Author Topic: Ben Aigan - Woods of angels wings  (Read 1883 times)

troy

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Ben Aigan - Woods of angels wings
« on: 14:32:16, 16/12/11 »
I know some people within my family describe me inpatient, along with other savory comments no doubt. But in regards to inpatients I will hold my hand on high and declare emphatically that , yes I hate waiting, despise queues, can’t even mention the word ‘customer services’ out loud without my face twisting into horrific shapes. At the moment my inpatients comes from the fact that I have finished a big job but have to now wait for others to do their stuff before I can finish what feels like a labour of love, and hence this short walk to a hill I have passed many times but never even considered walking up until boredom got the better of me today. In addition, the pup looks a tab upset and bored, bored because I haven’t taken her out that much recently and upset that I didn’t take her on the last two mountain hikes – in this weather, high winds and deep snow, I’d have the animal rights all over me.
 
Today there was still some snow but nothing serious and the wind was nonexistent, and most of the hike is within those majestic of all trees, the pines. In the summer months, I do love the sweet fragrant smell they give off upon sunny days from their sap as it drifts amidst the crunchy forests floors of cones and needles. In winter they are completely different and have a primeral feeling about them, as their thin bleak trunks thrust up from a thick blanket of insulating snow and your cold breathe floats like mist swirling around the tree’s like angels flying. If you are lucky, you could even hear the faint scurrying of small animals within the snow amidst the woods silence. Whatever they are, moles or mice doesn’t really matter as the peace and isolation swamps over you as the thick air dissipated not just the angels wings but the worries of my week; Light bulbs on the car blowing, batteries of the camera running low faster in -7 temperatures – inpatients – and money disappearing down a slippery slope to where, who knows, Oh ye I remember – Xmas.
 
On with today’s hike, in a few words it starts at a C/P (see file attached) follows in the footsteps of good forest tracks which today were covered in a very fine sheet of ice that lead you passed places the wood lost to the brut – the chainsaw – until you take a short cut up through where the tree’s have beaten the brut leading you back to the track that heads straight up to the summit, more or less any way. A summit that resembles a guy who’s bold on top where the usual rugged heather windswept wild land arc’s a 100m or so above the pines.
 
From the top you just follow your steps back, where today I ended up running back down to try to avoid an evil black cloud I could see approaching from the coast. A dark cloud that slivered like ooze over the landscape like it heralded the coming of night as it spilt from its unders dense snowdrifts driven onto us masses below it like a pack of ravenous wolves.
 
That was at least what it looked like and cannot tell you how relieved I was when, as it caught up with us half way down, it turned out to be merely whiffs of thin snow gently ascending making the landscape appear within minutes like something from a perfect Xmas card.
 
Started the hike in -7 and a heap of troubles, finished it in -3 and a cleared mind full of those quaint memories of Christmases past – but still inpatient, can’t change some things.
 

Winter moon shine

windfarm above a sheep farm

The summit

Ben Rinnes

Dufftown and glenfiddoch distillery

Rothes and glen grant distillery amongst others - I feel the appeal of hogmanay coming on..........
 
 
« Last Edit: 14:49:24, 16/12/11 by troy »
http://blog.mtn-m.co.uk/
Last night while I laid starring at the stars, I wondered.....where the hell is my ceiling!!!!

 

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