spindrift1980

I may as well contribute a couple of my own Alpine images from the Highlands at the weekend - from a wee trip round the less-frequented side of Ben Lawers. Definitely weekend of the year so far - hardly a breath of wind. Looks like some wintry showers are possible to fairly low levels later this week, after a milder interlude.

Woke up to a slight covering of snow - was only really expecting sleet so a nice wee surprise, although it's pretty wet slushy stuff.

Almost Alpine up in the Campsies today with snow and blue skies! Had a wander around the north-facing Corrie of Balglass near Fintry. It kept the snow much better than the south-facing slopes - an impressive place that wouldn't look out of place in hills twice as high. All the lay-bys down the Crow Road were full of sledgers and snowman builders on the way back! A zoom lens shot of Ben Lomond:

Really very heavy again and flakes are huge! Is there much snow on the Campsies? Was hoping to fit in a quick walk there tomorrow. Radar suggests they've picked up some snow.

It was more the road conditions which were worrying me to be honest. When they put the warning up to amber, I thought I'd better not ask people to drive - the problem was that I didn't have time to assess the conditions in the morning and had to let people know the night before. It doesn't look as though it was as bad as the MetO forecast suggested on Friday, and I feel a bit disappointed, but better to err on the side of caution I guess. It's good to have regular updates on Ochils weather though, as I go there quite a lot!

Cancelled a walk in the Ochils today as I thought I'd better not ask folk to drive in the conditions forecast, but got bored watching the smattering of slush melt in Motherwell and went down to the Dalveen Pass on the Lanarkshire-Dumfriesshire border for a wander. No great depth of snow, although it increased through the afternoon with some meaty showers giving temporary blizzard conditions, but boy was there some windchill. Even with a ski-mask on I was beginning to wonder if my nose was still there! The ever-changing light in the sunshine and showers made it worth it.

I was supposed to be taking a group of 15 for a walk in the Ochils tomorrow - have ended up cancelling due to the forecast, as much due to the possible driving conditions and delays as anything. It'll be interesting to see how much snow falls and to what levels - will be disappointed if I've postponed the walk needlessly but felt I needed to err on the side of caution.

This post from the model thread suggests GFS are currently suggesting a cold theme at the end of the week - whether the idea gets dropped or not in subsequent runs, who knows.

You could walk up to Loch Brandy - it's a beautiful loch which sits in a corrie at just over 600m above sea level on the east side of the glen, starting at the Glen Clova Hotel. It's a steep climb but on a good well-constructed path (unless the lower slopes are obliterated by snow!) The route details and some photos are in the link below. I would still make sure you have a map though and check the MWIS forecast for mountain weather before setting off. Not sure if you'll be guaranteed snow there as it appears to be becoming milder towards the end of the week - from info online it appears there is currently full snow cover at that level though. http://www.walkhighlands.co.uk/angus/loch-brandy.shtml I wouldn't recommend going up onto the plateau above (Ben Tirran area) unless you have well-practised navigation skills and winter hillwalking experience as it is a vast rather featureless plateau with great potential to get yourself into difficulties in winter! It was still snow-covered in early May 2012 when I visited the loch and continued on to Ben Tirran. There are some other walks in the area amongst these too (Corrie Fee also has some stupendous scenery): http://www.walkhighlands.co.uk/angus/angus-glens.shtml Link to MWIS forecast for East Highlands (updated daily) is here; http://www.mwis.org.uk/scottish-forecast/EH/

Went for a wander around Leadhills and Wanlockhead today and was up a hill when the great grey wall of cloud approached from the west. Down at village level (if you can call 400m above sea level down) it was already rather snowy - most of this was from before today's fall. Snow got heavier on the way back up the M74 and was pleasantly surprised to find a good few centimetres lying in Motherwell.

I first heard the term 'Baltic' in the mid 90s, used by a school classmate when standing around on a freezing day on a muddy school playing field, trying to fend off hypothermia while dressed in shorts and T-shirts during one of our joyous PE classes. Maybe some lexicographer out there can trace its origins? - if Susie Dent, for example, was to take an interest, I'd gladly help with her enquiries It doesn't really make sense since the Baltic is one of the 'milder' parts of the old Soviet Bloc in winter - Siberian might be more appropriate. 'Baltic' is quite a satisfying word to say though!! I find cold, dry air much more tolerable than the damp chill that Scotland specialises in. I suppose Scotland isn't that cold in global terms, but when you've got the winds factored in, and the damp air, you do need a word to describe it. A good old Scots word is 'cauldrife' - http://www.dsl.ac.uk/entry/snd/cauldrife

Nothing at all here - I must've jinxed it by putting that snow shovel in the car this morning! Oh well, maybe I'll get up a hill or two at the weekend...

