Ciste Bowl

With another crappy forecast, we headed up to the ski car-park with dread. And others. But as we whizzed past Loch Morlich, we could see the plateau was clear and it looked as if the sun might appear.

After a lot of queuing, we disembarked the Funicular at 1097m and strolled onto a windless plateau. What a transformation from yesterday! The Spey Valley remained in cloud, and for a while it felt as if we were skiing on top of the world. It was definitely the best skiing conditions I've experienced in Scotland.

Sadly there has to be a downside and a wee grump about Cairngorm Mountain Co. - when we were at Glenshee earlier in the week, they reduced lift prices slightly because a couple of the lifts were closed due to snow burial. At Cairngorm, in a much smaller resort, with a significant area closed due to snow burial, we were asked to pay 18% more.

At the Ciste Bowl, this meant that only one T-bar lift serviced the whole area and resulted in an enormous queue, well over 100 skiers long. It can be seen in the distance of the image.

Nevertheless, we still had an AWESOME day!