Ben Lomond

Today I went up Ben Lomond again.

Ben Lomond is 974m high and you start from not much above sea level.

At first the weather was fine, with mist drifting over the hills. But soon it deteriorated and began to rain, getting harder every minute. What a nuisance it is, having to put on waterproofs. My waterproof jacket is too narrow to zip up over my camera and GPS, and the waterproof trousers are a struggle to get on without taking my boots off. Of course, as soon as I had put them on, the rain became less. Soon the clouds turned back to mist, drifting away across the loch.

The summit of Ben Lomond was clear of cloud and I thought I was now in for a fine day.

Near the top, the clouds closed in again.

Soon it was not only raining, but windy and rather cold. I had to put my gloves on as well as the waterproofs.

At the summit trig point there was no view in any direction but, as it had only recently started to rain, I decided to hang around and hope for it to stop.

Patches of blue sky kept appearing overhead, but I had quite a long wait before the clouds started to move away. At last I had a view to the north, with a rainbow over the head of the loch.

As I started the descent, I could see sunlight on the loch below.

Suddenly the sun burst through the clouds overhead, so I hurried up to the summit again in the hope of seeing a Brocken spectre.

I was in luck.

The only other person still on the summit to share it with me was someone for whom Ben Lomond was his first Munro (hill of over 914m), and it was quite a celebration to see such an unusual phenomenon.

The descent continued to be a mixture of sunshine and showers.

The same view as the first picture, but now with better weather.

For more about Ben Lomond, see the virtual walk on our website.