Sunday 17 May - Corwharn (NO 288 651, 609m)

Start Point: Parking area on east side of Backwater Reservoir at NO260597

End Point: Parking area on east side of Backwater Reservoir at NO256614

Distance and Ascent: Bike: 9.1km, 160m; Foot: 4.1km, 210m

Weather: Some sun, a couple of showers.

 

Thin red = outward bike; thick red = return bike; blue = foot 

More detailed view of the route taken on foot

The day started sunny, but it soon started clouding over and with a forecast of sunshine and showers, the earlier I got going, the better.

I started from the parking area marked on the OS map, on the east side of the reservoir, and cycled off down the road. Down wasn’t an ideal starting gradient, so when, after 2km, I reached another parking area (marked as a picnic area, not a P on the map), I gave Mick a call and asked him to move, so as to make my return leg shorter and easier. I nearly waited for him to arrive, so I could get my forgotten earphones, but with the sky looking a bit ominous I decided I may later regret delaying myself by five minutes.

He arrived in the new parking spot just as I negotiated the gate part way up the forest track that was going to lead me some distance towards my hill.

There are no paths or tracks that lead out of this forest, but from aerial photos I was confident that I could find a way, and it proved to be easier than expected (in this case, by ‘easier’ I mean that I didn’t need to bash through densely planted conifers). I abandoned the bike by a couple of timber stacks, where forestry machines were parked up, and set off on the margin of a newly cleared area, keeping to the edge of the trees that are still standing, with its green, firm carpet. 

Before I knew it, I was out of the top of the mature/felled trees, and into an area of young (maybe self-seeded) trees, dotted amongst the heather. Given the choice between making my way relatively easily along a drainage ditch or across the heather and young trees to the fence line, I opted for the former, until that became a bit tricky, whereupon I cut across, aiming for a stile I could see over the deer fence.

It wasn’t the friendliest stile, with the top rung on each side being uncomfortably far apart, and with no tall upright to hang onto, but I made it across, onto the ATV track the other side. The track petered into a trodden line, but it still gave easy going up to the summit. There I wandered around at some length and believe that I found the tussock that sits half a centimetre higher than the surrounding tussocks. From there, I could clearly see the other hills I visited in this area last year, and yesterday. I could also see quite a few localised showers around me, one of which had only just moved away from getting me slightly damp on my approach to the summit.

My return was more or less a retracing of my outward route – I was never far away from it, but from the knowledge gained on the outward leg, I varied it slightly on the way back.

The return bike ride only took me 12 minutes, and it was probably about half way through that it started raining. By the time I reached Bertie it was as heavy as that shower got, which wasn’t ideal timing to be taking half of the contents out of Bertie’s boot to put the bike back in. Everything got rather damp.

I’d wondered whether taking the bike was the best approach to this hill, versus walking up to Spot Height 503 on Milldewan Hill and approaching via the ridge. That would have given me pleasing views for an extended period, but given how heavy some of the showers were that passed through in the hour after I got back, from a comfort point of view, taking the faster option was a good choice. 

Blogger has decided that we're doing photos in reverse order in this post:

Summit view (including a shower just over yonder)

Summit view (that shower is probably the one that hit me on my way back)

A section of the track along the ridge

The track along the ridge where I intercepted it, after crossing the deer fence

It probably doesn't come across as anything other than a bog standard deer fence stile, but it wasn't the easiest I've ever negotiated. That said, I still chose to use it again on the way back, versus scaling the fence or the wooden section by the nearby gate. 

Saturday 16 May - Crock & Hare Cairn

Crock (NO 226 632; 554m) and Hare Cairn (NO 242 623; 516m)

Start Point: Car Park at Freuchies

Distance and Ascent: Bike: 14.9km, 310m; Foot: Crock: 1.5km, 150m; Hare Cairn: 1.5km, 140m

Weather: mainly sunny and feeling warm when in the sun. Thankfully pretty calm after two windy days.   

