Relieved. Perhaps

"We smelt the smell of heather when
We burnt it for the tea,
And granite struck by granite at
The back of Corrie Fee,
We saw the twisted strata in
The glaciated lands,
The little speck of mica that
Stuck glistening in our hands".

A verse from 'The Poem, 1972' by
Syd Scroggie

On our descent of the Marilyn Craigendarroch last week, I slipped on the narrow path. Nothing much; hardly anything at all really, just a foot sliding a few inches. However in the evening I felt a slight nip in my left knee which worsened after a walk through the Morrone Birkwood the following day.

It was the same knee that was operated on two years ago and I feared the worst. The Braemar Gathering came and went with no easing and on Sunday we watched a re-enactment marking the 300th anniversary of the raising of the Jacobite standard here in 1715. Both events were thoroughly enjoyable and involved a fair bit of walking, but I knew that on Monday I needed to get on a hill to either confirm the worst or, more hopefully, discover that I had done nothing more than irritate a tendon.

It was with great relief that at the Glas Maol cairn all seemed well. The midges arrived as did the black flies but not even a plague of midges could have spoiled this glorious day. A young lad appeared and told us that this was his 5th Munro. He was in the forces (REME) and was home for week from his base in London and would soon be posted to Leuchars, much to his obvious delight. On Creag Leacach we met again then went our separate ways. The Knee was still fine.

It was like summer, or at least what summer should have been like. A perfect day with the main Cairngorms looking magnificent, the hills of the western Mounth equally so.

Respecting the knee, we had an easy afternoon the following day lying in the sun on a carpet of heather on Carn Aosda. I picked up a small rock - the mica glistened in the sun.


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