Type 2 Fun...

I've wanted to link up a few tracks in the SE Cairngorms for awhile, and had the brainwave to do this yesterday. I'd seen the mt bike route in a guidebook and it sounded quite mellow, 26km, with 450m of height gain/decent.

And we are off..

I'd nearly done it a few weeks ago, but waited for a thaw to ensure that the snow and ice was definitely gone. Given its modest length and the positive description I thought that we had time to dawdle over to Braemar, start about 1pm, giving us 4-5 hrs of daylight. The perfect plan, right?!

A busy Bob Scott's

Not quite... We set of from the Linn of Dee at 1pm, passing Bob Scott's bothy (full of lunching folk) and Derry Lodge. I love this side of the Cairngorms and was full of positivity and happiness pointing out various features, hills and landmarks to Abi as we headed West.

Towards the end of the 'riding' near Luibeg

I knew the track gets more technical, and problematic for a bike around the Luibeg Burn, but with the river high (snow melt), we had an extra carry to the bridge instead of fording, which in retrospect would of been better. I think somewhere around here Abi questioned the ride-ability of the days enterprise....

pushing

More pushing

Things deteriorated in a sense from here... it was a push mostly round the shoulder of Carn a' Mhaim (which I knew), but even down the other side it was only partially rideable down towards the Corrour bothy.

a little more pushing

I was very conscious that time was slipping away, and tried to keep us moving even though the terrain was pretty awful for the bike. Abi pointed out that it would of been a nice walk (without a bike), and she had a very valid point!

First views of Devils Point

The scenery was stunning, I'd not seen Devils Point from this direction before and it was fantastic, reminding me of a winter camp years back near its top with Ben who wanted to play cards (I hate card games) after we got in the tent after 10 hrs walking in a storm, when all I wanted was food and sleep, but we did have a 'cheese course' and hip flask during that long stormy night!

Heading South on dream single track - View N to Lairig Ghru

The guidebook had suggested fantastic single track from the Corror bothy, South to White Bridge, so I thought that this would be our saviour and we would get back before dark.

Tick, tock...tick tock...time marches on and the track South was 80-90% unrideable, a boggy, rocky, hell! Our spirits were pretty low by now, in fact probably had been for a while. At one point I worked out we only had 6km to White Bridge and a good estate track, but this took forever as we were pushing, lifting, carrying the bikes mostly.

couple hundred meters of nice trail

I realised we wouldn't make White Bridge before dark and dug out the head torches for the last 2 km or so. As darkness fell it felt quite serene trapped in the capsule of light from the head torch, blackness all around. We started enjoying the adventure again :-) .

Arriving at White Bridge and the rideable track we were both pretty happy to be out of the worst of it, only another 3-4 miles back to the Linn of Dee, and the track gently descends following the river so it is easy riding at least. It was nice riding along by torch light.

I can't actually remember another bike ride as exhausting as this, or one were I have been caught out by darkness. Definitely a type 2 fun day which we finished with fish and chips in Braemar.

Oh.. time to push again

Footnote - It's now funny looking at my pictures. Some are good photo's that capture the magnificent scenery, and without knowing the detail and ordeal required to get them, or to the particular place then it would be easy to think that it was all just an easy and scenic ride and day. The photo's hide some (?all) of the harshness and physical and mental stress that formed most of the day! All said though I did enjoy the adventure, but I won't take a bike on this particular route ever (EVER) again.

West Coast, best coast?!

The Woodland Trust Scotland hope to purchase the 10,000 acre Sheildaig estate, and Donald is interested in this project being an ecologist. I've always wanted to explore this area, so tagged along hoping we might spy some unexplored crags...

The slog..

The weather was great and I did looked longingly at the snow and ski possibilities as we motored through  Achnasheen heading to Torridon.

Finally on the shoulder

We passed Jack and Jenna heading to the Torridon boulders en-route, if we had time we may have stopped off on the way back.

Beinn Alligin behind grumpy (who was now cheery) 

Donald informed me that Sheildaig has a substantial Birch temperate rainforest at sea level, which then blends into the worlds most westerly Caledonian pine wood - impressive.

sorry couldn't lose my shadow

It was very beautiful, the main issue I saw was that Ben Shieldaig is very steep and craggy on 3 sides, with no paths marked on maps, so I wasn't convinced that the exploration walk would be enjoyable.

Beinn Damph

And I was right, well initially! Ben Sheildaig is only 534m high, and the slog up it was awful and hard work, being steep, boggy and overgrown. Donald declared near the top, after a considerable time that he hated walking, and threw his poles away in disgust... eek..

Liathach

At this point I wasn't sure about the success of the day! But luckily we made it onto the broad top, or ridge and moods picked up at this point. Stupendous views to Raasay, Torridon, Applecross and beyond.

The top, although small in height, was large in area and grandeur. Really interesting, with the beautiful loch nan Eun, rock sheets, and glacial erratics to marvel at. We savoured the views before the awful decent! A 5km walk that took 4' 30"!!

