Beinn Mhanach

The hotel offered an early breakfast starting from 7 am which allowed me to get to the hills nice and early. Temperates had dropped sharply and it was zero degrees in the morning and the hills which had been snow capped yesterday where fully covered in snow/frost in the morning.

I used the mountain bike for the approach down the Auch valley which allowed me to make good speed over what would have been a long slog by foot. There were many river crossings along the way which were all just about manageable on the bike but did mean getting feet very wet and cold. 

I stopped at a bridge at the foot of the hill and headed straight up the snowy grassy slopes. It was a long hard slog with the legs a little bit tired after yesterday. The summit was cold and windy and not somewhere to hang about. It would have been nice to do the other two munros as per the original plan but they looked too snow covered for me to attempt safely so I headed back the way I came and was back to the car before midday.

After a cup of tea at Tyndrum I decided to make the most of the good weather and did a cycle ride from Strathyre to Callander where I stopped for a coffee before heading back.

Beinn Dorain and Beinn an Dothaidh

A reasonably early start and drive up to Bridge of Orchy for some munro bagging on what was forecast to be several days of glorious weather.

It was fairly pleasant at the foot of the hill near Bridge of Orchy station but started raining about half way up to the col. I sensibly stopped and put on the waterproofs. At the col I decided to head left towards Beinn an Dothaidh. It remained pretty wet and cloudy with poor visibility on the way to the summit with some difficulty finding the right route to the summit and then being clear on whether I'd actually found the true summit. In the end visited everything that looked like a peak. Things then started to clear a little and were looking a lot better when I got to the col again.

From there it was a pleasant ascent at the start towards Beinn Dorain but I stayed on the lower northern path which started to get a little bit hairy towards the end with a lot of snow on the ground. I left the path near the end and headed straight up to reach the summit ridge which was a lot more pleasant.

The descent was pretty straightforward but the rain started again at the end.

Stayed overnight at the Muthu Ben Doran which was cheap and pretty decent. Had dinner at the Tyndrum Inn.

Pentlands Run with Max

Max and Colin headed out for a run in the Pentlands on a pleasant Sunday evening. A challenging route was planned but proved a little much for Max who hasn't been running much in recent weeks. We cut things a little short as it would be a bit tight to do the full route before the sun set. Very pleasant run with lovely views of the hills and the city.

Walk around Kinghorn, Fife

Cherry, Colin and Max had a day out visiting the organic area on the old mining works at Kinghorn. Really should have been a summer visit as it didn't look its best in the cold grey morning light. The sun came out later and we walked to the top of the Binn for views over Burntisland and towards the Bridges.

Rebus - Long Shadows at the Kings Theatre

Cherry and Colin went to the Kings Theatre to see a Rebus play. Pretty good.

SOL - near Calvine

A lovely autumn day and the A9 was looking delightful with the trees turning red and orange and the low but bright autumn sun shining bright. Another Scottish O League outing on the Short Blue course. As always these are pretty challenging but managed to get round reasonably cleanly. There was just one control where I was lucky to find it having run pretty aimlessly or a long leg in broadly the right direction but definitely losing contact of where I was on the map. Around 75 minutes out of the course.