BACK TO WINTER ON BRAERIACH

Some excellent breaks in the cloud

One of the gems of Braeriach, Loch Coire an Lochan

Excellent snow cover on the summit area and plateau

Atmospheric cloud and sun on the summit

Many fragile cornices still

Debbie brushing up on map and compass work to get off the plateau

Ben Macdui & Lairig Ghru

Return client Debbie was out with me for a day on the wonderful Braeriach. There was a change in the weather with an unusual NW airflow-unusual because we hardly had any NW's all winter! A dusting of fresh snow overnight plus some light and brief snow showers today. There were also some lovely glimpses of sun and blue skies and with the strong winds it felt a tad wintry again. It's a nice circuit to start at Whitewell and up into the Lairig Ghru and onto the long  north ridge to the summit. There are still some big areas of hard snow here so we took advantage of these over the usual bouldery summer terrain. Debbie did some micro navigation on the plateau area and we descended down to the lovely Loch Coire an Lochan where we had almost continuous snow all the way down to 600m before heading out in glorious early evening sunshine through Glen Einaich.  The plateau still has an excellent cover of snow. Why most guide books give the route up the UK's third highest peak starting at the Sugar Bowl car park, heading into the awkward boulders in the Chalamain Gap then descending into the Lairig Ghru on a mostly boggy path then returning the same route, ie ascending again into the boulders, as always baffled me (answers on a postcard please).