A thousand icicles

On Friday I went back to the Carron Valley Reservoir again with a friend, this time on skis. As we wanted an easy day, we kept to the track that runs along just above the reservoir for much of the way, but with a few small hills to add a bit of interest to the skiing.

Sheltered corners of the reservoir were completely frozen, but there was enough movement in the water further out to break the ice and the middle of the reservoir was entirely free of ice. In the picture below, taken where the ice was breaking up, you can just see the open water beyond the ice.

After a couple of miles we decided to stop for lunch beside the reservoir. It was only then that we noticed what wind and water had done to the trees along the shoreline. The base of each one was completely covered in icicles of every possible description.

In the picture above, the pile of snow along the shoreline is in fact washed-up pieces of ice from the surface of the reservoir, covered in a thin layer of snow.

Some of the icicles were hardly thicker than pencils and pointing upwards instead of down. Others were curiously bent (some of these having formed around thin twigs which hardly show in the pictures). All the pictures below are the right way up.

Even each blade of grass was completely encased with ice.

On a different note, today, Easter Day, we stayed at home to watch the service broadcast from Paisley Abbey on BBC Scotland this morning. What a treat! ...and I'm not just saying that because I do the website for the director of music there. If you can access iplayer, it's available for the next week at www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01rp2sq and I strongly recommend it.

More ice

Last Wednesday was a cold bright day. The night before, we had passed a frozen waterfall high up on the Campsie Fells on our way home from an unsuccessful attempt to try and view Comet Pan-STARRS, so we decided to head out in that direction.

We were not disappointed, though the waterfall was in the shade, which is probably why the icicles had remained.

On our way home, later in the day, we were lucky to catch the few minutes when they were sunlit.

Our destination, however, was the Carron Valley Reservoir, where we went for a walk.

Here we found some amazing ice formations, including these ice stalagmites.

Several streams were encrusted with ice crystals. I thought these looked like the skeleton of a reptile.

Cracked ice on a puddle

At the edge of the reservoir, where the ice was moving and clinking in the wind, it appeared as if ice pans were beginning to form.

Curious short icicles in a stream

A day in the Campsies

It snowed hard for most of the day yesterday, but didn't settle here. Late in the afternoon, I could see that the Campsies had a fresh fall of snow, so today I suggested that we might try going there to see if there was enough snow to ski. It was a damp, foggy morning, we couldn't see the hills, and almost no snow was lying, so we weren't very optimistic. We decided to take the road that climbs high into the hills, and to our delight we soon came up out of the fog into bright sunshine.

On the north side of the Campsies, there was plenty of snow on the tops of the hills, so we were soon skiing in good conditions.

Dunbrach

Meikle Bin

Lecket Hill

Near the top of Holehead, we looked down on a sea of fog below, but could also see far distant snow-covered hills above it.

We followed a forestry track for part of the way down the hill. The mist had now cleared.