Meall Chuaich

Meall Chuaich – “It’s life Jim, but not as we know it”

I’m 2 weeks behind with this one…a source of great embarrassment.  Given the way the milder weather is now setting in with the arrival of Spring, this may have been the last of this year’s real winter hills for The Resurrection Man, Cap’n Jack and The Fatdog.  This wee walk up the Drumochter Munro, Meall Chuaich (10/03/10), contained more wildlife (admittedly all grouse and mountain hares) than we’d seen on all our travels.  Most definitely not what we were used to!

It was another cracker. As we drove into Drumochter there wasn’t a cloud in the sky…again! It’s incredible the number of good walking days there have been in the past few weeks. It was such a beautiful morning that the feelgood feeling didn’t diminish even although I had to lift The Fatdog over a fence only 30m from the car! I have to say that the circuit training must be having some effect because lifting the black hairy brute over the fence was not the hit-or-miss operation it once was! As we prepared to start our way up the track towards the hill a jet screamed past overhead...

The trek in begins up the track to the little power station - Meall Chuaich left of centre

The long winding track beside the aqueduct was covered in ice filled puddles which The Fatdog took great delight in pounding through. Before the inevitable crash, the frozen surface creaked and groaned as FD tested its load bearing capacity to its limit…a bit like my back at the earlier fence.

There was a lot of loud laughing coming from the surrounding heather. In this part of the world this can only mean one thing…grouse! Lots and lots of grouse. You’ll find a number of photos of grouse throughout this “Tail”. Cap’n Jack’s camera was doing overtime. Usually we only see a couple (if that) but today we could hardly walk a couple of steps without another pair shooting out of the heather 20m in front. CJ’s big 300mm lens was coming into its own.

After 2km of gently rising track we reached the tiny power station. Photographed from the east there was a “ye olde mill” look to the setting.

The building appeared to be served, at least in part by an enormous pipe leading in from the south.

Next to the pipe there was an unattended skidoo. It was times like this one regretted not having a misspent youth hotwiring cars!

Continuing along the track for another 2km we came to the old bothy.

From here we left the track and followed a faint trail across what looked suspiciously like a frozen bog to the “foot” of Meall Chuaich’s south west spur. There were so many grouse lurking in the clumps of heather that FD was hitched up. To be fair it’s unlikely she would chase the grouse, but she always gets a fright when they shoot out of the heather at close range and I didn’t want her careering off into the undergrowth accidentally scaring more of the native bird life. Here we came across the two extremes of the grouse world. In this photograph is a shy, retiring female of the species...

...while the local "blackshirt" practised for the forthcoming rally of the Dalwhinnie Fascisti

Most of the tracks appeared to head straight up the snow slope but I reckoned my legs would prefer to head right and follow the gentler angle up the spur...

…but I hadn’t reckoned on the “Bird of Prey” uncloaking off to our right.

“Cap’n look!…”

“Eh?”

“Th-e-r-e-’s…

Klingons on the starboard bow, starboard bow, starboard bow…”

Cue video…

As we climbed the number of grouse diminished and the number of mountain hares increased. Now they are something The Fatdog loves to chase, sure in the knowledge that she has no chance of catching one and thus neatly avoiding the decision of what to do with one once trapped! She’s such a softy. The Fatdog takes time out from bunny chasing to pose for the hillwalking paparazzi

It didn’t take long before she spied her first big white bunny. I could almost hear its sigh from where I stood as FD thumped up the slope towards it. It wearily turned and slowly ambled off leaving The Fatdog in its wake. Maisie tired of the game very quickly and contented herself with interested stares from then on.

The snow had been our friend up to about 700m. There was enough give to make it walkable and enough consolidation to prevent our feet shooting through the crust. From the 700m mark it became variable. Sometimes it felt slushy and at others solid. From time to time feet and legs would suddenly disappear into unexpected deep pockets. The final upward traverse onto the top of the west spur and from there onto the wide shallow domed summit was harder going than the earlier slopes. As we headed for the cairn each step was a bit of a lottery.

An old fence post was caked in frost. The edges were beginning to thaw, leaving delicate sheets of frozen lace. Tiny dots of glittering colour lit up the surface, sparkling in the strong sunshine. Sadly our limited camera skills failed to reproduce the incredible beauty of these wonderful ice forms.

Its position at the north end of the Drumochter Munros means it is a hill of distant views. The Northern Cairngorms were sadly a near indistinguishable lump with little discernable detail as were the Southern Cairgorms off to the east. As we headed back down there were however more detailed views westward into part of Ben Alder and to Creag Meagaidh (shown centre).

As I eyed up the steep snow slope I dug in a tentative heel to test the surface. It pushed in a couple of inches. Good, it wasn’t frozen solid so no need for the microspikes. I brought the other foot onto the snow and took a couple of tentative heel-dig steps then stopped to look round for Cap’n Jack. I really had expected him to be his normal “careful” self but to my astonishment he shot past with The Fatdog close on his heels, “skating” down the snow slope in metre long foot slides. I had forgotten that he skied when he was at school. Best fun he’d ever had on our walks, he declared later. I was just thankful to get down in one piece!

As we shuffled our way back down the track to the car Cap'n Jack couldn't resist yet another grouse shot

I was half way through pulling off my boots when Cap’n Jack commented that we had just made it on time. Puzzled I looked into the sky for signs of rain. “No…look over there” he said. Some 100m away, near the track we’d just walked down, the heather was ablaze.

“Th-e-r-e-’s…

Klingons on the starboard bow, starboard bow, starboard bow…”

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