It was a bit grey-looking to the east, but when I looked out of the other side of the house, the sky was blue and the sun out - a braw crisp morn.
Picked up Harvey and GordonC then headed for Crathes, then doon the Slug road to park at the bottom of the Durris Transmitter road.




Due to the track running along the north side of the hill, the light covering of ice & snow from the previous falls had not melted, so we had to juke around to avoid serious bum-dunts !



At the edge of the clear-fell, we saw a couple of folk wi bikes and a pair of terriers. The dogs came down to investigate Harvey. The older one soon got bored, but the young one kept following us. After a few abhortive attempts, I had to take it back to where its owners had descended back to the track to help me get the dog back with its right party. Harvey enjoyed the romp for a wee while.

The steeper bits at the turnoffs were tricky to negotiate with their icy runnels forcing us onto any exposed grass or gravel. At the top of the second steep bit we came across a locked gate. Looking back gave us a great view over the Hill o Fare to see the Mither tap o Bennachie just peepin over the top..






We could see that a gas pipeline had been laid next to the track - its line marked by white posts.



From just past the gate we caught our first glimpse of the top of Monluth. The pipeline runs up alongside the fence. We followed the track until just before the top, we ploughed through the heather to the pipeline. after about 50m we came acros a pipeline marker with a square cairn beside it.






Not sure if the pipelayers considered this to be the top, but we wandered around the top about 50m further on and decided we'd reached the summit. There was no marker in the vicinity of the fence, so we conjectured that in laying the gas pipe, they had lowered the ground level next to the square cairn, thus confusing us auld billies. Anyway, the cairn had a pipeline marker on top.





GordonC stepped over the fence and moving north through the sparse trees got a braw view beyond, While I took a picture of the Durris TV mast framed by the trees in one direction and another in the opposite direction of the ubiquitous fans.





With the sun still shining and no wind to speak of, we headed back down the icy track. Whit another braw day, and another HuMP to tick off.
Only a few thousands to go !