11th & 12th Munroes 1st winter walk (Ben Macdui & Cairngorm)

[paulbritish]

Well after a month or two without a walk, it was high time I was getting back out again. Thanks to an early 30th birthday present (some Mahmut boots) this was finally achievable and I could finally retire the running trainers I had used on the previous 10 Munroes!

Alistair and I departed Aberdeen for Huntly at 6:15am and upon arrival jumped into Craig's car for the second half of the drive to the Cairngorm Ski centre. Arriving at the ski centre around 8:15am we set off for Ben Macdui around 8:30am full of eager excitement



Being my first winter walk I expected the cold and to be fair it wasn't quiet as bad as I thought, only really noticed it when stopping. What I didn't expect was how hard it is to catch your breathe and being a smoker this soon lead to the other two taking a good lead.



After the initial hardship that was the first hill (probably the closest i've come to giving up yet) the path flattened out and the long slog to Ben Macdui became quite a pleasant trip. Lost both Alistair and Craig in the fog but could easily follow there footprints and soon got a feeling of what it must be like for an artic explorer

Caught up with Alistair and Craig before the final ascent of Ben Macdui and reached the top without to much hardship. Although by this point flakes of ice had begun to form on eyelids.







Found the marker which had formed minature side way snow trees as had the rest of the environment and stopped for 5 minutes to have a quick snack. This is when you could really feel the cold and the lack of gloves on my parts became a problem!



From here we took stock and decided that we would only have time for the 2 Munroes today and Cairngorm was our next target. So off we set:



Wasn't to long till we reached the drop off looking down into Coire an t-Sneachda, the view here in between broken cloud was spectacular and made for same great photo opportunities. A number of climbers were scaling the face and looking down at them hanging off the rock was an incredible sight to see.





















After taking in the view for sometime it was on to the final climb.... destination.... the top of Cairngorm


Myself lagging at the back in a race against the oncoming cloud cover


Finally make the top to see a bunch of tourists that have taken the train up and not the 17km circuit to this point. Do they have the right idea? naaahhhhhhhh


Couple of pirenese mountain dogs

Victory!!!! 2nd and 6th highest Munroes done in a day





As we walked back down I couldn't help but feel a little bit of hatred and pity for all those in the train. Hatred because in a small way I wished I was onboard (hate downhill on hard terrain), and pity because they can't have the same sense of achievement that you get when you beat the elements and do a Munro the correct way

[quoman]

well done on your first winter walk the picture's are very nice and pack the fags in

[wilkiemurray]

Nicereport - was up Macdui on Saturday did not leave till nearer 09.15 though - got some similar conditions to yourselves - although looking at some of the pics you took on Cairgorm make me wish I had head up their too - we headed down Choire Chais.

[davedanson28]

Nice pics and well done on your first winter walk!