Red = bike; dark blue = foot to Crock; lighter blue = foot to Hare Cairn

There are more detailed views of the walking bits at the end of this post. 

I looked at visiting Hare Cairn when I was at Backwater Reservoir last year, but decided it would be better approached from Freuchies, and that it would be good if I had my bike available for the purpose. So to Freuchies is where we headed this morning, for Mick to run/walk some laps of the forest, whilst I did a 5-leg outing, consisting of: bike, walk, bike, walk, bike. 

Mick set out a couple of minutes before me, but I soon passed him as I pedalled off up the hill. I certainly can't claim to be an able cyclist, and I'm slow uphill, but even so I thought that I must have got well away from Mick by the time I reached my first stopping-point after 3.5km. It was thus a surprise to hear Mick approaching whilst I was still faffing in the transition between bike and walk. 

Mick looked dubiously at where I'd parked the bike and asked what I was doing. I pointed at the broom that was obscuring the old, unmapped track that I was going to take through the relatively young forest, and confirmed that this was, in fact, the easy way up the hill - and so it proved to be. The old track has largely grown over with heather now, relatively young at the bottom, more woody further up, but it was still a straightforward route. With the track ending at the top of the forest, the final approach to the summit was harder going than it had been getting up through the forest. 

I was back down at the bike in 35 minutes, and after another transition faff, I was ready to ride around to the east side of the hill to tackle Hare Cairn. 

All of the bike legs proved to be enjoyable (even to this non-cyclist). Some of the inclines may have been uncomfortably steep, but none went on quite long enough to be unpleasant, and this leg featured a big downhill, which preceded the final uphill. 

Putting the bike to one side again, I was temporarily paralyzed by indecision: I'd parked the bike at the end of a rough track that went off in one direction, but just behind me I thought I could see another track that aerial mapping suggested took a more direct line, but I also couldn't make out how far up the hill it might go. Eventually I had to conclude that standing still wasn't getting me anywhere, so I opted for the track that looked less direct, but I thought, from the aerial images, looked more promising. 

It worked out fine, but once beyond its end the heather was deeper and woodier than would have been ideal - particularly as I refuse to learn my lesson about leg wear, so I'd opted for 3/4 length leggings and was once again scratching my lower legs to pieces. 

This summit was a particularly fine viewpoint, over Backwater Reservoir and, beyond, the hills I'd visited last summer. I could also examine the hill I intend to go up tomorrow for the best looking route option. 

After a few snaps at the trig point, I took a bearing and paced out to the location where the highest point is said to be (which really isn't discernible from any of the ground around it), wandered around a bit, then just dropped straight back down the hillside towards the bike, eventually picking up my outward track just as the terrain was getting a bit tricky. 

Then all I had to do was to whiz back down to the car park - or not quite whiz down because someone has snuck some undulations in the way. Thinking back to my first hill-bagging outings on the bike, where I would inch back down the hill with the brakes on the whole time, I have gained in confidence, even with the big gaps between using the bike. Today I temporarily hit 40km/h on one of the final descents. Overall, I still would have been well behind the top marathon runners though! 

After a really enjoyable outing (the combination of some warm sunshine, not-too-difficult riding, and far-easier-than-expected walks up hills), there was then something of a reversal of roles. More often than not it's Mick who finds himself hanging around car parks waiting for me, but today it was Mick who had the longer outing.   

A lovely calm day after two unpleasantly windy days. 

Track up Crock. This was as overgrown as it go - the lower reaches were clearer - but even this was pretty easy going.

Crock Summit

You may need to zoom in, but I was rather taken with that house and its location. I may have to start playing the Euromillions when it reaches silly high numbers...

Track up Hare Cairn, before it petered out and left me yomping through heather.

I took a selfie at the trig before going off in search of the actual high point. 

Zoom of the 'on foot' bits of my route:

 
 

Tuesday 12 May - Hill of Garvock (NO 726 691; 277m)

Start Point: Viewpoint on B road to the NE

Distance and ascent: 4km, 60m?

