Scottish Highlands in Winter


This morning, as planned, I departed my overnight base in Glencoe and visited two snow sports centres; the first at Aonach Mor being about 8 miles N.E. of Fort William and the second at Glencoe Mountain Resort which is about 35 miles S.E. of Aonach Mor.

This was a photo themed trip which proved entirely successful as I was very fortunate to benefit from near perfect light and weather conditions, very unusual at any time of the year in Scotland let alone in February.

Because of the volume and range of images I will concentrate this evening on Aonoach Mor and follow with Glencoe tomorrow.

Although not the subject of this post, it is worthy of mention that the village of Glencoe is remembered as the location of an infamous massacre in 1692 when around 90 members of the local MacDonald clan were killed (directly and indirectly) by a British army unit comprised of Campbells.This event has to be viewed in context of the complicated politics connected with the Jacobite uprising of the time.

Readers are reminded to click on images to enlarge same.

Glencoe village in context of local landscape



Before departing Glencoe I took the opportunity to photograph Loch Leven which is tidal, connecting with the much larger Loch Linnhe,a sea loch (fjord) on the west of Scotland.

Loch Leven this morning.


On arrival at the Nevis Range Experience I took the gondola transfer up Aonach Mor to the skiing centre which affords a superb viewpoint for photography.

Temperature on the mountain was a tolerable minus 2 Centigrade with negligible wind chill.

Aonach Mor is one of two summits on a 4000 ft ridge in the Nevis Range, slightly north of Ben Nevis, Britain's tallest mountain. Aonach is a Gaelic term meaning 'coming together' or 'meeting in a point'. Elevation is 4006 feet although I did not reach this level.

View west towards Loch Eil



Loch Eil, Fort William and Loch Linnhe



View West



Clouds and snow-capped mountains



Skiers in action at Aonach Mor





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