A spring day in the Cairngorms

I have really appreciated your comments over the last couple of days - thank you. My grandson is now safely back home too.

Following the best night's sleep for a while I was all ready to go for a really long hike this morning but the weather turned ridiculous - hail storms in the middle of May!! I eventually took the dogs out for a quick walk then chuntered around in Aviemore shops until things looked a bit brighter. Eventually I walked quite a long way into Glen Einich and was rewarded by fabulous views as the path wound its way up the side of the hill overlooking a fairly wide but fast tumbling river down below on the valley floor. At one stage the sun was shining through the copse of pines, lighting up the sienna coloured heather and green hummocks of blaeberry bushes - it was glorious and looked just like a patchwork.

I was spoiled for choice for a blip and almost chose this one with the solitary tree. The path then took us quite high and this was another contender with Cara doing her Monarch of the Glen pose (thank you Feather for the caption) and Bruce being Bruce! I love the view across to the hills over the tops of the tall pines covering the valley floor and feel it gives a sense of the vastness as well as how high we had walked. I really enjoyed the company of my two chums today especially as they seemed to relish the day and walk as much as I did, and I initially wanted to choose a shot with them in it. However, very shortly after I took this photo of them a huge black cloud, which I hadn't noticed before, overtook us from behind and showered us with hail for the remainder of the walk. By the time we reached the car we were really cold and very wet but as i popped the weary dogs into the car i turned to look back at the hills from where we had just come and noticed this slip of a rainbow mocking the heavily laden sky which was almost obliterating the hills while the late evening sun lit up the foreground birches stunningly. It also lit up my heart and I forgot how chilled I was, so it won the day!

Once back at the cottage I fed the dogs and then had to pack up ready to set off on the
journey home. The temperature had plummeted to just 3' and for the first part of the journey I drove through hail and sleet. What on earth has happened to May?