F3F Winter League 2. Cancelled. Coffee and cakes instead!

15MPH winds and dry and cold was a pretty good forecast for the second round of the Winter F3F league and six of us turned up eager to get going. We were all hoping to bang in a few good rounds before heading for the Pillars of Hercules cafe to thaw out. 

View south

From past experience I did have slight concerns about how passable the access road up the hill would be if there was snow and ice left over from the recent wintry days. The drive over to East Lomond was fine and the roads and fields completely clear but as soon as I started driving up the hill it was obvious there was packed snow and ice on the roadway. (This area is a national park and is not salted/gritted) I managed to drive about 150m up the road before I spotted Ewan waiting in a passing place for a Volvo, stuck 50m further on, to clear the road. I pulled in behind Ewan’s Scooby Forrester. Despite new tyres on the front of my car I could tell I would not be getting all the way up to the car park. Dave and Robert turned up and they could get no further up the road and in fact had a job getting moving again at all. Ewan had a plan though!

We drove back down to the start of the access road and parked the cars and packed all our kit into Ewan’s car and Ewan easily drove all the way up and dropped Ian and myself off with the kit before he headed back down to collect the rest of the chaps

Only possible to get this far up the road in a 4x4

Ewan's Scooby

Eventually we were all in the car park playing with some snowmen who were already there and watched as low cloud formed on the face of the hill and blowing over the top precluding any flying. We hung around for a while getting cold before we abandoned plans for a competition and repeated the ferrying trips before we headed off for coffee and cakes in the Pillars.

Waiting for the rest of the guys to be ferried up to the car park. Low cloud already forming at the top.

Rather than wait in the cold for Ewan to return to collect us we started walking.

Thanks to Ewan for bringing the correct equipment and for acting as hillside taxi service. I am jealous! I need one of them!!