April 1st. 250m. Full winter cover. No joking.
1st April 2015
8.00am this morning.
The weather making a fool of the calendar.
And the rest of the day…..
Coire Ardair path at 450m this morning.
Hard going on the path from where the birch trees ends at 450m: 30cm of newly drifted snow with 50cm in places.
Watch out for deep man-traps.Â
Dropped thigh-deep into that. Deep newly drifted snow has obliterated the course of the main Coire Ardair path and drifted over the drainage ditches that run parallel to it. The personal ‘memory map’ of the path works fine right up the point where you just miscalculate a tad and one of your feet drops into oblivion!
70cm of newly drifted snow at 710m.
Heavy drifting on all lee slopes and access often very difficult. Poor visibility above 650m right through the morning.
Snowfall expected to continue until early evening (Weds) though drifting at higher altitudes will extend into the early hours of Thursday when winds eventually ease. Dry snow instability will persist right through Thursday on all shaded lee slopes, with wet snow instability possible on slope aspects exposed to sustained solar warming. All new cornices will be large, weak and collapse-prone.
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Grant Duff
1st April 2015 10:19 am
A day of post holing for your walk in and very “mushy” snow.
meagaidhadmin
1st April 2015 3:45 pm
Bang on correct about the post-holing, Grant! Snow not that mushy though – still quite cold this morning even at modest altitudes.
Nic Bullivant
1st April 2015 4:38 pm
That’s scary!
CM Much worse than Cairn Gorm today.
meagaidhadmin
1st April 2015 4:51 pm
Thanks for your comment, Nic.
We’ve had an exceptionally snowy winter at ‘Meggie so far. You begin to wonder whether it will ever relent!
Grant Duff
1st April 2015 9:04 pm
I’ve been a regular in the Meggie area for the last ten years and I’ve never known a winter like this one. Last year we had record volumes of snow higher up but this year theres been so much snow at relatively lower levels and it’s stayed.
Thanks meagaidhadmin for your excellent posts and photos which really is appreciated as well as the obvious essential avalanche forecast.
Cheers
Grant
meagaidhadmin
2nd April 2015 6:33 pm
A generous comment, Grant. Many thanks.
The formal aim of the blog posts is to give a little additional ‘colour’ to what’s already been said in the avalanche reports. Of course there’s also some scope to extemporise and wander ‘off piste’ a bit, if you catch my drift! Images seem to be a very important component of a blog posting and we can struggle to find just one image that’s worth publishing when the weather turns bad and visibility is down to 20m. They’re fun to compose of course and each member of the SAIS Creag Meagaidh team has their own special ‘take’ on how they see things and this often comes across in the published item. Look out for more pictures of dogs in future years as one of our number is training up his new hound to be an ‘avalanche poodle’ (I won’t spoil it be saying any more!).
Grant Duff
3rd April 2015 4:11 pm
Avalanche poodle sounds interesting.
Cheers
Grant