Winter in the mountains

This weekend should have seen me up in Braemar tramping about the mountains. Those of you in Scotland will understand why that didn't happened. Record snowfalls and the highest avalanche risk ever seen by the Scottish Avalanche Information Service have covered most of the highlands.

But still we went out onto a hill. People will think we were foolhardy, but in fact we chose a small hill called Ben Ledi armed with the knowledge of the situation and years of experience between us. Turned out that the snow hadn't affected it too much and for the most part it was well scoured though there was considerable wind slab on the western flanks. Ben Ledi itself is for the most part benign, but like all of Scotland's hills it can growl and it growled a bit today. 45-50 mph winds raced the summits gusting to about 60, there was near whiteout conditions and an air temp of about minus 5C, subtract the wind chill and it was bit on the cold side. Were we mad or do we just defy the cosiness of "safety" to dare wander in these conditions? Me I felt alive, it's not thrill seeking, just a dip into a visceral love of this environment. I'll be back into it in three weeks time. Counting already.