Ski Weekend

Bumper snow in the NW of Scotland meant we headed to the East obviously!

mountain closed

reindeer action

But there was a reason for this... Loz fancied another go at ski touring and trying his battered old ski's
again.

happy chappy

Ciste run 1

I hadn't realised that he has quite a ski pedigree, racing as a child, but last year when he tried his free ski's he couldn't ski for toffee on them.. or at least that's what I heard.

man down

winter skills

He got given the touring ski's and skins, but hasn't got any boots, and there are only 2 places in the Highlands that hire boots - Aviemore and Braemar.

quite like this shot.. not sure what he's doing

Ciste run 2 - more aggressive!

Interestingly when he booked the boots to pick up from Aviemore, he enquired about hiring ski's, but they were cagey and reluctant to hire him ski's as the snow cover was quite patchy with limited base so they were very concerned about what state they would come back in.

So I sharpened his ski edges with earnest (and wine) the night before, and he decided to give them another go to see if a) he liked ski touring b) the ski's are okay or for the bin.

Plenty of tourers out

third time up

We headed to Cairngorm mountain. After a coffee skinned up M2 onto the shoulder, passing the reindeer herd on route.  The cloud was sitting on top of the hill most of the day so instead of heading over the back we went round to Ciste Gully. Brilliant snow and skiing with 4-5" of fresh snow on a hard base.

ice station zebra

now he starts to show off. fence jump start

There were lots of folk out, tourers, walkers struggling in the snow drifts, people on winter skills courses. It was great to be out. We did another lap of Ciste Gully, before skinning up a third time and skiing down through the ski run area.

brilliant snow - top half of mt

The Ptarmigan top station is clearly closed due to the funicular being off line this year so it was quiet at the top. They were running skiing only to the mid station, so the whole top half of the mountain was pretty untouched and the ski down in powder was brilliant.

the master (of disaster)

first tracks

We got down at 3.30pm, I wanted to skin up again for another run, but Loz didn't have the legs and wanted beer, so we called it a day. Oh and his ski's were pretty good now they have an edge so he's going to buy boots! He reported that they were excellent on piste, not bad off, but got a little buried in the powder as they are quite short and narrow! A great days skiing.

...................................................................................................................................................................

With the forest looking snowy I thought that Abi might want to try xc skiing on the Sunday. So another non-lie in day saw us back in the Cairngorms. You can't pre-book xc ski's so we collected them at 9am, then went for coffee and a breakfast roll sit was snowing!

Setting off from the car near the hay meadow Abi looked a little scared and even though we have all been there its nerve racking see someone on ski's for the first time like (bambi trying to walk entered my head).

means business

They pre-cut 2 loops in the forest to follow and we went on the Southern one. Abi quickly improved, but didn't enjoy the down hill bits, which is reasonable as it's quite hard to stop on xc ski's (I fell on one decent).

It was nice cruising around the forest and Abi quickly got into the swing of things. On some down hills I would take off my ski's and run alongside her to give confidence and get used to the speed and her balance on the ski's.

checking the competition

On the second half of the loop she was fine and looked like a pro. A great 2 days skiing in the Highlands.

seasoned skier..

Time for some cross training!

Winter has appeared at last! Not much snow, but a dusting and some consistent cold temperatures this last week mean that mixed climbing is very good at present. Loz had a free day, and Shaw couldn't resist coming up from the Lakes so we agreed to climb in the Northern Corries due to its easy access and the fact that we knew 'it would be in'.

gearing up at the lochan

Interestingly there was a lot of chatter from some folk that stuff wasn't in good condition. Sure there wasn't much snow in gully's, or much ice, but boy the rocks were heavily rimed, and turf well frozen so stuff is in early season 'nic' even though its nearly the end of January.

Belting conditions

I don't do that much winter climbing, so had hoped we could do a couple of steady routes at grade III or IV, but I sort of knew Loz wouldn't have any of this!

Hoarmaster is the deep square cut chimney

A 5.30am get up saw us pick up Shaw in Aviemore at 7am, and at the Cairngorm car park at 7.30am. We were clearly the late arrivals with at least 10 teams ahead of us. But this was our deliberate tactic (yeah right).

Loz checking out the start

We headed into Coire an Lochain. The crag looked fantastic with many teams in situ on various routes. We originally aimed for Deep throat, but with a team on it instead of waiting we went across and climbed Hoarmaster VI, 6.

me getting to the first belay

Pretty steep and challenging, but a great route! Loz led it, I consolidated my skills (or lack of). My first grade VI (not done any V's either!). A team on the nearby 'The Gathering - IX, 9' were impressive to watch from our route, talk about steep!

looking across to Katie and her pal on Deepthroat

We topped out at 1pm into the sun. We did have time for a second route, but the will wasn't there from the team, and we made the decision to head back to Aviemore for cups of tea! No cycling but good cross-training today.

2nd pitch of 'The Gathering'