LOOKS LIKE THIS MIGHT NEED SOME HELP. If you get to this spot and can't find the box please try and help by putting something that folk can sign, PREFERABLY IN SOME SORT OF BOX / POT. Many thanks from a Sassenach
Who was Lord Berkeley?
Why did he have a ‘seat’ named after him?
Did he rest awhile at this point and, if so, what was he doing up there?
How far is it from Lord Berkeley's Seat to Lord Hereford's Knob?
Finders of this small geocache will be none the wiser on these matters (and they needn’t have climbed a Munro to get to it) but they will be surrounded by some of the most stunning mountain scenery in the UK. Hopefully the mist will not be down so they will be able to see it!
An Teallach is perhaps the most impressive mountain in Britain, and gives a day of walking, scrambling and views that will live in the memory forever. The most exciting part of the full traverse is the scramble over and around the sandstone pinnacles between Sgurr Fiona and Sail Liath, of which Lord Berkeley’s Seat is the first (or last) rocky spire on the Corrag Buidhe ridge. It leans at an improbable angle above a drop of at least 1000 feet.
The cache is hidden slightly to one side of the start of the scramble up to the ‘Seat’ but the ridge is relatively flat and wide at this point so there is plenty of room to sit in relative shelter and sign the log.
The cache itself is a small ‘clip and lock’ box about 6 cm square so it should be waterproof and strong enough to survive without attention for long periods. It will take geocoins or small TB’s but please don’t clog it up with odd bits of paper or ‘geotat’ that will hold moisture or go soggy. This cache should only be attempted by strong walkers and competent mountaineers - geocachers who like the more challenging type of cache locations. If you are not happy on exposed ridges then "The Forge" (GCWPPD) down in the corrie is the cache you should go for. When initially placed it contains a log book, pencil and a Scottish lassie for the FTF to take home with them.
NOTE: Neither the mountain nor this cache should not be attempted in high winds. In good conditions it is not a place for the inexperienced.
Postscript: According to the ‘Angry Corrie’ website “Little is known of the mysterious Lord Berkeley, but even though the present incumbent is a Labour peer, it's likely the first four letters of his surname applied to the original”..... because apparently this gentleman sat on the top with his legs dangling over the edge whilst smoking a pipe. My own internet search suggests that perhaps it was Rt. Hon. George Charles Grantley Fitzhardinge Berkeley MP (1800-1881) who devoted most of his life to hunting and was a bit weird for, as well as several dogs, he kept a tame cormorant called Jack. Apparently as a child, he and his brothers used to pick fights with the local children near their estate at Cranford, and horse whip them. The website I found says "He represents the degenerate English aristocrat at its very worst!”
Additional postscript: Near the summit of Sail Liath. I had the most surprising encounter with a BBC4 television team and was briefly interviewed about Munro-bagging by Nick (I always have my umbrella handy) Crane of "Coast" fame!!