Definitely snow in East Kilbride at just over 150m asl, although of the wet, non-lying variety at the moment.

Had time for a walk round the Carmichael estate near Lanark this morning - to be honest the snow cover looked like it was probably a bit deeper on the other (west) side of the M74 but there was plenty of wintry scenery to enjoy - see photos below. By lunchtime the trees were dripping but the temperature dropped back to about 0.5C on the way back up the M74 with sleet and wet snow when the showers intensified. The shallow snow cover in Motherwell was nice and crisp this morning but is now decimated, soggy and on its last legs.

Snow lying now in EK too - but rather less than Lauder!

Jings, that's some heavy snow and pretty good snow cover on that webcam. Only a few flakes lazily drifting down up here in East Kilbride. Abington and Beattock cams looking rather snowy now too.

There's certainly a big east-west contrast in snow at the moment, with the west looking very lean. However, the heavy precipitation bringing the horrific flooding to Deeside and other parts of the North-East has deposited a lot of snow on the hills of the eastern Highlands as temperatures have dropped, after starting off as rain at all levels. The photos below from the SAIS South Cairngorms blog shows a test pit with a depth of 180cm drifted snow. I'd imagine the Lecht and Glenshee will be looking to open for snowsports this weekend, although the road situation doesn't help. http://scairngormsblog.sais.gov.uk/2016/01/wintry-days/ Glenshee and the Lecht struggled for snow most of last winter as the Atlantic storms deposited phenomenal amounts of snow at altitude in the west, while leaving the east rather lean - very different at the moment!

Good news since the headwaters of the Don are in the hills above Cock Bridge, and the more precipipation which falls as snow, the less water is going straight into the river system as rain. Snow levels dropping in the hills should be a good thing for flood-hit areas. Lecht webcams certainly looking pretty snowy now:

An illustration from the SAIS blog of just how these mild and wet intervals eat up the snow in the hills - first image from Glenshee Ski Centre on 27 December, the second from 28 December! Hopefully we'll see an end to these really mild spells as we move into January. http://www.sais.gov.uk/

Certainly the coldest spell of weather I can recall - was 15 years old at the time and too young to properly remember the colder winters in the first half of the 80s. It took until 2009/10 before there was any remotely comparable level of cold in Lanarkshire. There was a modest snow covering here, but there were freezing fogs which coated everything in rime. Despite the relatively short duration of the spell, there were some deep frozen scenes around here with the river and the local waterfalls frozen solid just after Christmas and people skating on the river. It's a pity there were no camera phones (indeed very few mobile phones at all!) around then and people didn't take as many photos, and the internet was still in a pretty basic form then, or there might be a better record of it online. The coldest days were in the period just after Christmas, with a local amateur weather site recording a low of -23.1C in the early hours of the 29th. I seem to remember the thaw coming suddenly at the turn of the year with pouring rain, and being surprised at how quickly a world which had seemed frozen solid like iron yielded so easily to the thaw conditions. There were the usual problems with burst pipes, and I think I got an extra day or two off school after the Christmas break as they sorted out the plumbing.

Fair enough - I was basing it on what I'd seen last winter from (I think) Omagh and various other places (NI geography not being my strong point). I guess much of NI is too far south to really benefit from cool-cold zonality and rPM air to the same extent as western Scotland can.

I wouldn't go as far as brilliant but last year was a pretty decent year for snow even at pretty low levels in western Scotland and Northern Ireland, with a good number of lying snow events and snow cover hanging around for a week or so in January on the outskirts of Glasgow. There was also a hell of a lot of hill snow continuing into spring and even (alas) early summer. This year started promisingly as it seemed to be cooling down as is usual in late November/early December after a very mild/warm spell but it's all gone a bit pear-shaped (so far!) although today felt more normal with temperatures 4C-6C and squally hail showers. So far this 'winter' I've had one snow shower which left a brief smattering on the ground, and although the Highland mountains were looking very white last weekend, they're now down to the bare bones snow-wise.

Aye, plenty of snow to be had in the Ochils today - more than I expected. Quite difficult going where there weren't other footprints already there to follow! Just rain here this evening in lowland Lanarkshire, despite temperature being only just above freezing.

Yeah, looking pretty good at Glencoe Ski Centre - not sure how much will survive next week if it turns out as mild as some of the forecasts though.

Was pleasantly surprised to see a decent wee snow shower for a few minutes there - a wee icing sugar dusting on the cars and grass.