Somewhere out in the mist a lonely stag roared. Besides the faint trickling of a nearby stream it was the only sound that could be heard through the muffling effects of the thick cloud. We were somewhere east of Glenshee and despite the lack of views all was good.

Date: 15th October 2011
Distance: 14.77
Ascent: 875m
Time: 5hrs 35mins
Hills: Carn an Tuirc (Munro, 1,018m), Cairn of Claise (Munro, 1,064m), Glas Maol (Munro, 1,068m)
Weather: Low cloud, strong winds on the plateau, mild.
Route: View on OS Maps

Sixteen Stockets bravely set out from the car park at the start of the path which eventually crosses to Glen Isla by way of the Monega Pass. Though there was rain in the air, it wasn't particularly heavy, and the real problem was the ground underfoot which was merely muddy in places, but a true quagmire in others. A short distance down the path we turned left to climb gently up besides the north bank of the Allt a' Gharbh-choire. The path here was a little better, with some solid gravel underfoot, and so we made swift progress up besides a couple of impressive waterfalls and so further up into the mist. The line of the road faded into nothingness as our world was reduced to the few meters around us; people just a few paces behind were fuzzy shadows.

Date: 1st - 2nd October 2011
Distance: 32.77km (Day 1: 10.86km; Day 2: 21.91km)
Ascent: 1,384m (Day 1: 238m; Day 2: 1,144m)
Time: 22hrs 29mins (Day 1: 2hrs 2mins; Day 2: 4hrs 25mins)
Hills: Stob Coire an Lochain (Munro Top, 1,239m), Braeriach (Munro, 1,296m)
Weather: Rain on and off for the duration. Low cloud, mist, mild temperatures and no wind.
Route: View on OS Maps

I backed the car into the almost empty parking area at Whitewell and turned the engine off. Steam rose gently from the grill, a sign that the last puddle I’d driven through had been a little deeper than expected. The rain, which had been steady but mainly drizzly on the drive over from Aberdeen, now increased in intensity significantly. Without the windscreen wipers on my windscreen quickly turned into a waterfall, obscuring my view of the world outside. I wasn’t quite prepared for that sort of drenching so it was Jaffa Cakes and a few chapters of The Clash of Kings with the hope that the rain would at the very least ease off slightly.

Last night at the North East Mountain Trust's first winter talk of the season, Ian R. Mitchell gave an interesting and entertaining talk on the “forgotten” Scottish Himalayan mountaineer Alexander Mitchell Kellas. Kellas made several notable first ascents in the Himalaya, including being one of the first Europeans to climb above 20,000 feet, but sadly died in Tibet in 1921 on the way to Mount Everest. As a member of the 1921 British Reconnaissance Expedition he met George Mallory who would famously disappear on Everest just three years later.

Not a lot changed between this trip into the Cairngorms, and the two overnight trips I did in April. The night-time temperature, once the rain and clouds cleared, fell well below freezing so I was glad I took both my Icebreaker Merino baselayer and my PHD Down Vest, both of which were worn towards the end of the night. I was also pleased that my 13l Sea 2 Summit Ultra-Sil drybag kept all my down and camp gear dry during the walk in on the rainy and snowy Saturday.

Date: 11th-12th June 2011
Distance: 28.04km
Ascent: 1,494m
Time: 19hrs 22mins (including camping...)
Hills: Fiacaill a'Choire Chais (Top, 1,141m), Carn Etchachan (Munro Top, 1120m), Beinn Mheadhoin (Munro, 1,182m), Ben MacDui (Munro, 1,309m)
Weather: Day 1 brought persistent rain and snow showers later clearing on day 2 to bright sunshine with cloud building again towards midday. Sub-zero over night.
Route: View on OS Maps

I think I'd probably pulled my hood as tightly around my face as was possible and yet still the snow, flung sideways by a mean north-easterly wind, stung against my left cheek as I struggled onwards, trying my best to follow the path that stuck below the headwall of the Northern Corries.

A few months ago it was interesting to hear from the people who had taken a chance on the first batch of Backcountry Boilers. There was chatter on the blogs and Twitter as exciting packages turned up on doorsteps, and the internet came alive with excitement as videos, photos and articles appeared praising this lovely piece of product design.

Overview: Anquet for Mac is a decent solution for route planning and mapping on a Mac. Its basic functionality is good and its maps are competitively priced with no initial outlay for the software itself. However, a lack of more advanced features and some usability issues means I’ll be keeping an eye on the opposition, including Routebuddy 3 which launches next month.

Anquet for Mac was launched back in July 2010, joining Routebuddy as the second native mapping application for the Mac. I've been using it now for around eight months, for both plotting routes and printing maps for use on my trips, and have been generally pleased with the software. With the news over on Andy Howell’s blog that Routebuddy is almost ready to release version 3 of their software for the Mac, I thought I would take this opportunity to review my experiences so far with Anquet for Mac.

Date: 28th May 2011
Distance: 14.95km
Ascent: 1,470m
Time: 6hrs 00mins
Hills: Meallan nan Uan (Corbett, 838m), Sgurr a'Ghlas Leathaid (Corbett Top, 844m), Sgurr a'Mhuilinn (Corbett, 879m)
Weather: Cloud above the tops, some sunshine, heavy rain showers turning snowy and more persistent later.
Route: View on OS Maps

Cresting the brow of the steep final descent it was a great relief to see the car parked next to the sheep pen at Strathanmore, a small hamlet deep in picturesque Strathconon. The final rain shower had proved to be the worst, drenching us from head to foot as we waded our way through boggy peat and new burns that were springing into life more and more quickly. Back at the car it was a joy to be able to peel off soaked trousers, socks and shoes and change into dry clothes. My Montane eVent Jacket had stayed completely waterproof and so my top half was dry. It had taken us just six hours to do a quick round of a couple of Corbetts in a conditions that gave us everything from sunshine, to high winds, snow and stinging hail.

Update (October 2011): The Challenge has been and gone and in terms of weather it was one of the worst for a long time. I've now added links to the reports and blogs produced by each of the Challengers I highlighted in my original post. They are all definitely worth a read.

The annual TGO Challenge kicks off this weekend with several people already on the move from various starting points on the west coast of Scotland. This post is really just a collection of links to various people taking part and I'll try and keep it updated as I spot others. Please leave a comment with any other Challengers you know about (or if you are a Challenger!) and I'll add in the information. Finally, good luck to everyone taking part this year.

Date: Saturday 7th May 2011
Distance: 31.15km
Ascent: 1,311m
Time: 8hrs 48mins
Hills: Carn a' Mhaim (Munro, 1,037m), Ben MacDui (Munro, 1,309m)
Weather: Early low cloud and drizzle giving way to hazy blue skies and a strong wind.
Route: View on OS Maps

Bacon rolls from Ballater cheered us up a little but it was really the scraps of blue sky that could be glimpsed above the foothills of the Cairngorms that put a proper smile on our faces. The drive to the Linn of Dee had been through rain and ominous skies and although there was a little drizzle falling as we wended our way through the woods, by the time our feet were pounding out the kilometres of the Derry Road it had stopped and the air was muggy and warm.