Weather: Sunny, but a bit breezy and quite cool

I made an attempt on this hill on 23 May 2018. This is what I said at the time:

There was one more hill I intended to visit on my way from Aberdeen to TGO Challenge Control at Montrose (Hill of Garvock). The only thing that potentially saves this middle-of-a-field from falling entirely within the 'pointless summits' category is the presence of a tower atop it. I'll have to reserve judgement, as having driven to my start point, which sits about 1 mile and 30m of ascent away from the top, and having attempted approaches via two different fields, I left it unbagged due to overly frisky cows, with young, and an overly interested bull. I'm not generally too fazed by cattle these days, but these exceeded my tolerance level for bovine behaviour. I shall have to return to this one in the winter months sometime.  

I obviously completely overlooked the last sentence of that post when I decided that this hill needed to be bagged today. I think I've been in Montrose in May of every year bar three since 2008, but it's possible that this will be one of the last years when we have a need to be here, so there was an imperative for the nearest Marilyn to the town ticked off. I took Mick with me to help fend off the cattle. 

The left hand field (viewed from the viewpoint parking area) contained a sizeable herd that showed interest in us the moment we parked up and before we'd stepped outside, but the right hand field (with the 'bull in field' sign) seemed to be empty. That optimism lasted for just a few paces along its boundary, before we started seeing fresh cow pats. Fortunately, the herd in that field were out of sight on the south side of the hill, and didn't get to see us until we were a few steps away from our exit gate. The next two fields were empty, and the final field held both sheep and cattle, so we took a slightly indirect route for the final approach to the summit tower, allowing us to drop down the hill and out of sight of the beasts. 

It's an interesting summit, with its tower and excellent views in all directions (I'll gloss over the three communications masts a short distance away) and would no doubt be a popular place to go if it wasn't for the cows. 

A couple made a half-hearted attempt to follow us as we started retracing our steps, but once again we dropped down the hill out of their line of sight, and I think the sheep in between us and them may have also put them off from stampeding after us.  The herd in the final field had moved closer to the gate by the time we got back there, but whilst interested they didn't follow as we again just dropped low enough down the hill to put us out of view. 

I was happier than usual to be back at Bertie: whilst we'd had no trouble at all from the herds, we were lucky with where they happened to be congregated, and I'm glad to never have to go up there again. 

Summit shot. I understand you can go up the tower and I made a half-hearted attempt to unchain the door, but feared how difficult it might be to secure it again. 

View of the east coast countryside. It was a countryside and sea view in the other direction.

Proof that Mick was with me. He looked inappropriately overdressed, but it really is abnormally cold this May.

Those galloping cattle would have loved for that fence not to have been there. 
 

 

 

Monday 11 May - Strathfinella Hill (NO 693 787, 414m)

Start Point: Car park on W side of entrance to Drumtochty Castle (NO 697 798)

Distance and Ascent: 3.75km, 260m

Weather: Sunny intervals but cool at around 9 degrees. 

 

I had intended to do this hill on Tuesday morning, after spending the night in the car park, but having arrived there at just gone 3pm, I figured there was plenty of time to nip up there before tea time - a decision helped by the belief that I was far less likely to encounter any mountain bikers in the middle of the afternoon on a Monday than I was in a morning or evening.

 

Having considered various ascent routes (including cycling a long way around on my bike), I'd decided to go for the direct route. Strictly speaking, they are not designated mountain bike trails (with signs prohibiting pedestrians, the likes of which I see elsewhere), but it's quite clear on the ground that's what they are, and meeting a bike coming hurtling down the hill could be disastrous for both cyclist and pedestrian. On the steep bits I stayed off the side of the trail as much as possible, and was well positioned to both see and hear anything that was coming. 

