HighlandMist

Lovely Highland Spices

2012-01-20T15:24:00.001Z

Worth tracking down at a good delicatessen near you. Hand blended in the Highlands and has a list of additional ingredients required and the method on the other side.

Shotgun, Hide, Decoy

2012-01-20T09:48:00.001Z

Well I got a good deal on an old shotgun. Its a Francais D'Armes Robust No26.
Any information you have on above gun would be appreciated as there's not much out there in interweb land.

It's pictured here with a BSA Sportsman 5 .22lr rimfire rifle which was thrown in with the shotgun ! I told you it was a good deal !
Theres a piece missing from the shotgun butt which used to be a cheekpiece, I fixed this with a piece from an old BSA walnut stock given to me by John Macrae of Tain Rifle and Pistol Club.

So it went from this:

To this :

It's had some more sanding and oiling since then too.

So, I bought some FUD pigeon decoys and a hide and set off on some trials, setting up in a stubble field at first and bagging a bird that actually landed.

We moved to an Oil Seed Rape Field

Yes kids, those pigeons are Fold Up Decoys and should not be shot and eaten.

This is the view back to the hide

Here are my decoys being attacked by a Buzzard !

and here is the first pigeon I have shot on the wing when I moved the setup into the adjacent stubble field.

If you haven't tried Wood pigeon and know where you can get one, then try it.

Pigeons

2012-01-20T09:16:00.001Z

I like pigeon. Not the feral pigeons that hang around the distilleries munching on all the grain and making a mess by crapping everywhere. These I don't eat I just shoot.

The Wood Pigeon on the other hand is a much better bag. Now I'll try to eat anything within reason and so I have cooked some feral pigeon to see what they taste like, and the breast meat has a texture I don't like similar to liver.
Wood pigeon breast fried is lovely, more like a good steak than poultry.

I had managed to shoot a few 'Woodies' with the BSA Ultra but got a good deal on an old shotgun and decided to have a go with it.

Shotgun story to follow...

New Arrivals

2011-10-17T20:46:00.002Z

After several months, one interview and a couple of emails I received my firearms certificate and my shotgun certificate.

I had lined up a possible purchase and made the deal a day after receiving the cert.

It's a Sako Varmint Finnfire .22 rimfire rifle.

Once again I began the task of selecting the correct ammo for the rifle. I wanted to choose subsonic hollow point ammunition so that it was more suited to hunting.

After grouping trials and the CCI's almost not fitting in the rifle I decided on the RWS ammo.

It produced this little group on the right at 50m.

My son and I went lamping that night and took an unfortunate bunny at our zero range 50m.

I also managed a crow at 104m !

Two weeks later I acted on an advert at the local club and bought two second hand guns, another .22 rimfire in the shape of a BSA Sportsman 5, and a Francais d' Armes 12 gauge shotgun.

More about them in my next post :)

More Bad Knee News

2011-10-16T06:50:00.001Z

The last few weeks I have been suffering from pain in my other knee. Seems to be the medial meniscus with no apparent cause.
Looks like degenerative damage again! My running and hillwalking days may be done.
:(

Fac and SGC

2011-10-10T04:33:00.001Z

I started doing the forms in the middle of May, got everything filled out and sent off at the start of June and eventually got the accepted certificates back at the end of September.

I had to choose my proposed weapons on the forms and chose .22lt cor the club competition and also vermin control, and a .17 HMR for vermin.
I also applied for a shotgun for rabbits and especially the flying vermin and tasty Woodpigeon.

Rifle Club

2011-10-10T04:32:00.000Z

Of course, my son and I also joined the local gun club which is Tain Rifle and Pistol Club.
They have a25m indoor range and a 50m outdoor. We went along for a few weeks to see if we liked it and we did. The members are a nice bunch and we've both learned a lot.

We have also had the opportunity to shoot lots of types of weapons. Here's a wee example of the range of calibres. I hope it also conveys the fun aspect of shooting.

After a few months I decided that I would like to take things more seriously and maybe shoot a competition. For this I needed a rifle, and so began some forward thinking, some pretty far forward thinking as I discovered that it's a long process.

