It was Noel Williams who alerted me to the proposed remeasurement of Meall Gaineimh on Ben Avon just days before my scheduled 601-top completion with a 6 May email jokingly asking ‘A spanner in the works????’ So naturally we agreed that, as the Munro Society’s last (and presumably lowest priority) ‘heighting’, it was unlikely to be a serious threat, but I still found myself responding to another email from Dave Hewitt about my Fisherfield post with…
Not too chuffed to discover about the proposed remeasurement of Meall Gaineimh on Ben Avon just before (specially as someone who’s actually done all the tops, deleted tops and sundry other tors of Ben Avon) but not losing any sleep over it either… doubt it’ll make the height and, even if it does, it’ll take weeks to ratify so the worst case scenario is finishing the existing list in good faith and becoming subject to the usual rule of making good changes ASAP thereafter. That said, if I hadn’t crocked myself, I might just be nipping up there first to make sure! It would certainly be a worthy Top as the natural NE terminus to that ridge, but I also clearly recall looking at it from East Meur Gorm Craig and being thankful I didn’t ‘have’ to do the out-and-back!
On which note you’ll realise I’m still somewhat relieved to hear today through a tip-off from Graham Kelly that it’s measuring at something like 913.6m, so (subject to ratification from the OS) 0.8m short of the magic height:
Exclusive: Meall Gaineimh – A New Munro Top?
No doubt at all that the SMC would have given it ‘Top’ status had it measured up and that it ‘deserved’ to be a Munro Top. But I’m glad it’s not, despite the intrinsic comment there on the daftness of this whole game. I’ve already been to that 930 spot height on Big Brae and various other points (unlisted tors and things) as ‘insurance’ and can visit Meall Gaineimh (top right corner of map) sometime if I want to, but it’s not getting the chance to spoil things for me now!
