Heading out towards Knoydart, near the eastern dam on Loch Quoich.

Good on ‘em. Though an impressive application, using Street View to virtually browse the High Streets of “Anytown, UK” was always going to pale pretty quickly. About as interesting as today’s news that Cheryl Cole has separated from some footballer or other. Cheryl who? (A story which, incidentally, is currently occupying third position in the BBC News website headlines — five places above the news of a car bomb in Newry, NI. WTF?)

Anyway — have you not been able to get up into the Highlands for a bit? No probs. Here’s an embedded Street View window. Just click once in the window below, then keep hitting the “up arrow” key for a grand tour of one of the finest stretches of road in the UK. You might also want to click that icon top-right for some full-screen goodness.

View Larger Map

So, what next for the Street View team. Baggers’ paths?

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With a WAMP stack now running on my netbook, and a repeatable process for copying my live blog contents across from the host, I can play around to my heart’s content with PHP scripts and CSS files, without worrying about wrecking the live site.

The most obvious changes over the last week are the return of a header image (more about that in a future post — all being well, the image should change automatically from day to day), and date “badges” against post excerpts on the home page, rather than plain text.

All of which has bog-all to do with the title of this post, “Dreamy winter days…”. With the mountains, UK-wide, mantled in snow and ice to an extent not seen in recent years, my thoughts have been turning to what I’m missing, particularly on the sharp, clear days that we’ve had so many of over the last week or two.

I’m not complaining. I’ve had my fair share of magical winter days on the hills, and hope to have many more. While this exquisitely beautiful but uncompromising land is out of my reach, I’m fondly remembering some of those days. Here’s one from December 1995. These were very similar conditions to those the country’s experiencing now (though even colder then, if not as prolonged).

In case you’re wondering — no, we didn’t get off the hill before it went dark! (Always carry a decent torch peeps!)

Descending Carn Liath (Meagaidh, Laggan), Scottish Highlands.

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In a few of the national weather forecasts during the festive season, the central belt of Scotland was singled out with particularly low night-time temperatures — dropping to −16°C for several nights.

“Pah!”, was my reaction. Little dimmed are my memories of several days based in a cottage just outside Roybridge in Glen Spean, between Christmas and New Year 1995. For three nights in succession, the temperature dropped to −25°C. At the same time, Altnaharra recorded the joint lowest recorded UK temperature of -27.2°C (previously reached in 1895, and 1982). I got a frost-nipped nose walking the 1km to the pub one evening, and the following day discovered what happens to “Works down to −15°C” de-icer, when the ambient temperature is considerably lower. (For the record, it curled up in to a little ball, and rolled off the windscreen.) Two days later, after things had warmed up considerably, it felt positively tropical in Fort William with the daytime temperature soaring to −3°C.

Of course, in many parts of the world, such temperatures wouldn’t be worthy of any special mention. I recently re-read Jack London’s famous short story, “To Build a Fire” (full text) chronicling a traveller’s battle with the cold on a trail in the Yukon. Worth 15 minutes of anyone’s time.

I’ll end with an image from that bitter few days in Scotland at the close of ‘95. Daytime temperatures were more reasonable. Indeed, it was warmer on the hills than in the frigid depths of the valleys. Mercifully, there was no wind to speak of, and it was a joy to travel through this winter wonderland. Here’s hoping for more like this before the spring kicks in.

Frosted Spruce, Glen Spean (December 1995).

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My first two trips to this area couldn’t have been more different. Both involved an ascent of Beinn Dorain (with the addition of Beinn an Dòthaidh the second time), using the same route from Bridge of Orchy, but in wildly differing conditions. Here’s a summit photo from each day:

Summit photo, Beinn Dorain, February 1994.

Summit photo, Beinn Dorain, April 2002.

In February ‘94, the final pull up onto the summit ridge was through a full-on blizzard. Careful map-and-compass work and not a little determination led to the cairn in near white-out conditions. Fun, of a sort, but it hardly made for a relaxing day on the hill.

