The Cairngorms are ‘a little piece of the arctic in Scotland’ according to the SMC Munros Guide and the area contains many of the tallest peaks in the East Highlands. Ben Macdui (1309m), Cairn Gorm (1244m) and Braeriach (1296) are probably three of the better known and the whole area is full of steep corries and high plateaux. Access to the mountains is typically from Aviemore or Braemar.
A brilliant day - set off from the Ski Centre car park on Cairngorm and headed over to Coire an t-Sneachda, practicing pacing en route (doing various lengths along the track and averaging to get pacing per 100m) and using timing to corroborate. We headed up to the moraine at NH995038 and practiced some buckets, bollards, abseils (South African) and sliding, though the snow was a bit hard for the textbook finish. The axe once in the snow wasn`t giving a gentle slide! Then we solo`d up Aladdin`s Couloir (separate entry) and headed up to Stob Coire an t-Sneachda. Despite the good visibility as the afternoon sun came out, we practiced some nav assuming we couldn`t see. 400m due east from the cairn and then an off-north bearing to the windy col 600m away. For the first 400m our pacing was atrocious. But the 600m to the col was spot on. We used timing on both cases too. Then up to Cairngorm Summit where we bumped into three Glenmore Lodge guides - and had a good chat with Al Gilmour who had done my first WML training along with Sam Leary. From here it was a straight forward but laborious trudge down past the Ptarmigan and along windy ridge back to the car park.
