Since the seasons are turning again, I am still trying to make the most of the outdoors before we are back to spending most of the day in the dark, damp, and freezing.

Today I went to Loch Muick, close to Ballater. This is a favourite spot of mine, but I haven’t been in years. During the summer, this place is so popular that the car park is usually full up very early in the day. And one can see why this is a popular spot:

There is a circular walk around the loch (which leads up over the far ridge), but I only went for a stroll along the shore. The trail I took back is also one of the trails that leads up Lochnagar, which is the prominent peak that looks quite menacing. It’s a popular munro for people to walk up to.

What the pictures don’t show you is that the winds were so strong that it was quite hard going to walk towards the loch, and that the cloud cover changed ever 2 minutes, which meant that it changed from hot sun to freezing rain just as if someone kept flicking a switch all the way.