Days of Frost & Beauty

Sunset, Friday 13th

The weather is changing. After four days of cold and calm the clouds are thickening, the temperature rising, and the wind starting to blow. The magic of frost and ice and winter sharpness is fading. For now. It will return. It’s still a week to the winter solstice.

Venus, birch, mountains

The first frost came on an evening of serene beauty, the blue sky fading into black, the bright white dot of the planet Venus in the sky, a half-moon rising. The temperature soon fell below freezing. It was to stay there the next three days.

Dawn came with a white world, frost decorating every stem of grass, every twig. Only the conifers escaped, staying mostly dark and sombre.

The Cairngorms

The mountains looked magnificent, shining and bright. I longed to climb up there, into that snowy world, but I couldn’t as I’m recovering from a bad cold and getting used to new medication following an unexpected overnight stay in hospital. Instead I wandered the local woods and fields, admiring the beauty of the frost and crunching over the hard frozen ground.

Silver & gold

The world was not just cold and silver, it was also warm and gold at the same time as the low sun cut across the landscape, lighting the trees and hills with a pale glow. Glorious, just glorious.

Sgor Gaoith & Sgoran Dubh Mor

Feeling a little recovered the day the weather changed, Friday 13, I went up little Tom Mor, a local hill. The temperature was only a touch above freezing but the frost had already gone. The mountains were beginning to sink into clouds, the snow on their flanks already streaked with dark bare ground as the thaw set in.

Cairngorms fading & thawing

A cold wind swept the summit. I sheltered behind the huge cairn – far bigger than on most much higher hills – for a hot drink. The sky turned fiery red and orange, a spectacular sunset.

On Tom Mor

As the colours faded I turned and headed down into the growing darkness. Soon I switched my headlamp on, picking out the patches of ice on the track. All was silent. All was dark, A winter’s night. I love walking by headlamp. Although less than a mile from home as the crow flies it felt remote and wild. Occasionally a distant car’s lights shone briefly. Otherwise I was enveloped in darkness.

Frost in the forest