. Without the paddle I couldn't get right way up, and my walking boots were jammed between decks. Just as I thought I was about to drown I struggled free and swam to the shore while Syl collected canoe, paddle and hat.
Having changed and recovered we set off again, but after about 5km the cold set in and I was experiencing cramp in both legs. Not a happy situation, so I shouted to Syl and beached about 500 metres from the Abhainn Chosaidh. This was quite fortunate because until then the shore had been too steep to land. The decision was then made to walk in the rest of the way.
Arriving at the river, which was in partial spate, we had to walk a long way upstream to make a crossing and follow the long- abandoned track to the end of the loch. We couldn't find the path shown in the SMC guide up Meall a'Choire Dhuibh, so we followed Allt Coire nan Gall until we could make a rising line to land us by the lochans close to the first bealach. We then followed the ridge, skirting round the north side of the first knoll, then down and up to the summit. Time taken: 61/4 hours.
We made an easy descent down Allt Coire na Cruaiche and retraced our steps to the morning's crossing place of Abhainn Chosaidh. Once across the river the dark clouds came in and the wind began to gather strength, bringing with it ten minutes of stinging hail. By the time we reached the canoes the NE wind had created white horses breaking from 1m high waves, and we both agreed that paddling would be suicidal. By now we were too tired to contemplate walking out over miles of peat hags (and having to recover canoes the next day), so we sat out the squalls for over an hour until canoeing seemed reasonable. The paddle back was uneventful but we were both thoroughly tired by the time we landed. The whole expedition took twelve hours.
In completing all the Munros, Tops and Corbetts, in all sorts of conditions, this was our only real epic. As Syl said afterwards, it would have been really sad if I'd drowned on the way to the last Corbett, but not quite so bad if it had happened on the way back.
