Last Wednesady, the 28th January was the first anniversary on my Dad 'Freddy's death. The best place for me on such a day was on the mountains with my dog Meg.
Starting at the Steall Car Park in Glen Nevis at 10.20am - 5C I quickly moved through the Gorge to the Steall meadow. Followed by a group of Stalkers from the John Muir Trust I hoped I wasn't going to be dodging bullets on such a nice day.
Turning up hill just before the ruin of the old Steall Farmhouse you climb up towards a hidden valley protected by huge boulders. At around 1000 feet the snow depth started to increase to the point that I really should have been on skis.
After about one and a half hours I reached the Coll between Aonach Beag and Carn Mor Dhearg (Big Red Mountain) This was hard going and even Meg was tired.
Stopped here for lunch in the cold. Temperature was well below zero yet the snow pack was still 'strange'. From here you climb the long corniced ridge of Carn Mor Dhearg. Meg was on a cord because of her disturbing habit of peering over 'big drops' and with cornices she could get her big drop a little sooner than even she would like! The view as you climb this ridge is really first class. To the North the sky formed a heavy leaden line of cloud. To the South the mountain of Lochaber spread out as far as the eye could see - a winter panorama - and on such a sad day an uplifting experience.
It took about another hour to get up this long ridge to the summit of Carn Mor Dhearg
Meg enjoyed the view
On the summit of Carn Mor Dhear the wind was full on so the windchill was close to minus -15C At first no visibility of the great North Face f Ben Nevis - the UK's highest mountain then the cloud started to clear to show a fantastic panorama of the route ahead.
The CMD arete over to the Ben is one of the great winter days out in the UK - Although Ive done this a few times! this was Megs fourth winter ascent - every time you do this the route is different. This time it was very windy and a lot of snow on the ridge - still very 'clingy' snow. The wind though wa close to 70- 100mph - making great spindrift plumes - but difficult climbing for an old man like me. Started with Meg on a line, but found her route finding a little suspect and then realised I was following a dog - which is a bit silly really - how that Dog does'nt know about Windslab - I just don't know!!
On any winter route no matter how many times you may have climbed it you have to focus and use your skills and experinence not to do something stupid that could kill you. So I was concentrating on staying on the mountain but never far from my thoughts that day was Freddy, my great Dad. I was happy I was up in the mountains - a place I love- particularly on such a dramatic day but sad day - It was perfect then to be able to think of my Father in the right place for me, with a smile, thinking how much Freddy would have said about what I was doing!