 

I was a bit more concerned about the way down, as I would have my back to the direction of travel, so I went at a rate of knotts (with a little bit of confidence that the clearing of fallen trees looked like it had happened in the last couple of days, so most people wouldn't know the trail was clear for use), and didn't see a single person for the entire outing, on foot or bike. 

 

 

 Summit selfie - no view from the high point

There were some open areas further down the hill

Fresh looking cuts through fallen trees

 

The tree in the foreground is one of the oldest Sitka Spruces in Scotland. the sign in front of it gave some stats about it. I sent Mick out to have a look at it later, as he appreciates an impressive tree, and this one was impressive indeed, particularly compared to the little skinny specimens all around it.  

I'm including my recorded track below, but this is not a route to be recommended for the reasons stated above. 

 

Saturday 9 May - Lochnagar (Cac Carn Beag) and Conachcraig

Lochnagar (Cac Carn Beag - NO 243 861; 1155m) and Conachcraig (NO 279 865; 862m)

Start Point: Spittal of Glenmuick (£6 per day)

Distance and Ascent: 21.75km, 1070m

Weather: Lots of sunny intervals in the morning, then increasing light snow showers towards and beyond lunchtime. 

 

Mick & I first had Lochnagar on our TGO Challenge Route Sheet in 2011. That was the Year of the Storm when a forecast of gusts up to 130mph put us off. We had it on our Route Sheet again a couple of years later, but although calm that year, the tops were heavily shrouded in cloud and I've long believed Lochnagar to be a summit that requires a fine day, so we bypassed it again. I think it was on another of our joint routes too, and maybe one or two of Mick's solo crossings, yet here we are 15 years later having never made it up there. 

 

So, when I withdrew from this year's Challenge (yep, it was on that Route Sheet too), I said to Mick that we would come to Braemar and make a special effort to finally get up there. Today's forecast looked decent, and the plan as of two days ago was that we would walk up from Auchallater, exactly as per all those Challenge Route Sheets, and take in the obvious two other Munros on our way, before retracing our steps. Then tomorrow I would cycle in (as far as I could manage the gradient, at least) from Balmoral and visit the adjacent Corbett of Conachcraig.  

 

Then, talking about the plan and the distances involved last night, I pointed out that most people would do Lochnagar from Spittal of Glenmuick and Mick suggested that's what we should do too, even though it would involve driving Bertie-the-Motorhome down 7 miles of single track road. On the revised plan, rather than doing 3 Munros, we would only do one, but instead we would combine my two Marilyns into one outing, negating the need to cycle in from anywhere tomorrow. Even better, we could do it as a circuit with two little spurs, rather than an out-and-back.

 

It was still quiet in the car park as we set out at 0815, opting to go in a clockwise direction so as to do the big hill first. It wasn't a bad day as we set out, but as we progressed along the side of Loch Muick, the sky really started to clear, raising optimism that we would get a cloud-free summit (there had been some low cloud around first thing). 

 

A slightly deceptive photo, in that there was quite a bit of cloud in other directions, but so much blue in the direction we were going was encouraging.

 

The ascent from Glas Allt Shiel up to the top of the waterfall didn't feel as steep as the contour lines suggest (Mick was tempted to come back the same way just to find out how knee-crunching it was in descent). After the more gentle gradient alongside Glas Allt, we were above the snow line by the time we got to the next steep section, but it didn't affect us, as there are only patches hanging around now, and only on the northerly and easterly aspects.   

 

We'd only passed two pairs descending, and no one else going in our direction, until we met the path coming in from the east, just before the first summit, which is when we came to appreciate that's the way most people ascend. Even so, we timed our arrival at the summit nicely, with only one other chap up there. He, a trainee Mountain Leader, was doing a round of 5 Munros. Once he left, it was just us as we swiftly put away our pork pies and yearned for a flask of tea (didn't pack the small flask for this trip and I wasn't going to carry the big one).

