Hiking, Scrambling, Mountaineering, and Climbing

As promised: here's a quick write-up of our little winter trip to Scotland. This might turn into a bit of an epic post, but I'll try to keep it concise, and let the photos do the majority of the talking...

The logical place for me to begin is with my elderly Land Rover; Dora. She's a 1972, sereies 3, 88" Diesel. Almost entirely unmodified, and surprisingly capable (although she does struggle up steep hills).
This is her, in all her muddy glory:

I love climbing, and I love the mountains, however, I've been pretty tied up with my boat restoration for the past couple of years, so haven't had much of a chance to do much serious stuff in the hills for a while. However Josh (my climbing partner, boat-project partner, and conveniently capable mechanic) and myself decided (at the pub, naturally) we'd earned a break this winter, and would drive up to Scotland for a week of winter mountains, between Christmas and New-year.
The plan was simple: Drive Dora up to Scotland, wild camp, score some scottish winter ticks, then drive home. The reality was not so simple...
The first minor detail was the capability, and reliability of a 44 year old farm vehicle, which we were planning on driving 1,800 miles in a week, much of which would be on the motorway. I was pretty confident the engine was up to it, as those things are super simple, and basically run forever. The biggest issue was the 45mph top speed, which would be uncomfortable and dangerous on the motorway. The solution was to replace the original differentials with a set from a Discovery, giving us approximately 30% longer gears, hopefully achieving a cruising speed closer to that of a lorry (55-60mph). This was all very well, except we needed to squeeze a bit more power from the engine to push this bigger gear along, so the head needed reconditioning, to improve compression, and increase the horsepower.

While we were at it, I dropped the front axle off, reconditioned the steering, replaced all the shocks and springs, fitted a new roof (sans windows), tidied up the bodywork, did some welding on the chassis, replaced the entire fuel system (reconditioned injectors and injector pump), replaced all the doors, modified the induction system, fitted a new heater matrix and blower, sealed, carpeted and sound insulated the cab, and re-sprayed the body.
We hatched the idea in early November, and this photo was taken on Boxing day 2015, putting the last bits back together before loading up and leaving that evening:

Everything seemed to work, so we loaded our gear, and set off, Northwards, driving through the night. She ticked along nicely at 60mph, and we managed to top-out at 71.8mph (gps speed), down a long, straight hill! We were also achieving close to 40mpg average, which is pretty remarkable for an old land rover!

Obligatory gear photo:

We drove in shifts, taking it in turns, trying to sleep in the passenger seat. I thought it might be nice to take a scenic route through the Yorkshire Dales, but as we were both very tired by about 3am, and didn't have a working fuel gauge: I decided it'd be a good idea to stop and sleep in the back of the car. We slept on a petrol station forecourt, until it opened at 7am (27th Dec). We fuelled-up, and pushed on Northwards, into the morning. Note: Sleeping in the back of a short wheelbase land-rover, loaded with gear is not very comfortable.

We made it to Glasgow by midday, where we met up with a friend, Oscar, who had sensibly decided to let us drive his gear for him, but fly to Scotland (Actually, I made that sound far too simple: Glasgow has two airports, and Oscar landed at the other one. We found him eventually though). We drove to Asda, all three of us shoe-horned along the bench-seat, bought a weeks worth of supplies, and pushed on to the Aviemore, via Loch Lomond, where we experienced our first (and only) mechanical issue of the trip: A sheared fuel-return line. Fortunately we were leaking very little diesel thanks to the newly recon'd injector pump, and there was no chance of finding a spare between Christmas and Hogmanay, so we carried on with a token cable-tie holding it roughly the right place.

We made it to Aviemore quite late and decided we wanted to make an early start, and hit Cairngorm and Ben Macdui, in the morning; so we drove into the woods, and the three of us slept in the back of the car. This was even less comfortable than the previous night, but Storm Frank was starting to make himself known, and we didn't fancy pitching tents in the dark, wind and rain.
We awoke to pretty severe wind, and generally unpleasant conditions, so we wrapped up, and set-off from the ski centre car park.