Zero

2011-10-10T03:58:00.000Z

Had no luck with the first scope I bought, it originally went on the rifle we found in the garage but whilst zeroing the rifle fell off the rest and landed on the scope disabling the vertical adjustmnent.

Another one was purchased and the zeroing took place.

As you can see, I went with the AA Diablo Field pellets after trying two other types.

Happy with the accuracy it was time to venture out. When I eventually found where the rabbits live I managed to get one with a 25m standing shot.

You can see that I've 'camo taped' the moderator and some of the barrel, this is to hide it from the pigeon and it helps to soften the report.

Yes the sound moderator or silencer does make a huge difference on this rifle.

Other helpful accesories have to include a pair of homemade shooting sticks.

Now to Regulation

2011-10-03T01:55:00.001Z

The Ultra us a very good and accurate rifle, nut what if you could improve it ?
There is a way of increasing the shot count and consistency.
The air from each shot is released when the hammer strikes a non return valve on the air cylinder which releases roughly the same amount of air every time. This varies mostly at each end of the cylinder being empty or full. You can have a regulator fitted so as to more accurately regulate this quota of air given to discharging the pellet.
Of course I got one fitted :)

Here is a video showing the sort of consistency and shot count you can expect from a regulator.

If you are interested then visit XTX Air's site for full details.
XTX Air

Getting up and running. Shooting.

2011-09-05T15:16:00.003Z

Had no lucvk with the first scope I bought, it originally went on the rifle we found in the garage but whilst zeroing the rifle fell off the rest and landed on the scope disabling the vertical adjustmnent.

Another one was purchased and the zeroing took place.

As you can see, I went with the AA Diablo Field pellets after trying two other types.

Happy with the accuracy it was time to venture out. When I eventually found where the rabbits live I managed to get one with a 25m standing shot.

You can see that I've 'camo taped' the moderator and some of the barrel, this is to hide it from the pigeon and it helps to soften the report.

Yes the sound moderator or silencer does make a huge difference on this rifle.

Other helpful accessories have to include a pair of homemade shooting sticks.

Full instructions on how to make them HERE.

The hits just keep on coming with this very useful little .177 rifle.

I will discuss firing at different distances using the mil dot reticle in another post, but 45m kills are easily achievable and on one occasion under special circumstances a 63m one !
My current vermin totals so far...
31 Feral Pigeon 5 Wood Pigeon 47 Rabbits 1 Corvids

After The Knee

2011-09-03T13:26:00.001Z

So, I had severe knee pain last November after a run. Over several months and following two visits to two different Physiotherapists the verdict was degenerative cartilage damage. In other words, I'm old at 44 !

So I stopped running, hill walking and climbing and eased right off on the cycling which was also painful.

More or less sat out the first part of winter and to get me out and about in February, fate stepped in.

I have done a fair amount of shooting over the years, owned several air rifles or pistols and was in the Army Cadets and TA shooting everything from rimfire to 81mm Mortar. I got rid of the air rifles when the kids arrived.
At the start of 2011 my son found an air rifle in my sister in laws garage, one I had forgotten about. We put a service kit on it and played with it for a few weeks before returning it to my brother !
Then I purchased this:

BSA Ultra Multishot

Its the first PCP air rifle I have owned and I can highly recommend it, the beautiful stock isn't really bipod friendly though so I only use it on rare occasions and zeroing.

At the same time my son and I enrolled at the local Rifle and Pistol club, Tain RPC.

There's more pictures, videos and experiences to come, maybe even some helpful advice so stay tuned. Right now I have a bathroom to decorate :(

Spotted At Moy

2011-04-21T19:32:00.000Z

Spotted some activity today at Moy, don't know who it was but well done.

The corner route being bolted looks really nice.

New Camera

2010-11-29T16:37:00.000Z

Well, the camera hasn't turned up yet so had to bite the bullet and shell out for a new one.
It had to be a compact camera but this time I wasn't too bothered about it being waterproof, always mindful that the old waterproof one may still turn up at some point.

I decided on the Lumix TZ10.

Has a lovely lens and a decent array of features including the a GPS for on the spot geotagging.

I'm currently injured ( again ) with a torn cartilage so haven't ventured too far since the purchase. Here's some local pics.

