Ben Nevis.

Yesterday we had gusts of wind over 100mph on Cairngorm and very similar here on the west coast. It's unusual to get such strong wind speeds in June and thankfully the storm only lasted one day. This morning was a bit breezy but the wind dropped to a breeze by mid-morning. Charlotte and I enjoyed a walk up the Pony Track to Ben Nevis and managed to stay mostly dry on the way up.We had some nice views for much of it but the summit was stubbornly stuck inside the clouds.

The work carried out through Nevis Landscape Partnership on the Pony Track is fantastic. There is always more to do but the bulk of the major works are complete and what a difference it makes. It's a very skillful job to set the rocks in just the right place and manage the water that wants to drain down the path. What we have now looks really solid and will hopefully last for a couple of decades at least. It also makes the walking much nicer. The rocks are set at small irregular steps and it is easy to cover the ground at what ever pace and stride length works for you. It's an excellent piece of work but not cheap. This work cost in the order of £900,000.

Charlotte and I made it to the summit in good time and enjoyed looking at the ruins of the observatory. There is no snow on the summit now but there is still a small easy angle patch of snow just above the 1200m shelter. It will be a couple more weeks before this disappears I think. We had a shower of hail on the summit today and it was only a couple of degrees above freezing so perhaps this last patch of snow will hang around for longer. Well done Charlotte, it was great chatting with you. Well done Nevis Landscape Partnership for amazing work on the path too.