Eight years later, and the same route yielded a pleasant bimble up late spring snow in the sunshine, and expansive views from this singular summit. Reversing this bit of the route and tacking on Beinn an Dòthaidh, we were treated to an extensive display of crepuscular rays, projected through a layer Altocumulus.

Crepuscular rays over Beinn Dorain (from Beinn an Dòthaidh).

And this year’s trip to the Bridge of Orchy Hills? Well, this time the itinerary started a few miles north of Bridge, at Achaladair Farm. Beinn Achaladair and Beinn a’ Chreachain in combination give a very fine day on the hills indeed. Not that it’s easy. And the weather was pretty ropey too. I was all for calling it a day after Beinn Achaladair, and returning to the car at the farm while my companions continued, but they were having none of it.

Fortuitously, shortly after leaving Achaladair’s rocky summit ridge, I got the fillip I needed as the clouds parted to reveal the vast, lochan-studded expanse of Rannoch Moor. The steep profile of The Buachaille, and a distant Loch Ericht were pretty much all I could reliably identify in this expansive vista.

Rannoch Moor from Beinn Achaladair.

Aching legs were easily forgotten now, and, despite a quickly noticed navigational error leaving the top of Beinn a’ Chreachain (the old “180° off” malarkey — must remember; red end of the compass needle points to magnetic north — I was having a bad day!), the remainder of the day was uneventful.

Now, having seen Rannoch Moor from this vantage point for the first time, I really want to get out there and explore more extensively. A brief incursion from the A82 to a cracking little lochan on a fishing trip some years back has been pretty much it so far. Something else to add to the list…

And so on Sunday, to give my knee a chance to recover, I took the low road — following the West Highland Way from Tyndrum to Auch, and then back to Tyndrum. An easy but pleasant few hours moving through country that I’ve only previously experienced from a railway carriage or car. The route from Tyndrum and Strath Fillan across to the upper reaches of the Allt Coire Chailein is shared between the West Highland Way, the West Highland Railway Line, and the A82 trunk road that links Glasgow and Inverness. For a kilometre or two, walkers, trains, and road vehicles travel parallel to one another, just a few metres apart. Not a particularly quiet stretch of the West Highland Way then.

A comedy gate alongside the West Highland Way — just north of Tyndrum

Not that this matters a jot when you’ve got a cloud-capped Beinn Dorain filling the view ahead. Some interesting mixed-mode transport was in operation on the railway hereabouts too, with workmen carrying out maintenance on the line having been transported by an Aquarius Rail Rover Land Rover conversion.

Heading downhill towards Auch, a Hooded Crow was oblivious to the stream of West Highland Way walkers passing by:

Hooded Crow, near Auch

I’d originally intended to turn off the West Highland Way and see how far I could get up Auch Glen without getting my feet wet (the track here crosses and recrosses the river a number of times higher up the valley). I managed just 500m before being brought up short by a substantial ford. On the previous day’s Munro bagging expedition, this would have presented no great problem. I wasn’t on for getting my boots soaked again on what was supposed to be an easy bimble though, so this marked the far point of my stroll.

Interestingly, this has now got me interested in doing the West Highland Way as a walk in itself. I’ve walked various bits of it (near Loch Lomond; from Bridge of Orchy to Victoria Bridge; down Glen Nevis), but always as parts of other mountain walks. It would be nice to make the complete journey and get a different perspective on many places that I’ve seen from the peaks above, or from the car or train whilst pushing on to other destinations.

As I’ve only got three or four days days up there, I want to make the most of whatever fickle weather comes the Highlands’ way that weekend, so my thoughts have turned to hatching some bagging plans. Munro bagging that is. Not that I’m a gung-ho bagger these days, but if the weather’s up to it, I’d like to get high on the hill, and stride out a bit on an airy ridge.

Now, usually, I’d dig out the relevant OS Landranger maps, and, in combination with the SMC’s “The Munros” would start tracing possible routes. A finger-in-the-air estimate of distance and timing is usually good enough, but, in this case, I have to factor-in the relatively sparse train service on the Glasgow – Fort William section of the West Highland Line. Grabbing a train north to Corrour or east to Crianlarich will certainly open up the possibilities for a good day’s walk, but I can’t afford to miss the last train back to Tyndrum!