 

The forecast told us it was going to be -1 on the summit, with a 'feels like' of between -4 and -7, but when the sun was out, and being seated on the lee side of the summit tor, it was a perfectly pleasant temperature for sitting around. Fortunately, there was quite a bit of sun too, even though clouds had gathered in the final part of our ascent, the odd snow flake had hit us, and we could clearly see various snow showers around us. 

A group of three antipodean women arrived at the base of the summit tor just as we were leaving it, but a good few more were seen as we made our way back to the junction of paths at which we would stop retracing our steps and take to what we now knew to be the more popular route, to descend to the east. I can see why it's popular (aside from the fact that it's shorter) - the views over the corrie and to the summit are incredible. 
  

I hadn't realised this was a popular hill with tourists, which is how I'm classifying (and I accept potentially insultingly in some cases) those who were wearing ordinary street trainers, fashion jackets and school-style backpacks. There was one fairly large group who had decided, in what looked very much like street trainers, to make their way up the large snowfield that was sitting on the top of the spur on the way down to Little Pap. As they laughed and kicked their way up, I couldn't help but think that if they'd contemplated falling, they'd thought that the only implication would be landing in the snow, without realising that a fall could lead to a slide which would end with an abrupt (and potentially catastrophic) stop against a large rock. Happily they all lived to tell the tale. We walked around the edge of the snow. 

 

Approaching the Gelder Sheil - Spittal of Glenmuick track, our path forked, and that's where Mick and I went different ways. Mick had been intending (I think!) to join me on Conachcraig, but his calf was suggesting that wasn't the wisest choice, so he continued along the engineered track, where I took to a trodden line that would give me a slightly more direct route to my next objective.

 

My trod ended at the track, then was immediately picked up again on the other side, which led me nicely to the bagger's path, which in turn gave me easy passage to the top. It's only around 160 metres of height gain from the track to the top, and less than a kilometre of distance, making me somewhat kick myself that I bypassed it when it had been on my TGOC Route Sheet in 2019 (the valve in my Thermarest had become suddenly detatched at something like 3 o'clock that morning, instantly placing me on the cold ground, so I was rushing to get to Tarfside so I could attempt a fix in good time for the glue to go off before bedtime). That said, it had also been in cloud that day, and it would have been a shame to have missed the view back over to Lochnagar, which really is something impressive. 

I'm not sure this snap does any sort of justice to the reality of the view

 

I visited three of the tors atop this hill, as even though the high point appeared clear, I wanted to be sure I wasn't mistaken. I then noticed that Casteal na Cailich, about 1km to the north, was only 3m lower and considered wandering over there just by way of insurance. I opted against, and as there has been a survey on this hill I think I'm reasonably safe against the summit being moved.

 

Whilst I'd been wandering around, Mick had phoned and asked me to look for his glove on my way back. By the time he'd realised it was missing, it was 2km since he knew he'd last had it, so it was a bonus that i was sweeping his route and saving him the backtrack. 

 

Thus, instead of taking a more direct line, I descended to where Mick's route from Lochnagar had come out and thought I'd just take a little glance back along that path. I didn't have to go that far, as under a rock in the cairn that marks the junction (immediately opposite the path I'd come down) was the glove. That saved me an extended period of scanning the ground as I walked!

 

I then just had a straightforward 5k along the track to get back to Bertie. Somewhere along there the very light snow, that had been falling more often than not since half way down from Lochnagar, became more determined and slightly more sleety, but it never came too much for my windshirt to cope with, so no waterproofs faff was called for. 

 

A really excellent day out!

Atop Conachcraig with a good view of Lochnagar.
  

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wednesday 6 May: Gathersnow Hill & Goseland Hill

In our hasty packing for this trip, whilst also trying to decide on where we would be going and what we would be doing, I belatedly decided that I needed to include my mountain bike, to ease access to one particular hill in the Braemar area. Thus the abandoned steed was hauled out of the shed, where it has sat unused for the last 6.5 years (I think; I'm relying on a dodgy memory and some searching of this blog). After pumping up the tyres, I took it for a spin along the road, just far enough to establish the gears still worked adequately before I put it in Bertie's boot. 