I'm impressed with the results on the 'Intelligent Auto' setting.

These were taken with the aspect ratio set to 16:9 which records a 10.5M image, you can also set the aspect to 3:2 and for the full 12.1M image you use 4:3
Can't decide what ratio to use ? Then there's a multi aspect setting which which shoot all three with one press of the shutter.

The camera will also shoot 720p HD movies and can utilise the AVCHD lite compression format.
I haven't really had a decent play with this but will include a wee clip if I remember.

First impressions are good with the only niggle so far being the actual filing of the recorded images. They are all just piled into the same folder until theres 999, and then another folder is started. The old Pentax started a new folder every day and named the folder after the date. Oh, and my PC does not recognise the formatting of the SD card so using the USB cable is a must.

So set the below clip to 720p to see the HD movie capabilities of the camera. The clip was shot in the same lighting conditions as the first beach picture above.

Lost My Camera

2010-10-20T04:26:00.000Z

I know it's in the house somewhere, but where ?

Latest news:

Sol climbs his first Munro, Ben Wyvis.

We were lucky with the weather and Sol really enjoyed it, as did Cooky.

Well done Sol, only a few more to go :)

The local Academy gets a traversing wall, paid for by Skretting and built by Scott Muir of Extreme Dream .
It's open to the local community so the kids and I checked it out.

Good fun and those big yellow ones can be tricky without shoes and chalk.

We Went Further !

2010-08-15T20:22:00.001Z

Yes ! At Last ! The weather picked up and we got our days climbing with Go Further Scotland. This trip was originally planned for 30th July but bad weather and other commitments postponed it until 14th Aug.

We met up with Paul Tattersall in Gairloch and drove a few miles along the road to Clown Slab. This crag has been bolted for sport climbing, rather than having to place protection like in traditional climbing, you simply have to clip in your quickdraw and then put your rope through the quickdraw. Sport climbs are graded for their difficulty from 1 up to 9b+ the last time I looked the number is usually preceded with the letter F.

We climbed the routes graded F4 for starters I led them and then Paul met me at the top to go through threading the lower off. After that the kids could top rope the climbs.

When the troops went to get lunch from the car Paul and I practised another situation. I climbed up and then secured myself to the top anchor, then hanging from this I belayed Paul up to me.

After a quick bite and more anchor and gear placement practice Paul reckoned we would do an F5 route and Molly would lead it. She managed to get to the top clipping 'draws all the way up !

After that we had to move round to Kuhjo Crag and the kids were put straight onto an F6a+ route Called 'The River Gods'.

It was a huge ask of the kids and they managed to get about half way up clipping a couple of bolts, I tried it and couldn't get as far ! I also had a go leading an F6a but fell before clipping the penultimate bolt :(

I had a rest and then managed to climb to the top. Molly then came along and also climbed to the top after finding a great rest place !

Oh and we all abseiled off the crag, even Karen !

I can thoroughly recommend a day out with Go Further Scotland and if you want to know more about the crags in the area then have a look at these great wee Topos.

Invergordon Tank Farm

2010-07-29T18:32:00.000Z

Sol and I went on a cycle today. We went to do a 10 miler but then decided to go up the hill at Inchindown to find the 'secret bunkers' in the hillside.
It was a steep climb.

but the views were nice.

We soon found the first entrance.

and used the flash on the camera to see what was inside.

There was a great echo and a nasty smell of oil inside.

I must admit I'm not exactly sure what the purpose of these hillside bunkers was but it was something to do with the tanks in Invergordon. You can read an interesting account of one of them being bombed in WW2 here. The bombing of tank 13.

Wild Wild West

2010-07-24T21:37:00.000Z

First of all apologies for any grammatical or spelkling errors.. I have just had a lovely barbecue, a bottle of wine and a large Cointreu and Esprsesso. thanks to Mary and Roger.
Had a nice few days camping in Clachtoll and then a days climbing at Gruinard.
Clachtoll is lovely. We first visited in 2006 and the kids had a ball.

This time I had apirations of doing some climbing. Split rock was a real posasiblitty.

