After the glorious sunshine on Saturday I hoped todays weather would be the same, unfortunately this was not the case. I got to the carpark by the Glascarnoch weather station at about 8am and was greeted with a downpour of biblical proportions. Typical!

Fortunately by the time I'd got my boots on the rain had eased to a light drizzle. The route I was taking follows Abhainn an Torrain Duibh before crossing Allt an Loch Sgeirich and heading up the slopes of Creag Dubh Fannaich and on to Beinn Liath Mor Fannaich.









This route is slightly longer than the usual way up the mountain, but I'm trying to get a lot fitter so wanted to push it a little. The way up to the base of the hill is an excruciating bog slog with little or no path to speak of. At one point I was close to going home as I stepped ankle deep into yet another quagmire and the rain lashed down. However I gritted my teeth and kept going. It was a busy hill, not with people but with wildlife.A couple of Dippers accompanied me on the initial walk along the river and there seemed to be an abundance of Ptarmigan on the way up, which was a surprise as I've never seen them outside of the Cairngorms! A flock of Snow Bunting seemed to busying their way the hill too. The highlight was the Mountain Hare that bounded past me just before the summit. I've never seen one before so that was a nice added bonus. I tracked what I thought was a Weasel for a hundred yards or so, the prints were very fresh, unfortunately no other sign if it though.



As I started to get higher the weather started to clear and I got some decent views of the Fannaichs, unfortunately the snow cover has deteriorated over the last few weeks and any winter climbing will be non-existent at the moment.



A steady pace took me over the top of Creag Dubh Fannaich and on up to Beinn Liath Mor Fannaich. Unfortunately it was very claggy so no photos. The weather seemed to deteriorate again near the top of the hill and considerable amount of snow was falling, once I touched the summit I decided to make a hasty retreat back down. Typically once I was half way down the weather cleared again. The views from the top would have no doubt been really good. If only I'd hung on for 10 minutes! I got a good look across to Beinn Dearg and Am Faochagach, very little snow across there too, although it did look like it had recieved a fresh dusting and the gully lines may have saved a bit of ice. It was difficult to tell from that distance though.