There is something wonderful about the feeling of a long hill day. They always feel surreal: the early start, lacing up frozen boots, walking in the pre-dawn darkness with thoughts somehow feeling soft and bouncy, the second life when the sun rises and the bliss of the first hours of walking feeling free, and that satisfying fuzziness of the brain at the end of the walk, and my planned outing for this weekend was not a short one – with somewhere inbetween 35km and 40km of winter ground to cover, including some steep sections that would almost certainly require care. Safe to say: an early start was required.
The alarm awoke me at 4:30, and by 5am, I was walking. The first few kilometres were walking along a road before heading towards the Chlamain Gap and the Larig Ghru. I was making good time, but the ground was already difficult: although the ground was generally snow free there were large sections of black ice and any snow that was there was bullet hard and required careful step cutting with an ice axe. It was due to be a long day…
As I entered the Larig Ghru I saw the lights of Aviemore glinting in the distance: I seem to end up in Aviemore every week at the moment and it’s a small town I’m very fond of.
As the sun began to rise, I finally turned my head torch off and marvelled at my surroundings. What a place!
The path was often covered in snow and care had to be taken when crossing streams on snow bridges. The snowpack is very strange at the moment, with about half the ground completely scoured, and some covered in thick accumulations of bullet hard neve. What’s interesting is there is a significant variation in which aspects the accumulations lie, a result of the complex weather systems that have been hitting Scotland recently.
Soon, I turned off towards Refuge of the Garbh Corrie Mhor, a small “bothy” in the coldest and most remote corrie in the UK. The terrain here felt big: almost North Face of the Ben esc but with no one around – class! The bothy istelf is very basic – much more of a shelter but it felt cosy. I want to come back here to climb: there is lots of summer and winter new-routing potential.
The next section up to Lochan Uaine was the only consequential ground of the day: steep snow and ice-covered rocks had to be overcome at around grade I and crampons had do be donned. From the lake, a short climb up to the summit brought me initially into a beautiful setting, before a white out descended.
With the edge of the corrie significantly corniced and a fair amount of snow accumulating on this slope, care had to be taken to avoid simply walking off the edge. For folk that are unfamiliar with winter nav, I utilised a dog leg, essentially walking on a bearing for a fixed distance (a technique known as dead reckoning) before walking on a new bearing for another fixed distance to avoid the hazard entirely. Safe to say: this is a strategy that requires practice and care, and I was satisfied to reach the saddle bang on.
The ascent to Angels Peak was again straightforward, and once at the top I opted to add a couple of extra layers. I followed the ridge around to Brarieach, with briefly improved visibility, but soon, again, it was near white-out. Careful navigation was required on the plateau. Luckily, towards the end of the second leg, the visibility cleared so I could use the edge as a handrail to reach the summit.
The return journey was quite straightforward, and in just a few more hours I was having a beer in the pine martin with Fergus, who had travelled up that day to meet me for another hill day tomorrow up around Loch Avon and the Northern Corries. The day totalled around 38km: a rather long day out and it was safe to say that the beer got me drunk rather quickly that evening.
Oscar Outdoors 