Other than 'a few hills in the Braemar area', we left home without a plan, so this morning over breakfast (in a layby near Shap) I pored over my records on hill-bagging.co.uk and found there were a few hills along the A701, between Moffat and Edinburgh that I haven't visited yet, and as the first one I looked at lent itself to being accessed by bike, it became my objective for the day. It was a bonus that it had such an excellent name.

Gathersnow Hill (NT058256; 689m)

Start Point: End of windfarm track, on A701, at NT 11004 27724. Room to park a car without obstructing the gate. 

Distance and ascent: Bike: 12.0km, 220m, Walk: 3.1km, 320m

Weather: Sunny intervals.   

 

Blue = bike, red = walk.  

 

Fortunately, Mick had no aspirations to join me on this one, as there wasn't really room to park Bertie-the-Motorhome at the end of the windfarm track, so he was positioned blocking half of the gateway, with Mick available to move him should the need arise. It didn't, which is surprising (based on previous experience that the moment you pull up in a gateway, someone wants to use it). 

 

Getting the bike out isn't an easy endeavour (half the boot needs to be emptied first), but Mick made short work of it whilst I faffed, and with the front wheel reattached and the brake reengaged (a key part of the process that I may have overlooked once or twice), we joined forces to heave the great lump of heaviness over the locked gate. 

 

A couple of minutes later, I realised that I had completely forgotten how to use gears, which resulted in me pushing up the first significant incline. Happily, I soon got to grips with which gear was which and the rest of the outing went smoothly (even if I did have to ride through a herd of cows with calves at one point; I approached slowly and talked to them nicely, and they all moved politely out of the way for me). 

 

The track was pretty decent, if rough in places, up to the remote house at Hopehead. Beyond, there was a mix of hard track and grassy surface, but all dry enough at the moment that I could still make easy enough progress. 

 

My intention had been to go to the end of the track, but at Nether Cule Burn, it seemed that it would be more efficient to just head straight up the hill, rather than going the long way around. The bike was abandoned, and I was just about to strike off up the hill, when I saw a trodden line heading up onto the spur a little further to the west - less direct, but the extra distance would be offset by the relative ease of an ATV track. 

 

The ATV track took me so far, then petered out, and I continued across ground that was neither smooth, nor too rough, constantly thinking that there was probably another ATV track just to my left. I concluded many years ago (if I went searching, I could probably find the blog post - it was a hill somewhere up the Great Glen) that if the going isn't too dreadful, then there's no point weaving around searching for a good line that may not exist. So, bash onward I did, until I did eventually converge with the ATV track that had indeed been to my left for some while.

 

The summit was an excellent viewpoint and a worthwhile objective. I took in the views, took a few snaps, then rather than retracing my steps, I dead-headed for where I'd left the bike. A steep descent, but quick.

 

The return bike ride wasn't all downhill, but I did it significantly faster than the outward leg. Just knowing how all the gates fastened was a benefit, as was the fact that the herd of cows had dispersed and this time I only had to deal with four adults. 

 

Back at Bertie the boot was again half emptied, the bike stowed and off we went to Broughton for a late lunch - a location chosen purely because I knew there was a car park here, as we'd used it last year when I did a round of three hills to the east of the village. 

 

Over lunch, I looked at the map and contemplated another hill nearby that would also lend itself well to being approached by bike. As much as I wanted to sit around and do nothing all afternoon, as it's not often that I have the bike with me, it seemed silly not to put it to good use, so out it came again, and off I pedalled to...

 

Goseland Hill (NT 07115 35014; 435m)

Start Point: Broughton Village Hall Car Park

Distance and ascent: Bike: 11km, 100m; Foot: 1.8km, 190m

 

Blue = bike; red = walk

 

Cycling on tarmac is a whole lot easier than than toiling up a rough or grassy track - that was my main observation from this afternoon!

