free to be able to rate and comment on reports (as well as access 1:25000 mapping).
This winter has been nice since the bigger snowfalls 2-3 weeks' back.
We did Stob Gabhar and its neighbour last weekend - dry, very little wind. The paths over there were icy in the base of the Glen then a fair bit of knee high snow further up. Since then we have had dry, warmer weather so with a decent forecast under our belts we planned to make the most of another weather window.
Driving over from Edinburgh then a c20km walk in a short day meant that we thought we'd bike in having had one positive experiment from Bridge of Tilt a few months' back. I had been at the Glasgow Warriors rugby the night before and had switched on a beer curfew at 9pm to avoid any driving risks - also decided not to head off hours before dawn to let the boy (and me of course) get a decent kip.
Got to Tyndrum just before 10am, had spoken to our friends and was so busy looking for their car that we drove past the Auch turn off and had to drive on for about a mile to find somewhere to turn back. The "lay-by" on the main road is only just a lay-by, our friends parked 100yards down the track at a small lay-by there before the farm entrance proper - take note future baggers, room for c3 cars down there just before gate to farm.
There are plenty to other reports up - we did an out and back rather than go round the other hill at c920m, seemed shorter (it was just under 19.5km) and was really good fun coming down !
1) as per other reports, there are quite a few river crossings and not all easy on a bike
2) we were basically fine as there's been a week or more of basically dry weather, if it's been raining you're going to need more than gaiters
3) as of Saturday there are some decent sized patches of hard packed snow near the summit, you may want crampons if you're not comfy on that stuff
4) various forms of sliding used coming down on said patches of hard packed snow
5) basically hopped back down to the bridge where we parked our bikes; that bridge is a decent feat of engineering and the track starts to descend straight after it so it's easy to work out when to turn off and up the hill
6) no path per se, just grass and some bog
7) at that bridge you have gained about 200m of vertical since the farm at Auch, makes the bike ride out a real pleasure
Long live dry winter days, no blue sky or sun this weekend (compared to last weekend) but hey ho better than rain/sleet/clag !
That's the boy at 116 and the dog at 113, half way mark just about in sight for 2017
