Days of Frost & Beauty

Sunset, Friday 13th

The weather is changing. After four days of cold and calm the clouds are thickening, the temperature rising, and the wind starting to blow. The magic of frost and ice and winter sharpness is fading. For now. It will return. It’s still a week to the winter solstice.

Venus, birch, mountains

The first frost came on an evening of serene beauty, the blue sky fading into black, the bright white dot of the planet Venus in the sky, a half-moon rising. The temperature soon fell below freezing. It was to stay there the next three days.

Dawn came with a white world, frost decorating every stem of grass, every twig. Only the conifers escaped, staying mostly dark and sombre.

The Cairngorms

The mountains looked magnificent, shining and bright. I longed to climb up there, into that snowy world, but I couldn’t as I’m recovering from a bad cold and getting used to new medication following an unexpected overnight stay in hospital. Instead I wandered the local woods and fields, admiring the beauty of the frost and crunching over the hard frozen ground.

Silver & gold

The world was not just cold and silver, it was also warm and gold at the same time as the low sun cut across the landscape, lighting the trees and hills with a pale glow. Glorious, just glorious.

Sgor Gaoith & Sgoran Dubh Mor

Feeling a little recovered the day the weather changed, Friday 13, I went up little Tom Mor, a local hill. The temperature was only a touch above freezing but the frost had already gone. The mountains were beginning to sink into clouds, the snow on their flanks already streaked with dark bare ground as the thaw set in.

Cairngorms fading & thawing

A cold wind swept the summit. I sheltered behind the huge cairn – far bigger than on most much higher hills – for a hot drink. The sky turned fiery red and orange, a spectacular sunset.

On Tom Mor

As the colours faded I turned and headed down into the growing darkness. Soon I switched my headlamp on, picking out the patches of ice on the track. All was silent. All was dark, A winter’s night. I love walking by headlamp. Although less than a mile from home as the crow flies it felt remote and wild. Occasionally a distant car’s lights shone briefly. Otherwise I was enveloped in darkness.

Frost in the forest

Frost Images

After the first snow of the winter at home thawed ten days ago there were a few days of mild weather then temperatures dropped again and there was a thick frost that has lasted ever since. Tonight temperatures are rising again and it looks like this period of calm cold weather is ending. 

 

Local walks have been wintry despite the lack of snow, the landscape pale, the sky grey and misty. On strolls from home I've taken many pictures as these beautiful and magical conditions are rare. Here's a selection. They are all colour photos.

Hoar Frost & Freezing Fog: First Hill and First Camp of the Year

On the summit of Sgor Gaoith

My year in the hills began with an ascent of a favourite in the Cairngorms, Sgor Gaoith, and a camp on the vast expanse of the Moine Mhor plateau. I love the huge views, the sense of endless space, the dizzying depths falling to Loch Einich, the feeling of an arctic wilderness. This trip only the last occurred and not in the usual way.

The forecast was for high pressure but in the depths of winter this can mean dull cloudy weather rather than clear skies and sunshine. There was some brightness in Glen Feshie as I set off  but the hills were shrouded in grey. The air was cold but still and as I climbed towards the clouds I was soon warm and off came hat and gloves and sleeves were rolled up.

As I reached the plateau I entered the cloud and a brisk chilling wind. Reverse the clothing changes, quickly. Then stride off fast to warm up. Crossing the plateau I dipped in and out of the cloud. Reaching the Allt Sgarnich I left the path and followed this stream upwards over frozen peat bogs, eventually camping on crisp icy grass not far from the water.

Camp on the Moine Mhor

The ground was white with frost. Old banks of snow lined the stream. I couldn't see far but the sense of vastness was there. Inside my little tent I settled down for the night. Water boiling on the stove filled the air with clouds of steam. Cuppa soups, a pasta 'n sauce meal, hot chocolate, writing notes, reading about Colin Fletcher. A quiet cosy evening.