... but jeez, a really tricky ledge from the headland and then a tidal gap followed by a scaramble just to getto the climb. A wee bit too much for the kids. Saunders and I managed to get to the base of split rock on the reccy and then gave up.
The next day I went soloing severalother insifnificant but none the less quite interesting wee climbs all within walking distance of the campsite.

View from crags back down tocampsite and split rock.

Whilst the kids had a laff on the beach AGAIN !

Then we managed some climbing a few days later at Gruinard. Now never mind the Anthrax.

We did a coupleof climbs Flaky Wall 15m VD.

and Small But Perfectly Formed * 25m VD.

Then we spent a wee while on the beacj before heasding home, ooch time for a wee dram then TDF high;lights and bed...

Reiffer Madness

2010-07-03T15:59:00.000Z

After many weeks almost going, when the weather has been very nice thank you very much, we were organised enough to head for Reiff for a bit of climbing.

We had picked a a few climbs suitable for me and the kids. The forecast wasn't too good, 25mph winds and heavy rain showers, but we decided to chance it. I didn't bother checking the tide as the guidebook Scottish Rock Volume 2 North describes it as non tidal. We drove through a few showers on the way but they really weren't too bad. I thought the fresh wind would help to keep the cliffs dry. When we parked up the wee man saw huge breaker rising up against the cliffs across the field !

Not a great photo, tha camera is fairly basic but waterproof :) The waves were breaking as high as the cliff face as seen from our parking spot.
We crossed the fence and headed across the field, leaving the troops in the wee stone structure I went down to investigate.
The way around to the pinnacle from the north was being regularly swept with swell.

I checked around the other side.

It wasn't good, the Pinnacle and some of our bloody climbs was being soaked with spray.

The base of the slab with our other climbs was being lapped by the swell, it just wasn't safe for the kids to descend and stand about in close proximity to the angry sea.

The females in the party were not up to abseil in down "Descent route" we shrugged and made our way home.
Later... I checked the tides and found that high tide was 1211 BST, we were there at 1130, although it appears to have been a neap tide !
Maybe we'll get another day in the upcoming holidays although the wife isn't keen on the drive.

Forcan About In South Glen Shiel

2010-06-23T04:04:00.001Z

First of all let me say how pissed of I am with all the manky skanks using the great Scottish outdoors. Sharp eyed blog readers may have noticed Molly holding a plastic drinks bottle in the photo with the dog. That had been left at the crag by a previous visitor along with cigarette butts and chocolate bar wrappers. It's the same story on the hills, on our last walk one we discovered more butts, tissues and cling-film.
Rant over, on with the recent activity.

First of all I climbed my first Severe route, the cheeky wee Left Bay Groove at Pinnacle Crag, where Sol and I were savaged by Midges. We really will have to try some other climbs at different venues now.

I went walking again. Two routes in South Glen Shiel.

Todd and I did The Saddle and Sgurr na Sgine which includes the Forcan Ridge. Mostly fag butts. A really good, enjoyable approach path which winds its way up from the road along Meallan Odhar.

Followed by some very interesting 'put those poles safely away now' scrambling.

We descended the Saddle just after the trig point

and then climbed Sgurr na Sgine where we looked back at our achievement.

We then headed back to the road along the knee breaking Faochag north ridge.

After nacking his knee, Todd was unable to join Saunders and I as we tackled the other seven Munroes on the South Glen Shiel Ridge. You really need to drop a car at the end of this one or chance thumbing it back up the hill, it's a fair distance to walk on a busy road.
Saunders had never climbed a Munro before, although he told me a story about a fairly hefty lassie he knew when he was in third year who was called Munro, I told him that this didn't count.

Another excellent if lengthy path led us right to the top of the first Munro in just under two hours ( need to check timings with Saunders who may have logged walk on GPS ).

His wife, not the Munro lassie, had promised him a new pair of strides if he completed all seven so we hastened on.

We took photos at the all the summits but you know how one can start to look like all the others so here's one with a nice view from Munro number 4 Maol Chinn-dearg down to the bridge and Loch Quoich.

By this time I was missing Basher and Norma's veggy wraps and Saunders had to give me one of his rolls.

For number 5 Sgurr an Doire Leathan you bear right for the summit so then have to double back to continue along the ridge. Beware, as in the mist it's very easy to follow a path onto Maoile an t-Searraich.