 

The bike took me to the access track to Gosland, to the S of the hill, where I locked it up under a tree (and spotted a Geocache in the process), then took to my feet to attack the side of the hill. Trying to find grassy bits through the heather as much as I could, I eventually stumbled upon a really good ATV track that looked like it would have been the better line of ascent, although I didn't follow it for long, as I couldn't resist taking a more direct line.

 

The top was another excellent viewpoint, so I sent a short video to Mick to show him what he was missing as well as taking my usual snaps. Being a tad nippy (it was now late afternoon and at no point had the day been hot in any case - 9 degrees was the warmest we saw on Bertie's display, and the forecast suggested a high of 5), I didn't linger long. 

 

The ATV track that had looked promising on the outward leg proved not to be as beneficial as I'd thought - it was too steep for comfort, as well as being less direct, so after a short while on it, I decided that going through the heather was the better option after all. 

 

Getting back to Bertie just 20 minutes after reaching the bike, I was rather proud of my speediness, until Mick pointed out that Sebastian Sawe (who won the London marathon a couple of weeks ago) ran faster than I had managed to cycle, and he'd had to go considerably further.  

 

Looking back to the remote house at Hopehead. It looks habitable, but uninhabited. 

At this point I wished I'd taken the trouble to put the rear mud-guard on my bike before I set out!

Now on foot, heading up the hill, the view looking back down the glen

A bit rough, but not bad going. The ATV track off to my left would have been easier, though.

Gathersnow Hill summit selfie

Apparently I only took snaps from the top of Goseland Hill. Here's the trig point and a snippet of the excellent summit view. 
 

Wednesday 14 January - Drygarn Fawr & Carn Gefallt

It was -4 degrees as we set out from Rhayader this morning for the drive into the Elan Valley and even on first glance out of the window an hour earlier, it had been obvious that there was a temperature inversion. The drive alongside the Caban-coch Reservoir was particularly atmospheric, with the fog hanging over the water, leaving visibility on the road clear. I was pleased with the cold conditions: the ground would be frozen, and surely everyone prefers a hill day to be dry and cold rather than warm and wet?

Drygarn Fawr (SN 862 584, 644m)

Start Point: Car park at the SW end of Caban-coch Reservoir - a much smaller car park than I'd expected, but plenty of room for us (as we were the only vehicle there). 

Distance and Ascent: 12.9km, 420m

Mick came with me for the first couple of kilometres of this one - the section along a track. With the amount of ice on its surface, it turned out to be the trickiest bit of the outing. Once I left the tracks and headed out onto the open hill, the ice was more easily avoided and almost all of the ground was frozen solid (the exceptions being a couple of areas of running water). 

 

What a place to be on such a crisp morning, and clear too with the cloud hanging on the other side of the hill, leaving my side clear, and with lumps and bumps spreading out in all directions. 

 

On top of superb surroundings (so much emptiness!) and the favourable ground conditions, when I consulted the map when the ground seemed to be levelling out, it was to find that I had 3.5km left to the summit, but only 150m of ascent, meaning I'd already done the hardest part and the rest of the outing was going to be a breeze. 

 

When I first saw the summit, it appeared much closer than it really was, but (as is to be expected) the map wasn't lying to me as to the distance. After three days of positive temperatures, before last night's plummet back negative, I'd expected all of the snow to be gone, but there was still a sizeable patch just before the summit, around which I opted to detour. 

 

With the big summit cairn visited (and the trig, just for good measure), I was retracing my steps when I looked up to see a Hercules apparently hanging in the air in front of me. I have no idea how they can travel so slowly without falling out of the air, but I managed to take my glove off, get my phone out and get a snap in the small window before it disappeared around the side of the next hill. It's position relative to me meant that I hadn't heard it coming (unlike Mick, back in the car park, who had thought there was a tractor coming, until he realised the tractor was above him). 

