Caisteal Abhail is a mountain on the
Isle of Arran
The Isle of Arran (; sco, Isle o Arran; gd, Eilean Arainn) or simply Arran is an island off the west coast of Scotland. It is the largest island in the Firth of Clyde and the seventh-largest Scottish island, at . Historically part of Butesh ...
in
Scotland
Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...
.
It is the northernmost
Corbett Corbett may refer to:
* List of Corbetts (mountains), 222 mountains in Scotland between , with prominence over
* Corbett, Oregon, a community in the United States
* Corbett Award, US award for athletics administrators
* Corbett (surname), people w ...
on the island. The mountain forms the main part of a view known as ''
The Sleeping Warrior'' due to its distinctive outline (resembling the profile of a recumbent figure) as seen from the mainland. The most notable feature of the mountain is ''Ceum na Caillich'' (often rendered as the "Witch's Step", ''cailleach'', here in
genitive
In grammar, the genitive case (abbreviated ) is the grammatical case that marks a word, usually a noun, as modifying another word, also usually a noun—thus indicating an attributive relationship of one noun to the other noun. A genitive can al ...
also means an old woman/hag), a deep gash in the eastern ridge. It is the northernmost peak in a chain of three Corbetts:
Goat Fell
Goat Fell (marked as Goatfell by the Ordnance Survey; Scottish Gaelic: Gaoda Bheinn) is the highest point on the Isle of Arran. At 874 metres (2,867 ft), it is one of four Corbetts on the island. The mountain, along with nearby Brodic ...
(the highest peak on Arran) is in fact an eastern outlier to this chain.
The summit lies at the junction of four ridges: those running east, north and northwest eventually descend, whilst the southern ridge continues on to the central summit of the range,
Cìr Mhòr
Cìr Mhòr (Scottish Gaelic, usually with definite article, ''A' Chìr Mhòr'') is a Corbett known as the Matterhorn of Arran. Its name means the "big comb", referring its resemblance to a cockscomb. It is separated from the island's highest pea ...
. The summit is crowned with a series of rocky
tors, and in poor visibility it may be difficult to ascertain which one marks the highest point.
The mountain is most frequently climbed from North Glen Sannox. There is a car park on the
A841 road west of
Sannox
Sannox ( gd, Sannaig) is a village on the Isle of Arran, Scotland. The village is within the parish of Kilbride. The name comes from the name the Vikings gave to the area, ''Sandvik'', meaning the Sandy Bay.
History
Within North Glen Sannox it i ...
. From here, the summit can be attained via the northern, northwestern or eastern ridge. Ascent over the eastern ridge requires the
walker
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In the United States
*Walker, Arizona, in Yavapai County
*Walker, Mono County, California
* ...
to negotiate Ceum na Caillich, a tricky
scramble
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...
that is not easily by-passed.
Ceum na Caillich and the eastern ridge may also be reached from the village of Sannox on the east coast of the island by way of Glen Sannox. The northwestern ridge can be climbed via a longer route following the Gleann Easan Biorach from
Lochranza. An ascent of Caisteal Abhail is often combined with Cìr Mhòr, and indeed other Arran peaks.
.
Corbetts
Marilyns of Scotland
Mountains and hills of the Isle of Arran
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