Stay at home

[CalHen]

My Cairngorm adventure started on Thursday night when I decided that I would venture into the mountains and take on the second highest mountain in the UK, Ben Macdui. I also decided that, after seeing a post on instagram that it would be an ideal place to wild camp and try to catch a sunset/sunrise looking down over the Lairig Ghru.

Day 1 - So after finishing work on Friday I headed up to the Ski centre, parked my car and began the ascent of Ben Macdui around 6pm. The forecast wasn't great but I was holding out for a clear sky on the Saturday...as visibility began to degrade around 9pm I decided to find a camp site and knuckle down for the night and an early start. After some food and a look over the map I decided to take on another munro the next day and planned to head for Carn a'Mhaim then double back and head to the car.

Day 2 - I reached the summit of Ben Macdui pretty early (around 7:30am) in some pretty poor weather and no scenery in the distance. I decided that perseverance was key and headed on for the next munro in the hope of scenic views. A short walk later across a tricky boulder field and steep descent I reached Carn a'Mhaim. By now the clouds were beginning to clear and I could see Lairig Ghru in all its glory, so much so that I decided to take on the Devils Point. From there it seemed daft not to complete the circuit....and by 5pm on Saturday I had reached my sixth summit taking in Cairn Toul, Sgor an Lochain Uaine and finally Braeriach. Reaching the summit of Braeriach was unexpected given my original plans but the views were well worth the extra hiking. From here I began my long descent down through the Lairig Ghru and back round to reach the car around 7pm, a much welcome sight after a long days hike!

[Sgurr]

Can remember sitting on Braeriach and seeing someone coming the other way followed by a shadow that seemed sometimes to go over, sometimes around the rocks.It turned out to be a guy who was doing your round, followed by a miniature long-haired dachsund. It turned out that it wasn't yet a year old and had done 60 Munros. I asked if he never gave it a lift, and apparently in deep snow he had once put it in his rucksack. Dog people I spoke to later thought it was puppy abuse. When he had gone, a Yorkshire guy who had come the same way as us with his son and collie turned to us to say "By gum, we think WE'VE done well, but that fellow has done all THAT and what's more,so has that MILLIPEDE thing."

So congratulations, both the Yorkshire guy and we would think you had done very well.