Scotland January 2003
This trip Gaz and I went on in January 2003 was the first outing of my Porsche following its initial 2 months off the road (for repairs, it made it to August 2003 and has since spent 4 years off the road whilst I rebulid it), besides that it was a bit of a bust.
Gary arrived in Scotland a few days before me, and managed to get out on the hill (all the photos in this gallery are his, you can see his walks in the earlier pictures before the Porsche first appears) for a few short walks, however once I made it up we had nothing but heavy snowfall making most routes a sod. To add to our problems the weather made roads treacherous, and then during a heavy storm in Glencoe the headlight lifting motor on the Porsche shorted thus and melted the dashboard switch (snow loaded with road salt had worked its way into the elecrics), there are a few pictures from the Kings House where we had to stop, they were nice enough to let us in whilst I carried out emergency repairs on the switch.
We headed off to Fort William first, where we stayed at The Backpackers Hostel, which we have since stayed at a few times and I'd really reccomend to anyone who wants to stay in Fort William on a budget, and they went on an outing to Knoydart.
Knoydart is one of the most remote settled parts of the UK, it can only be reached by a 20 mile trek from the nearest tarmac road, or by the ferry. We chose the ferry. Knoydart also has the UK's most remote pub The Old Forge, which was to be the main feature of our visit.
Alas we didn't plan to stay for long enough, the Ferry dropped us off at 11am and came back at 4pm. The pub opened at 5pm. The local coffee shop also closed 20mins after we arrived, hence, having explored the entire village in 15 minutes, we went and made snow effigy's of people we didn't like. Despite our frustration the scenery was beautiful, and had we had a tent and made a few days of it in the hills I'm sure we would've had a great time.
The following day we had decided to head down to Snowdonia, however the weather cleared up no end, and the forcast was for a cold night, so we set up camp in one of the camp sites near the Clachaig Inn. The overnight temperature was -5 degrees centigrade, and after a very early start we headed up the Aonach Eagach. Sadly by Mid-day the temperature had reached +12, and most of the fragile cornice had started to collapse, so we headed back down via a round about route.
The following morning we woke to find that snow had been replaced by rain, and so we headed down to Snowdonia and stayed in The Bryn Tyrch Hotel.
We decided to do Crib Goch, the weather was poor and we wanted an easy route. However the conditions were so bad, due to the remaining snow covering the footpath and verglas on the rock of the ridge that it turned into an epic of a day. We sadly (or stupidly) forgot our crampons, otherwise it might have been easier, and we might have taken some photos.
That evening Jools joined us, and we did some easier walking before heading back.
Gallery
Click here for a clip of me pelting the head of a snowman in Knoydart (a little bored we were).
Click here for a clip showing a panorama from the dirt car park at the top of the rise in the A82, above the Green Welly Stop.
Click here for a clip of Gary shot from the top of Am Bodach, at the start of the Aonach Eagach.