And so... After a brief detour in the thickening mist and a re checking of the map and our fitness we tackled what I thought was the best part. A very interesting walk and scramble through the mist up to Sgurr an Lochain with an equally impressive ridge walk and scramble up to Creag nan Damh, number seven on the day.

It wasn't quite over yet, heading for the bealach theres a cracking wee crag you climb over just to end the ridge with smile on your face.
A thoroughly enjoyable walk with a wee bit of everything, you have to do it. I guesstimated that we were back at the car in 8 1/2 hours. No cigar but Saunders gets a new pair of trousers.

Hills and Crags

2010-06-01T06:28:00.000Z

Well we did the next Munro on the list, a fairly direct assault on Ben Klibreck. A lot of trudging through grass and heather following the route from the SMC guidebook.

Not trail until you gain the ridge where you get a bit of a breather and nice views.

Then come the boulders and the mad dutchman.

No views at the top where the cloud was refusing to blow off.

This week we had another nice evening at Pinnacle Crag where I led some V Diffs and Sol and Molly took turns seconding.

We also did the chimney which Sol really enjoyed especially when he found a good way of climbing it. Molly went for a different technique.

We then re-visited Tapered Groove and did a better job leading-seconding than we did top roping.

The sun just kept shining as Sol seconded.

And Molly found a wee friend.

Another Nice Day

2010-05-19T10:31:00.002Z

Hope we are going to get some payback after suffering a nasty winter. Yesterday was really nice. Despite a local road closure preventing me from doing a 50 mile cycle it still turned out great.

I was caught out last week on my 50 miler when I arrived at the bottom of thee climb up Struie Hill only to see a sign stating that the road was closed for roadworks. I has to go back the way I had come into a nasty headwind.

I went on a much shorter route instead.

I call it the Kildary Loop. It's 36 Km and took me 76 minutes.
The weather was nice, NO WIND.

Later I decided I would pick the kids up from school and go straight up to Pinnacle Crag. We were not alone at the crag, whilst rigging up a top rope I was surprised to see a head bob up as someone topped out beside me soloing !

Here's a pic of some others doing Pinnacle Chimney.

The kids climbed a couple of routes and then Sol had a go at belaying me.

Happy with Sol's belaying ability and having found a suitable ground anchor, I decided to lead my first climb, Broken Groove graded Moderate :) Ach well you've got to start somewhere.

And Sol seconded as Molly took the photos.

What a great day. Oh the wife eventually turned up in a dress and sandals !!

Decent Weekend

2010-05-09T16:15:00.001Z

Just shook off the cold I got on holiday for a week and then got another one which I passed on to my workmates, sorry Paul and Albert :(

Friday: managed a wee run for the first time in a few weeks.

Saturday: Met up with Basher and Norma on Saturday and had a nice wee walk up Ben Hope.

Looking towards Durness and Cape Wrath

Which had a cheeky wee bit of snow up top.

Hey your not at the top until you are at the highest point.

Nice walk, good company and decent weather.

Sunday: We went back to Pinnacle Crag and climbed another two routes.

We were just setting up for the climb in the chimney when we got drenched in a heavy rain / hail stone shower and so retreated back down to the car.
Need another day to do the severe graded routes and then we will try longer routes.

Working Out Routes: Pinnacle Crag

2010-04-21T08:41:00.002Z

Yesterday was a first for me although it reminded me of planning a weekends hillwalking from a few years ago. I wanted to sort out our first outdoor climb. I started on the UK Climbing website forum and asked about decent top roping locations nearby.
I then purchased Highland Outcrops and 'studied the form' looking for locations with some easier graded climbs.

Pinnacle Crag near Loch Duntelchaig fitted the bill. Yesterday I went on a reccy just to make sure of decent anchor points at the top. I then took several photos including these two:

Which I then had to do some work on. I consulted the guidebook and had to work out the routes from the descriptions given. It was my first time doing this and it was really interesting. Unlike some route guides I have seen I didn't go the whole hog and draw dotted lines up the crag. I may do this when I have climbed them and worked out exactly where the lines should go !
I then 'stitched' the two pictures together using Hugin. Here is the result.

