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On a fine Saturday morning we set out for Glen Doll, with the mission to climb Mayar and Dreish and then descend by The Scorrie, in the reverse of a report Monty posted on here some time ago. We chose to do the reverse to avoid the really steep climb up The Scorrie and since we've never been to Glen Doll before, to get that "wow" factor of entering Corrie Fee from the trees that so many people love on WH.
We left Stenhousemuir about 9am and made it up to The Glen Doll car park about 11:15am. The drive up had been in glorious sunshine the whole way, apart from the last section in Glen Clova, when some ominous dark clouds gathered overhead.
The last part of the drive up the B955 was also a spot of Grouse dodging, I think local school has it's work cut out teaching them the green cross code!
We began walking about 11:30am and by the time we were crossing the White Water we had snow, hail and rain all falling on us at the same time, slail we called it.
As mentioned above I had read that the entrance to Corrie Fee was something special and it didn't disappoint. I loved how as the trees thinned out just before the entrance, you could glimpse through them and see the cliffs of Craig Rennet beyond. As the full corrie became clear, it really was an outstanding sight, well beyond my lyrical abilities to describe. The waterfall at the back making a delightful finishing touch. My photo does it no justice at all and I'm the so and so wasting the view!
We made our way across the corrie, enjoying every moment, from the Fee Burn meandering across, to the odd shaped moraine and the ever watchful crags above.
We stopped by a big boulder by the bottom of the waterfall and had a breather to prepare us for the steep climb up the side of the waterfall. We made that climb and then found about 10 people all sitting on a giant stone slab enjoying their lunches, including a couple of other walkers we would get talking to later.
My brother and I were just talking about how nice the waterfall had been when we rounded a corner in the path and discovered a second, smaller one. Corrie Fee really is magnificent.
As we passed the fall though the ground became boggier as we began the slog up Mayar proper. Two weeks ago I climbed Ben Ime and thought it was bland, at least it had some rocks now and then. Mayar really was just a fairly steep featureless uphill plain....
...until I turned around. Until this point I had had my head down, huffing and puffing about hating boggy, muddy paths, the slail being back on and snow patches making it worse and being right sorry for myself.
Then I turned round and was treated to magnificent view northwards into the Cairgorms. This spurred me on to get to the top a bit quicker and to get the view back from the highest possible vantage. As we made it to the top two other walkers seemed to appear out of nowhere. Turns out they had been to Driesh first and ascended via the Shank of Drumfellow. They reported the path to Driesh was looking good and all paths were fine. They seemed a bit disappointed, when I had to tell them about the boggy bit! However, as they left I got that picture that had been driving me on... only in the time it had taken me to make the last part of the ascent and to blether the clouds had partly moved in, but it was still a nice shot.
And the route over to Driesh was looking a little whiter than Mayar had been, but nothing too serious.... but those clouds would bring a little bit of havoc!
We decended from Mayar to the col between it and Driesh with no troubles, following the metal posts and we made the point on the col where the fence splits the path in no time. Taking the right hand path we began the climb up Driesh, gently at first. Where the ground begins to become rocky, I inadvertently took the wrong path, taking a smaller path which took me right along the lip of Corrie Kilbo. With the wind really beginning to pick up it wasn't for the feignt hearted. I kept on the wee path and spotted a pair of Ptarmigan, who were clearly were startled to see a person on this part of the hill. I was equally as startled to see them! By the time I had my glove off and the camera phone ready, they had blended seemlessly into the rocks and the opportunity was gone. I hadn't realised I strayed from the main path so far, until I just about heard my brother shouting on me from quite a wee distance away.
I rejoined the main path and wee quickly made it up to false summit/shoulder and then after a quick breather made it up to the summit. The only difficulty was a small, crusty snow patch. The crust couldn't hold my weight and with each step it was a case of guessing how far your foot would sink through the snow. Sometimes my leg would sink knee deep, other times it barely broke the surface.
The two walkers we had seen lunching had overtaken us as I wandered looking for ptarmigan and we took their photo at the summit and then made way for three others who had followed us up. The three blanked the rest of us and seemed surprised when I asked if they had taken their photos of the summit cairn. They grumbled that they had and I was grateful for it because the wind had really picked up and the temperature was dropping. I settled into the wee shelter and enjoyed my lunch of ASDA chicken and bacon sandwiches, flask tea and a yoghurty oatmeal bar, with a mouthful of blue powerade to wash it all down. (There are of course other brands of sandwiches, oatmeal bar and energy drink available.
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I had barely finished my grub when within seconds the weather turned really nasty. The high wind really bared it's teeth and the snow was driving in at an almost horizontal angle. Time for a cool, sharp, harp, time to get out of there! We quickly made it down to the shoulder and had to stop for my brother to pull on his big army surplus coat, our escape from the summit had been in record time and he didn't have a chance until now. As he pulled it on a band of 4 walkers passed. They were unperturbed by our reports and the deteriorating conditions made they're way up. We however, in our haste had forgotten all about the The Scorrie and had instinctively opted for the easier way down, our WH route planner laid out, down the Shank of Drumfellow. A we rounded the top of Corrie Kilbo, seen of my earlier distraction, and got the narrowest point of the col, we noticed the snow was actually "falling" upwards! The wind was so fierce it was driving the snow up the corrie, over the col and back down on the Glen Prosen side, forming a sort of snow arch over us. Gratefully, as we rounded the corner onto The Shank, we became more sheltered and out of the wind's worst. As we made our way down the slightly rocky path back towards the trees the wind did eventually blow itself out and we got a view back up to Driesh.
The weather, however, wasn't finished with us. Hail fell on us as we wound our way down through the trees and it eventually turned into light snow and then finally into a wee shower of rain as we crossed the Kilbo Burn.
Nothing too dramatic though, but enough to hasten us back to the ranger station. Yet there was to be another weather twist... this time a pleasant one. In the final few yards before the car, all precipitation, regardless of type ceased hostilities and the sun finally broke out over Glen Doll.
After a quick change of clothing, it was back to playing Grouse Dodging in the Astra along the other side of the Glen Clova. I'm proud to say no Grouse were harmed despite their lemming-like suicide bids, though there was one very close call near Cella Bridge just before the road loops back onto itself. Astra 1-0 Grouse!