Now, for the first time, I’ve tried out some digital mapping software. I’m not talking about an on-line service like Google Maps, Google Earth, or MultiMap. These do a fantastic job when it comes to working out how to get from A to B by car, locating a nearby pizza restaurant, or snooping on your neighbours to see who’s got the biggest swimming pool, but aren’t so useful for detailed route planning in the hills.

OK, so MultiMap includes OS 1:50 000 and 1:25 000 mapping, and if the area you’re interested in has been covered in high resolution by Google Earth (which, as of this writing, now includes most of the Highlands), you can pick out very fine details on the ground. However, if you’re looking do do things like plotting and saving a route, calculating the amount of ascent and descent, or estimating timings, these online tools don’t cut it.

Mapyx Quo screenshot (from Mapyx' website)

Enter the likes of Anquet, Memory Map, and, a new one on me, Mapyx Quo. I came across Mapyx Quo on the Outdoors Magic site, and was easily tempted by the free download of the mapping software (the full shebang — not a time- or feature-limited demo). The maps seem to be very good value too, costing just 99p for an OS 1:50 000 tile (a tile measures 40km x 40km, with a minimum purchase of six tiles at a time).

to be continued…

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Now, this was what I’d call a pretty typical spring day in the Highlands. Scudding clouds were unleashing regular bouts of cold, spiteful rain. The wind was getting up. Looking up the length of the loch, towards the mountains I’d set out to climb, I could see the ragged cloud base was fixed at about 600 metres. No place to be without the right gear, alone.

One might reasonably ask whether I could easily have changed my plans — perhaps caught another train someplace else, or mooched around the gear shops in town. The thing is, trains are pretty infrequent on this line, and, more to the point, Corrour is the only station in the UK that’s not accessible by public road. Sitting on the edge of Rannoch Moor, 450 metres above sea level, and 10 miles from the nearest public road, Corrour is wonderfully remote. No gear shops to mooch around then.

This picture gives a really good feel for the location:

Corrour and Loch Ossian from Leum Uilleim

Corrour station and its associated buildings are too small to pick out on this view from Leum Uilleim (the Corbett that overlooks Corrour). The West Highland Railway Line runs across the picture from left (towards Fort William) to right (towards Glasgow), with the station located in front of the small lochan near the centre of the picture.

This particular picture was taken in February 2006 — there was no snow on the hills when I was here ruing my lack of planning. As I left the shelter of the porch and headed out along the south shore of Loch Ossian, the rain moved in with a vengeance. Fleeces, even the windproof variety, just don’t cope with persistent rain, so, not particularly looking forward to spending the next few hours wandering about soaked to the skin, I started looking for some shelter.

It’s amazing how dry it can be under the thick boughs of a large conifer. There are a few stretches of plantations along this shore of the Loch, and it wasn’t long before I found a dry spot where I could sit and eat a (very) early lunch, and hope the rain would start to ease off at some point.

I’d given up on any idea of climbing the hills I’d originally been eyeing up — Beinn Eibhinn, Aonach Beag, and Geal Charn — or, indeed, any hills at all. The weather obviously wasn’t going to clear any time soon, and the cloud was lowering if anything. To try and crack on up the mountains without a waterproof in these conditions would have been reckless.

Still, a circuit of Loch Ossian proved quite pleasant (especially when the sun came out briefly as I made my way back towards the station), and I had time for another cuppa in the cafe before jumping on the mid-afternoon train towards Tulloch and Fort William. On arrival, I was relieved to find my large rucsac waiting for me in a dorm room at the lodge, my bone-dry waterproof stuffed into the top. Re-reading the route card stowed in the lid gave me a wry smile though…

My most recent absent mindedness (or just piss-poor planning if you prefer), put paid to what had the potential for a fine day in the hills. This was to be a solo effort — for reasons that will become apparent — and it was in seat 1A of the “seated sleeper” carriage on Scotrail’s Caledonian Sleeper service that I scribbled out the following route card at twenty-to-midnight, in preparation for the following day:

Route card

At around 9 the next morning, the train approached Corrour Halt. This is a request stop for the Sleeper, so I was paying close attention to the goings on in the guards’ carriage as we approached the stop.

