free to be able to rate and comment on reports (as well as access 1:25000 mapping).
After a break from the hills of over thirty years I decided to make a slow comeback after a trial walk up Mount Keen with my old walking buddies. My plans were a bit ambitious; a round of The Devil's Point, Cairn Toul, Angel's Peak and Monadh Mhor. The original plan had been to tackle this in mid/late May but the weather was not looking good on the planned weekend (late blizzards and gales; not that rare in the Cairngorms really) so after a three week delay I set off for Braemar early (0600) on Friday 17th June. Set off from the car park at 0905, with fine weather in prospect for the morning at least. It took a while to walk in to the Corrour Bothy, too much gear in my pack I guess. The walk was very pleasant though and I could feel the years rolling back. Found the bothy in good order, much better than the last visit all those years ago. Sadly the weather turned cloudy and wet while I ate lunch at the bothy. Time to re-assess my plans. I figured the Devil's Point was going to have to go and be my main and only, as it turned, out target. It was a real slog with a heavy sack (planned high level bivvy) but the misty view from the top was worth it. The cloud, wind and rain were making for unpleasant conditions and a quick chat with a fellow climber (who'd just spent the past two hours struggling back from Baeriach) at the bealach above the bothy convinced me that on this occasion discretion was called for. Descending to the bothy where I thought I might now spend the night was easy enough but the bothy had now filled up so there was nothing much else for it but to walk back out. I was back at my car in the Linn o' Dee car park by 11pm having passed a few intrepid souls on their way in. By 2am I was back home. Getting out of the car I felt I was walking like a crippled gorilla. Luckily after a hot bath and a good night's sleep I was almost back to normal.
Now I know this is a long tale for such a small outcome but I hope a few folks out there who think they've hung up their boots might just take heart and get the boots out of garden shed, dust them off and go for it. Personally I can't wait for my next trip.