I must admit that on first inspection it looked quite difficult, but when reading the guide the routes seem to appear out of the rock. Time will tell if this is the case :) I personally want to try number six which is called Tapered Groove and graded Very Difficult in British Trad Grading,

Here itis on the right of this photo:

There was a decent amount of boulders at the top for anchors and further back someone had planted a stake. Hope the weather is good at the weekend.

Climbing

2010-04-05T02:24:00.001Z

The kids went climbing at Extreme Dream a few years ago and enjoyed it so we always expected to give it another go one day. Finally last October I decided to do an induction course at Extreme Dream to learn how to belay.

We then used out Highlife Cards ( a monthly payment to the council ) at the Inverness Leisure Centre and used their indoor climbing wall and bouldering facilities.

Before going away to Gran Canaria at Christmas we visited EICA the worlds largest indoor climbing arena.

Oh boy is it big, and cold. We were there just when the cold weather was really taking hold in scotland and we bought those wee hand warmers in the Tiso shop !

The big boulders were off limits awaiting new crash mats, but the 30m tower was there beckoning the unweary, I declined.

Oh, we had also had a look at Tom Riach but it was far too cold wet and mossy.

We have just completed our most audacious expedition, a visit to the Ruthven boulder south of Inverness. We actually stopped in Tiso Inverness on the way down to buy the excellent stone country guidebook.

We didn't get the sun which was forecast, but we were ready to give it a go.

After a warm up on the 'Baby Bunnet' we moved over to the Bunnet Stane proper. After checking the guidebook we totally disregarded it and just mucked about trying out everything all the way around.

This is Sol trying to find somewhere to put his fett under 'Barry Manilow'.

Molly having a go.

And me getting into a knot !

Sol laying back but not relaxing :)

I did have several goes at a traverse, but only because there were nice big hand holds.

It was good crack, but wet and cold. As the drizzle grew heavier we decided to make our escape.

After one or two more wee goes that is.

Bye now !

Latest Ski Trip: Montgenevre, France

2010-03-15T05:46:00.003Z

Things didn't start well. After staying the night in Glasgow we woke to find the flight was delayed 6 hours. After boarding the plane and taxiing we were disembarked due to a faulty starter motor in the left engine !

The new part had to be flown up from London so our delay became 13 hours.

Those attending Ski School missed the first lesson due to the lateness of our arrival at the Chalet.

Montgenevre is part of the 'Milky Way' area which includes resorts in Italy, several of the group skid over the border on at least one occasion.

Meanwhile, back to the script. We surfaced mid morning on the Monday and made for the top of the resort. Skiing and Boarding Greens Blues and Reds in the first two hours, there may have been runs on Blacks at this early stage but not not by me.

The chatty ones amongst us ( everyone but me ) got aquainted with the other guests in the chalet.

Now here's my challenge, I am going to try to name everyone.
From Left Clockwise:
Fiona, Leslie, ~~Dave~~ (John), Muzz, Karen, Molly, Hollie, Sol, Henry, Kerry, Gareth, Clair, Gavin, Saunders (hiding), Jean, Julia.
It would turn out that we were of varied experience and discipline which lended itself to various smaller group matchups and outings.

The weather was very cold on Tuesday and we had fresh snow.

Molly had a bad time of it and ended up in the medical centre for checks, she felt a lot better later on :)

We had lovely weather for the rest of the week. There seemed to be an endless supply of runs and loads of off-piste for those who wanted it. Myself and at least one boarder were not too keen on the metre deep powder in the woods.

OK, just to be fair here is one of Jean in a more appropriate boarding position.

I didn't attend any lessons on this trip and failed miserably to emulate the skill shown by Fiona.

Or the seemingly effortless skill, technique and sheer speed of John.

The above photo was taken at the bottom of what was prbably my favourite run, on Le Chalvet.

Oh I did do some Blacks but didn't find them as much fun as the reds as I actually went down them slower !

The wife and kids benefitted from taking lessons and showed considerable improvement. The wife vowing to go Red or Dead on the next trip :)

All that exercise, mountain air and cheap wine took their toll... ...and so it was time for us to leave old Monty.

We all enjoyed it.

And I had a sore throat by the end of the week from all the chatting.