I originally made up this page to sort my frustration with Hotmail; I couldn't send pictures to illustrate an e-mail correspondance because this "wonderful" Microsoft-owned web-based service kept chucking them. So I did this from scratch in about eight hours (the original text has been changed, of course!) At the time I was doing a lot of driving through Glencoe on the way to and from hills, and making the point that I'd got so used to the drama I was taking it for granted, so I hardly ever stopped. There are more dramatic, even terrible places elsewhere (further north) if you go for the rugged/wilderness type thing, but these are usually individual mountains or groups of them, whereas with Glencoe it's the place that always thrills - night-time in winter under a full moon in the snow ( in a 3 litre Merc on a round trip from Aberdeen via Ullapool back to Glasgow at 3am - see, I am mad) is one I always remember. 

The first picture below is another time going through the Coe at night in a full moon -- all the light in the picture is the moon shining through cloud streaming off the Buachaille Etive Mor (the big triangular hill at the entrance to the eastern end of Glencoe).

 

Next one is some of the ruggedness referred to above - the figure is my brother again in Torridon under strict instruction not to attempt to fly off the end of the hill. Torridon has been described as "exhibiting more mountain beauty than anywhere else in the highlands", though not in this shot!

The next one shows a grimmer view of the Aonach Eagach - the north wall of Glencoe. You can see the road slivering along the bottom ( did I mention this is one of my favourite driving roads? - I'd like to do it in a BMW M5, or maybe a Lancer Evo 6(7), or maybe on a 916 (though I'd only fall off)). The Ben (Nevis that is) peeps over the back on the right.

An hour or two later looking south from higher up on the same ridge shows a brighter view, looking down loch Etive to Ben Starav and Cruachan (on the road to Oban)

Quite a few people say the Scottish hills look best under snow (and ice), maybe because they look higher as a result. I tend to keep off them then (nutter bastard territory). This is a view of Ben Fhada from the Mam Ratagan, a hill pass (from where you can still get a ferry to Skye, rather than pay £5 - each way- to cross the bridge). In fact the situation now is that the KyleRhea ferry is more expensive than the bridge - that's progress (of a sort).

 

Contrast this with the Marmolada (I kid you not) in the Dolomites - in early autumn (11,000 ft)

 

To bring this page right up to date here's a picture in Glencoe taken only days before the outbreak of FMD. I could see plenty of climbers doing the hard routes on the front of the Buachaille, then standing on top - rather them than me!

 

 

Contrast this with another Alpine picture - except that it isn't! The north view of Sgurr nan Gillean on Skye, a few weeks ago.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I hope you find this page entertaining. All the photographs are my copyright, by the way. Can anyone guess where the backdrop picture was taken from? Clue - you can still get there right now even with the FMD restrictions.