A Day Away

Last week I decided that it was time for a day away from St Andrews and the computer.  So I decided rather impromptu to check another item off of my Scotland bucket list: Aviemore and its surrounding Scottish Highlands in Winter.  Aviemore is a village nestled in the western Cairngorm Mountains along the corridor that runs from Perth to Inverness.  It is in the Cairngorm National Park, but you wouldn’t know it; there are no Park Entrance stations requiring $20 per car to enter.  Imagine that.

Like most places in Scotland, it takes some maneuvering to get there without a car.  For me it meant a day of leaving home at 5:45am and returning at 11:00pm, with a bus and two train rides each direction.  Nothing beats train travel though, especially on sunny days through beautiful landscapes.   

There’s nothing particularly special about Aviemore itself, unless you have an insatiable desire to spend countless hours wandering in and out of stores selling ski and snowboard gear to those largely uninitiated to winter sports.  But I wanted to see the mountains Highlands in their white robes of winter snow at least once while here, and Aviemore is the perfect location to do so.  The village is surrounded by the Cairngorms and features a ‘ski resort’ of sorts about ten miles out of town. 

Unfortunately for me, the mild winter, combined with the fact that it was the end of March (another reason I can’t bring myself to call them ‘mountains’), meant that the majority of the snow had already melted around the town. 

Fortunately for me, though, that meant I could hike along the eastern ridge and take  in the views.  Here is a view of Aviemore from mid-way up the ridge.

And here’s a shot from 3/4 of the way up the ridge.  Across the valley you can see the hills that still wear their wintery robe.  If you look along that ridge to about an inch from the right side of the picture you will notice a black line that seems to run from the top of the ridge to the bottom.  That line is what they call the vernicular, a rail-tramway that replaced the chair life about ten years back.  That hillside was my afternoon destination.

Hello!

(It was super windy!  This was the one selfie of many that didn’t have my curly locks completely shrouding my face.)

Not wanting to be blown off the ridge by the wind, I made my way back to Aviemore.  Once there I caught the once-per-hour bus to the ski chalet.  The bus ride to the top was quite nice.  At one point I even thought to myself, ‘Wow, this is slightly like the Beartooths’.  Mostly when I saw this scene through the window at the front of the bus.

And this scene was nice too, but just a wee bit too dense to be Beartooth-like.  It does a perfect job being Scottish Highland-like though, does it not?

Once at the ski chalet I jumped off the bus, making sure to ask the driver what time the bus collected people for the downward journey.  ‘Four hours from now’ was the reply, and not the most welcome one.  Besides riding the vernicular to the top and taking in the view, perhaps with a coffee in-hand from the summit coffee shop, there wasn’t much else for a non-skier to do.  I figured I was good at sitting and staring at wide open views, and this would be such an occasion for doing just that.  Four hours would probably go by too fast once at the top… (said my puny brain).

I  purchased my vernicular ticket and rode it to the top.  This was the view I encountered.

And, as I was there for the view, the clouds were not a welcome feature—by me, and I doubt if the clouds were welcomed by the skiers and boarders either.  For those on skis and boards, at least, the cloud only enveloped the hill at the summit.  They were soon out of the cloud on their downward descent.  I, on the other hand, had 3.5 more hours of it.

Thankfully, there was coffee at the top.  And I had a book.  And every now and then, the fierce Scotland wind would push the clouds away for the briefest of interludes, revealing the distant hills of the Cairngorm National Park.  The clouds would lift for no more than 20 seconds, at which point I would race outside with my camera.  This would happen once every thirty minutes or so… for 3.5 hours.

But, hey, I got some work done (on holiday… how American of me) and saw the view throughout the afternoon.

Here’s the view from the vernicular on the way back down.  It had a very- slow-rollercoaster-feel to it.  Many of you will quickly notice the serious lack of snow.  The skiers and boarders basically had snow paths they had to follow.  In March.  And that’s when I knew for sure… these were anything but mountains.  They are beautiful High-Lands, but they are not mountains.  Not my kind of mountains, anyway.

Back at the chalet I discovered a path leading into the wilds of the Cairngorms.  Not wanting to miss the bus (the last bus of the day) I hesitated to wander too far, but wished that I had discovered it sooner. 

Oh well.  Live and learn. 

I caught my bus back down the hill to Aviemore, and then my train to Perth, another train to Dundee, and a bus to St Andrews where my rusty-trusty bike was waiting to take me home at 11pm.  It was a great day away, and time well-spent checking-off another item on my Scotland Bucket List.  See what you’re missing by not visiting?