 

With no phone signal in the car park meaning that I couldn't keep Mick updated as to progress, he'd asked me at what point he should start to worry. Many times in this situation, I've set myself a timescale that has proved to be overly optimistic and ended up hurrying and anxious about being late, so today I said to give me 4 hours before considering that some ill fate had befallen me. It was only as I descended that I realised that Mick had done his maths wrong when he'd said that he would worry at 1230 (given that we'd set out at around 0915). Fortunately, with the good ground conditions combined with a friendly gradient, I was faster than even my optimistic estimate today.  

 

The intention had been to go straight to the next hill, but I'd also decided on the way down that as Mick was doing a lot of sitting around in car parks and laybys, it would be nice to nip back into Rhayader for lunch at a cafe before driving the few kilometres back out of town. As it went, we didn't need such a big detour, as we pulled in at the Elan Valley Visitor Centre instead, where I had a good lunch and Mick had an incredibly disappointing one. Then onwards to the final hill of this little trip.

 

After a foggy start to the drive, alongside the reservoir the low cloud was only over the water

A lovely frozen track in a largely empty landscape

Still fog in the valley on that side of the hill 

 The wind at the top was absolutely biting!

 

 The overflowing dam by the Visitor Centre was an impressive sight. We had a view of it from the cafe. 

 

Carn Gefallt (SN 940 646; 467m)

 

Start Point: pull in at end of public footpath at SN 949 659 

Distance and ascent: 6.5km, 280m 

 

There was some confusion in my note-making for this one, leading us to stop in a different pull-in from the one I'd originally intended (opposite the farm track at SN 946 657), and thus a slightly different route was taken, although in the grand scheme of things it made little difference on the way up and only a positive difference on the way down. 

 

The downside of approaching the hill from this side was that I needed to pass through a farmyard with the risk of farm dogs. There turned out to be many such dogs (I saw at least 7), but they were all in kennels and in most cases I only saw noses poking through grids on the doors. 

 

My notes (made some months ago now), also told me the grid reference at which I could find an ATV line heading off the track towards the summit, and I assumed that when I'd plotted my route I would have plotted the position of that junction and thus expected that it would be accurately represented on the map on my phone. I now know that I hadn't been so accurate. So it came to pass that I turned up hill at the first set of tyre tracks I found (which was further on than where I'd plotted) without checking the grid reference. The ATV line soon ended in a mass or gorse and dead bracken, but when I say 'soon', it was far enough up the hill that going back down to try a different route was not an appealing option, so I bashed through the gorse, then across heather, until I eventually found the right line.  

 

Theoretically I could follow a good line back down to the track, but a poor decision caused more wiggling (with a bit of reascent) around before I finally did the sensible thing and followed the ATV track. I was almost back at the track when Mick phoned to ask if I knew that I was heading in the wrong direction (I always activate live tracking when there's a phone signal where he's parked so he can see where I am), and by the time I had reassured him that it was an intentional deviation, I was almost back at the spot where I'd originally headed up onto the open hillside.

 

All I then needed to do was to trot back down the track, which would have been straightforward if the gates weren't now closed across the farmyard, with some dogs running around. They didn't give me a friendly welcome as I approached, and there was no way I was entering a farmyard with loose working collies. After a bit of a backtrack and having negotiated a few fences (one protected by a hedgerow) I was within paces of the final fence when I heard a tractor. I simultaneously didn't want to be caught with one leg over a fence, and perfectly prepared to defend myself for trespassing in the face of loose dogs on the public right of way. The former was the path of least resistance though, so I launched myself over the wire and breathed a sigh of relief as I landed on the track the other side. 

 

A bit too eventful an end to the final hill of the trip, but it's good to be now over 600 Marilyns, giving a bit of insurance against summits being moved or demoted. 

I was dubious as to whether this was the ATV track I was looking for and should have trusted my 'this doesn't seem right' instincts. 

Summit selfie, as always.

The correct track, that I followed on the way down.