Monadhliath Mountains means "grey mountains". Running in a northeast to southwest direction, the mountains lie on the western side of Strathspey, to the west of the Cairngorms and to the south east of Loch Ness. The mountains are within the Highland council area, and the south and east fringes are within the Cairngorms National Park. The high point of the range is Càrn Dearg, at 945 m/3100ft, located 24 km south of Inverness.
As the weather was due to deteriorate during the day I set off from the car park at the end of the C road NW of Newtonmore at 6.30 am. I walked to Glenballoch house then alongside the Allt Fionndrigh. I crossed the small wooden bridge then over the col to Gleann Ballach. At the head of the valley I put my crampons on and my goggles and balaclava. I had the ice axe out as I ascended the ramp North of some cliffs to the col between Carn dearg and Carn Ban. I had snow blasting into my face as I ascended Carn Dearg. I then worked my way round to Carn Sgulain via Carn Ban, Carn Ballach and Meall a Bhotain on hard snow. Although this should just be a case of following the fence posts they kept disappearing when the snow was too deep. So then it was a case of keeping track of which summits you were between and following the compass needle again in the white out.
