The Cairngorm Club do an annual through-traverse in autumn and there are enough determined folk within the ranks that I thought we should also aim for a winter traverse too. Winter had now come and just about gone, with other stuff being on, weather just plain rubbish, and the opportunities were slipping away.

NEMT had done a spring trip last year to see some conservation in action at RSPB Abernethy, which afterwards a few of us used the opportunity to traverse back towards Braemar, and with another trip in the offing, I recruited one other to do a traverse again.

This time the trip was hosted courtesy of Cairngorms Connect – we started off with a stroll from Loch Morlich towards Rothiemurchus in the company of 2 reps from Forestry and Land Scotland who explained activities in the area. I’m in general not a big fan of FLS who I feel only pay lip service to both public leisure use and cultural/ecological conservation in tiny areas of their huge land holdings while scooping up millions of public money every year, and stick with pretty outdated practices. Nonetheless the reps were engaging and it was useful to hear from ‘the inside’. I got to waylay one with a rant about why they should do more Continuous Cover Forestry which she was none the wiser about, so a seed planted as it were.

Most of the large party continued onwards after the guided tour to do some walks in the area, but the traverse duo got a lift to the ski centre to get a good start in terms of height.

Dodging piste machines we trudged up Cairn Gorm into the storm and snow – windy but mostly from behind – we headed around to Ciste Mhearad (no sign of any snowholes) then followed the ‘path’ mostly unseen buried down to the saddle, watching for hidden streams and checking the snow condition for any instability – we were now out of the SAIS forecast period..

Losing height the snow turned into rain and sleet and we slogged and sloshed along the pooled track and thrunged in and out of heather at the side to avoid the worst. We were getting bedraggled by the time we reached the fords of Avon; we met 2 ladies out bikepacking (also looking bedraggled after a long hike-a-bump-a-bike from around Bynack More to here) who had a wade in the river ahead to get to Bob Scott’s, their next stop.

We still had a 5k trudge to go to get to the night’s abode, feet now squishy and a general dankness all over. Once the trail left the hill side and followed the wide flood plain below Leacann a Bhothain Dhubih I kept expecting the bothy to pop up in the distance, every distant shape squinted through the haze hopefully “ah there it.. nah” as we plootered along slowly, but very glad to eventually see the real deal.

With a lot of our clothing wet for tomorrow we used some of the chairs to try and air in the strong wind outside between showers, but with high humidity and low temperature it wasn’t doing much. There were a few damp logs by the stove but not enough to get a drying heat on the go for long. Our packs with winter gear were pretty heavy so we hadn’t committed to extra weight for coal, though I was glad of my single evening treat (a tin of strong IPA). With some very careful fire building, and judicious application of a small gas camping stove as a torch, we eventually got the log kindled and got an hour or so of heat before turning in.

I made the mistake of using the top bunk: it’s pretty small, and the frame isn’t fixed to the wall; any slight movement from the bottom bunk magnifies to an upper sway and after an hour or two of just about drifting off admitted defeat and decamped to the floor.

The morning saw clearing skies with the wind whipping past strong; we were now committed to going over Beinn a Bhuird which would probably be spicy but at least not blowing in our face. I stuck a pair of bread bags over fresh socks to save them drawing in water from the waterlogged boots, they’d get sweaty in time but hopefully would be over the snow zone by then.

The last time we’d continued onwards further downstream to the wire bridge, but it’s creaky swaying over today’s torrent would have been squeaky bum time. The wooden bridge to Cnap Leum an Easaich is relatively a bastion of solidity (although a rickety thing in wider bridge terms). The hill name means something along the lines of ‘hill of the leap of the cascade’ and although a few miles away I guess it’s referring to the narrow here. Today they were boiling furiously with snow melt, not sure even the strongest jumper would fancy a leap here.

We thrunged steeply out of the glen up on to the rounded ridge above, found no path as mapped, and surveyed the task ahead. We decide to forgo the dip and climb back up to Stob an t-Sluich, and would keep it height-efficient and head for the Cnap

The skies had been pretty clear but a gloom approached and thrashed us with hail, we looked towards the rocky outcrops above of Cnap Leum an Easaich where we’d stop for a break.

There wasn’t much of a nook to be found for shelter, but with the wind really whipping past thought it best to take the opportunity to eat, drink, faff and then batten down the hatches before starting the next leg of what would be a spindrift-thrashed ascent – we could see big whirls of it higher up. We double checked and discussed navigation options, realising it would be tricky to do much map work higher up in the high wind. Whirls and waves of snow crystals crawled over the ground.

On the plateau waves of cloud and light passed occasionally picking out nearby peaks like Ben Avon. Visibility was great so we soon found the tiny north top cairn and then moved towards the corrie, though stayed well back from the edge: apart from the huge cornice size, the plateau had a lot of plate ice and in combination with the high wind blowing towards the drop, wasn’t somewhere you’d want a stumble.

The snow cover on the plateau had been scoured in large areas, but the south side held more with fresh windslab from the west overlaying old hard neve. We headed down the stream outflow from the “laird’s tablecloth” snow patch sticking to the side that’d hold less new cover. Crampons were on but the going was mostly soft enough to heel kick into, when the going got steeper.

We stopped to layer down at the snowline edge, the wind still howling but a bit warmer so the windchill wasn’t as dire. I took the opportunity to have a nosey around some of the crevices and holes in the stream’s snow cover, finding a couple small snow tunnels, and after a bit of careful cutting of an entry nook to not drop into water but on to a rock, had a look inside.

As I’d not expected major snow-tooling with the route profile, I’d made a weight saving by taking my ultralight ice axe (a 200g cassin ghost). One omission it has is there’s no plug in the shaft so it can fill up with snow, and before slinging back on the the pack a few taps dislodged some ‘ice lollies’

With the last river crossed running high we thought that rather than head to the usual ford we’d stravaig a lot further upstream where less streams had joined, and bimbled our way through the bog and rivulets east of Carn Fiaclach

Eventually we found a good crossing spot – though all told would have been quicker committing to a ‘boots off’ wade. In our original planning we’d pondered staying at the secret howff and having a third day out as the forecast improved then, but we were both pretty tired an fancied a good night’s sleep at home rather than another cold one in the unheated confines of the howff, so began the descent to Keiloch.

In the now balmy spring conditions lower down it was a pleasant stroll down despite the heavy packs, and at the end even missing a bus we were happy enough sitting having a blether. As the sun set the temperature dropped sharply and the layers piled back on, but we blagged a lift from a passing car going to Ballater, where the chip shop and the pub provided comfort until the final leg of the journey home.