I’d already told a guard I wanted to disembark here, but the train crew had changed twice since we’d left Edinburgh in the early hours, so I was by no means certain that this information was still with the people that mattered (namely the driver, and the guard). If it wasn’t for the fact that a friend on the same service had been inadvertently whisked straight through Corrour under exactly the same circumstances some years ago, I might have been a little more relaxed.

But things were a little more complicated than this. I’d also arranged for my large rucsac to stay on the train at Corrour. The guard had instructions to drop it off at the next station — Tulloch, about 10 miles north of Corrour — where it was to be picked up by the proprietor of Tulloch Station Lodge (my home for the weekend).

And it was into the lid of said large sac that I placed the aforementioned route card. I was to be walking by myself, with the rest of the group I was staying with not expected to arrive until the Friday evening or Saturday morning. Thus, I’d let the Lodge owner know that I’d be leaving a route card with him, giving me at least half a chance of being rescued if anything went badly wrong.

Everything went swimmingly. The train slowed, and stopped, at Corrour; the (new) guard was happy with the rucsac drop-off arrangements, and I now had a great day’s mountain walking ahead of me. But not before I’d refuelled at the Corrour Station House Restaurant and B & B with a full English breakfast.

Full of tea and sausages, I paid, made my way out to the porch, and began final preparations for the walk in alongside Loch Ossian. Which is a long-winded way of saying that I started digging around in my daysac for my waterproof. Which wasn’t there. Because it was in my big sac which was now (I hoped) waiting for me at Tulloch Station Lodge.

continue to part 2…

First off was a very mixed week based at Corran — a minuscule settlement of perhaps five buildings, clustered around the slipway of the Corran ferry. Visiting Scotland for an extended holiday is a meteorological lottery at the best of times, but if your chosen week falls within what’s technically the northern hemisphere winter (20th/21st December to 20th/21st March), the odds of a “win” are somewhat stacked against you.

When the weather does play ball, there’s simply nothing to beat it — “it” being hillwalking, climbing, snow-shoeing, skiing, or whatever snow-enhanced mountain-based activity you’ve set your mind to.

Carn Mòr Dearg and Ben Nevis

The above photo taken on Carn Mòr Dearg is a great example of the magnificence of Scotland’s winter mountains. Then (February 2006), with a group based at Corpach (just outside Fort William), the weather and ground conditions were so sparkling that by the end of the week, most of us couldn’t face dragging our fatigued bodies into the mountains for a sixth consecutive day, so we spent it playing at being tourists with an excursion on the Fort William to Mallaig railway line instead.

The thing is, you just don’t usually pace yourself for six consecutive “big days” in the mountains in Scotland at that time of year. At the first sign of clear skies, a gentle breeze, and good snow conditions (an all too rare combo), everyone’s out with the bit between their teeth, putting in the miles and the moves, extracting every last moment from a day that will inevitably be followed by miserable dreich, or torrential, slush-inducing, storm-driven rain. Thus, when the weather repeatedly fails to conform to type and deteriorate during the week, overdoing it is inevitable.

So, what of this year’s trip to Corran? Well, it was a week of two halves. The first part of the week was disappointingly devoid of snow — then, on Wednesday, this happened:

Snow-wading in the Mamores

And there you have it — this, in large measure, is what makes Scotland’s winter mountains so compelling. Quite apart from the sheer variety of landscapes (the steep, shapely peaks of the west coast, giving way to the hulking sub-arctic Cairngorm plateaux in the east), it’s the Highlands’ far-flung location at the edge of Europe, bordering the Atlantic and the prevailing winds, that means you’re always kept on your toes, forever having to adapt your plans to such a capricious environment.

I’ll leave a description of that unfeasibly snowy day in the Mamores for another time. Similarly, my second trip to the Highlands in May — a cracking long weekend based at Tulloch Station Lodge. On my mind right now is the next planned Scottish trip; a long weekend based at Tyndrum.

Ben Lui is calling. I might be keen to bag some new Munros in the area, but a third ascent of Lui would be most agreeable…