During the night the wind picked up and rattled the tent, waking me a few times. The cloud of freezing fog was damp and the tent was slick with frozen condensation inside and out. Opening the door to look out at dawn brought a shower of ice crystals on my face. There wasn't much to see other than frost so I quickly closed the door again and retreated inside for breakfast. The water in my pots had frozen solid. The temperature was -4C.

Comfortable in the tent

Full of muesli porridge and coffee I ventured outside. The wind was bitter, the landscape frozen and bleak but also starkly beautiful. Nothing stirred, the only sound the wind rustling the icy grasses.

A cold world

I packed up all my gear inside the tent, wishing I had a roomier one for ease of movement and organisation. The tent itself went in an outside pocket where the frost and ice on it wouldn't soak into other gear when it melted. My trekking poles, left standing outside overnight, were white with frost.

Heading for Sgor Gaoith I checked my position on my smartphone map then used my compass for a bearing, a combination of old and new navigation technology that works well for me. I knew roughly which way to go but also knew I could easily turn the wrong way in this minimal visibility.

The best view of Sgor Gaoith

Eventually I came to the rough, well-used main path and followed this to the summit. Occasionally I had glimpsed of rocky aretes falling away into the mist. On the top the wind was bitter. My beard was wreathed in frost and ice and once I stopped I quickly felt chilly and realised I was quite damp from the wet freezing fog. A brief glimpse into the depths of Gleann Einich and I turned and headed for Carn Ban Mor and the track down to Glen Feshie.

View into Gleann Einich from Sgor Gaoith

A walker approaching the summit greeted me. 'I guess it cleared for great views on top', he said sarcastically. I shook my head, amused. 'Thought so'. He asked if I was going across the plateau to Mullach Clach a'Bhlair, the second Munro above Glen Feshie. I shook my head again. One Munro was enough for today. This year there will be more, maybe a hundred for the hundredth anniversary of Munro's death.

Carn Ban Mor

A snack on Carn Ban Mor, where the summit stones were intricately patterned with frost, and then down the track into Glen Feshie. As I dropped out of the cloud I also dropped out of the wind. Suddenly it was calm and I could see the glen below and the land reaching out into distant greyness. People coming up were hatless, one in a t-shirt. That would soon change!

Frost patterns on Carn Ban Mor

Down in the glen I looked back up at the hidden hills. The trip had not been as expected, though I always know this may be the case. It had been satisfying though. And challenging. And It had taken me into a unique world of frost and cold. A good way to start the year.

A Week of Frosts & Wonderful Sunsets

After sunset, November 24

Today in Strathspey it's misty and damp with the hills hidden in cloud, a more typical November day than the previous week which has seen hard frosts at night and brilliant sunsets. There's no frost today and the snow is vanishing from the lower edges of the hills visible under the ragged edges of the grey clouds.

But the weather has been glorious.

A spot of colour in the frost

Crunchy leaves

A last rosehip hangs on

After sunset, November 25

A Frosty Camp in Glen Feshie

Early morning in Glen Feshie

Sometimes the weather forecast isn’t quite accurate enough. Not wrong exactly (sometimes it is that) but not quite right as to just when types of weather will occur. That happened a few days ago when I wandered down Glen Feshie for the first time this year, intending on a camp under the pines followed by an ascent of Mullach Clach a’Bhlair. The forecast suggested the cloudy, windy weather would clear during the night and the following day would be fine until late in the afternoon.

A clear sky at dawn

 

At dusk as I walked down the glen there was a touch of pink in the western sky but mostly it was cloudy with spots of rain and a chill wind. The night was black with no stars as I pitched the tent and I was quite happy to be inside warm in my sleeping bag and soon falling asleep. I woke once, at 3.30 a.m., to a mass of stars and a hard frost. The weather had changed as forecast. Waking properly at dawn I looked out on a crisp pale world. Frost lay on everything and I could see fresh snow on the tops. The sky was blue. A cold wind swept down the glen though and there were streaks of cloud.