(28th Dec) The wind was insane, and made things very difficult: we were all really struggling on relatively easy-going terrain, and had to retreat from the summit of Cairngorm, without attempting Ben Macdui. Sometimes it was literally impossible to make any headway against it. We were going to make a roped descent via 'the goat track', but the conditions made it unsafe with the gear we had, so we walked back off, the way we came. It is difficult to capture wind in a photograph, but this might give you some idea: we had to build a wind-break from snow and rock to boil some water to make some lunch.

As we were off the hill quite early, we found a nice campsite, just outside Aviemore (I forget the name), with showers and a sauna; so we booked ourselves in for a night of proper rest. We made the most of the Sauna, and drove into town to an all-you-can-eat Italian place. We ate a lot.

The next day (29th Dec) we woke up to better conditions, and set-out for a bigger day. Nothing particularly challenging, but it was a great day out. We ticked Ben Macdui, and the weather stayed on our side, however the wind did gust-up pretty hard occasionally, and visibility came and went.

Josh near the Summit:

Nice traverse:

That night Storm Frank hit hard. Oscar's tent was ruined in the wind, and I got mine down just in time. The wind was near hurricane force, and the owner of the campsite kindly lent us an empty caravan, free of charge. He wouldn't take our money, so we put it in the mountain rescue charity box.

The following day (30th Dec) we spent driving through the beautiful Highlands, eventually to Dundonell. When we were getting near, we asked a local for directions, and he asked us why we were heading there at this time of year. When we told him we were here to climb An Teallach, his response was "In this?! You must be mad!"

The storm had passed by now, and the Forecast was for new years eve to be calm, with clear skies. This had to be the day to attack An Teallach. Our weather window had arrived! We found a good spot to set up camp, cooked a big, carby dinner, and got an early night. We set our alarms for 0500, woke up early and excited for a big day, and set off in the dark, shortly after 0530.

The walk in was steep, and surprisingly technical, in the dark, but sun was just starting to rise as we made it to the top of Sgurr Fiona, at about 0730. The view was pretty spectacular, looking out over the islands below us.

We pushed on, gaining the subtle ridge line:

...which quickly became less subtle:

I didn't have much opportunity to get my camera out, while traversing the pinnacles, but here's an obligatory summit shot (where we stopped for a brief rest, and some lunch):

There were some quite technical, quite exposed, but thoroughly enjoyable sections, and some much easier going sections:

once you make it off the hill, the walk back out is long, boggy, and partly on-the-road. There are also some really awkward boulder fields on the way down. However, it's a really rewarding day, and I'd recommend it to anybody. It took us 11 hours, round, from camp to camp. It was a long day, but a very good day.

We treated ourselves to a night in a hostel in Ullapool, and were all fast asleep for new year.

Oscar left us the next day, to fly home, and Josh and me decided to drive to Skye. The drive down was stunning, with breathtaking scenery all the way, and lovely roads. We camped that night (2nd Jan) in the Cuillin hills, and the fickle wind eventually finished my tent off too.
Skye is really pretty.

We drove around the whole island in a morning, and took in some of the sights.

The Old Man of Storr is very cool. I was an idiot though, and free-soloed up to the spire, in hiking boots, only to realise it was way to chossy to down climb, so I had to sit there for about an hour while Josh ran back to get a rope and harnesses from the car (I bought him several beers after this).

We drove back South, to Glencoe, that night, where we spent a final night sleeping in the car. We woke up to this view, and drove back to Suffolk from here, stopping only for Diesel.

It was not a bad week. Had a very good time, and arrived home feeling tired, but refreshed.
I've just realised it's almost 3am, and I have a flight to catch in the morning- going skiing, in France for a week!

TL;DR: Went to Scotland, got rad.