Climbing through the woods as the clouds close in

By the time I’d had breakfast and left the tent the clouds were dominating and the tops were beginning to fade into them. I packed and headed up anyway on an old overgrown and steep path through the trees to the open hillside. Away down Glen Feshie I could see mist filling Strathspey. Beyond the strath the Monadh Liath hills were cloud-capped.

View down Glen Feshie to a mist-filled Strathspey

Out in the open I felt the full blast of the wind which brought with it light flurries of snow. Soon I was walking through snow as well. The surface of little Lochan nam Bo was a mass of grey waves. I was on the edge of the clouds now and could see little of the slopes above. The summit was 300 metres higher and 3 kilometres away. I’d be in the mist and the wind the whole time. With the ground above snow-covered this probably meant white-out conditions. A walk back along the glen seemed more appealing so I turned and followed an icy track back down into the trees.

The landscape changes from brown to white

 

Much later in the day the weather did change again and the sun came out, at least on the eastern hills. But by then I was back in Aviemore in a café.

At Lochan nam Bo. Far enough.

Images of Frost & Ice: A Cold Boxing Day

View over Strathspey to the Cairngorms

An overnight temperature of -7C ensured the hard frost continued. Frost on frost in fact as the new frost extended the old. No sunshine on Boxing Day meant no melting of the frost anywhere. On pools and puddles the ice grows thicker. Whilst strands of low cloud drifted in the valleys the dense mist of yesterday was gone and the high clouds were well above the mountains, which stood out across Strathspey in the flat light. The birch trees were a ghostly white, the bare branches coated with frost.

 

Frosted grass

Shapes in the Ice

Silvery birches

Frosted leaves

Christmas Day Crescent Moon

Late afternoon. Above the mist and frost a new moon hangs in the sky.

A Frosty Christmas Day Stroll

Across the mist to the Cromdale Hills

Christmas Day has been quiet and cold with mist filling the valleys and frost coating the ground. Early afternoon saw a few hours of sunshine on the slopes above Strathspey. Underfoot the ground, frozen and white, crunched with every step. Puddles were frozen. Gates and stiles slippery with ice. The glare of the bright sun hid the high Cairngorms to the south. Across shrouded Strathspey the Cromdale Hills rose into a blue sky. Drifting cloud came and went over the summits. The mist rose and fell, at times threatening to envelop us. A buzzard flapped lethargically from a fence post as we approached, soon settling again a few hundred yards further on. In the field it was watching rabbits ploughed dark trails through the frosted grass.
 

Remants of the last snowfall

The woods were dark. We peered in but stayed out in the fields, in the sunshine. There would be other days for exploring the sombre winter forest. Today the sun was welcome though there was no warmth in the brightness. In areas shaded from the south-westerly winds and rain that brought the big thaw last week crisp snow still covered the ground.
  

The mist rises

As we turned for home the mist was thickening below and starting to rise up the hillsides. Soon after we were inside and warm with hot drinks in front of the fire it surrounded the house. Just a few hours of sunshine then. But a lovely few hours.

Frost

For three days now the temperature has barely risen above freezing during the day and at night there have been hard frosts. Everything is white – grass, trees, rocks, soil – and the frost forms intricate and beautiful patterns. The sun has shone in the sky but only south and west facing slopes have received enough of its warmth for the frost to melt. The sun is too low in the sky even at midday to shine downwards. Instead the light slants across the land making long dark shadows.

Roaming the meadows and woods for a few hours I marvelled at how the cold and frost had transformed familiar places. The ground, so often muddy and slippery, was frozen hard and my boots crunched through the crisp frost and banged down on the stiff earth. Walking was easier than in the wet, as long as I avoided the ice in the hollows. Rabbits browsed on icy grass out in the fields. Once a pheasant broke the silence, squawking loudly as it crashed up into the air. A flock of fieldfares flew raggedly low over the ground to perch in a lonely birch tree and then flap off again as I approached. Mostly though the land was silent and subdued, held quiet by the frost. In the distance, across the valley, the high Cairngorms hune, pale silhouettes against the dark of the forest. This is winter.