The girl who went up a mountain and did nothing.

I don’t know about you guys, but this weekend my one and only plan was to do as little as possible. So when I got asked on Thursday if I wanted to come along on a skiing trip to the Cairngorms I initially thought – nah – not for me! After all I am just not a big fan of skiing at all, the last time I tried, I ended up walking down the mountain after closing time as I couldn’t even get my skis back on my feet after I fell over. Let me tell you walking down-hill in skiing boots is hard. Especially when the lights are switched off!

Therefore, my initial thought was thanks but no thanks. But then I thought about it. Essentially it was a free trip to Avimore, which is a lovely place, but I have never been there in the winter, and there are some great coffee shops that I could hang out in, and also I have a friend who lives nearby that I could meet up for a coffee or something whilst the rest of the group was off skiing or snowboarding or whatever it is they do, and so I decided – why not – I had no plans anyway so might as well get out of the flat for a little bit – that is after all one of the goals I had in mind for 2015!

So bright and early at 6,45 Saturday morning I was  picked up, and me and a small group of people headed up towards the mountains. I’m a bit of a sucker though, because I think sometimes the actual drive is the most enjoyable thing about a trip. Probably because I don’t drive myself, so it still has a bit of a novelty.

It was a gorgeous day, so once we were actually up at the  mountain, I quickly realised that I would have to alter my plans slightly. I definitely wanted to take the funicular railway to the top, skiing or no skiing, and have a look at the views, and also to be able to say I had my lunch at Britian’s highest restaurant. (Even though they were quite pricey and it was mobbed) and once we eventually got up there, I couldn’t quite figure out how I could make my way off the mountain, and down to Aviemore to meet my friend, on my own, and to be honest, I was quite happy sitting up there enjoying the views, whilst everyone else were off skiing. I felt a bit bad just abandoning my group who had invited me to come along you know?

And so it was that I ended up spending Saturday sitting at the top of the 5th highest mountain in the UK, watching our bags, guarding the snack-box, reading books, and knitting on my sweater to some spectacular views of the Cairngorm national park on a winters day.


From sitting quietly I even got to eavesdrop on some well random conversations. The nightly exploits of a group of 3 20-something boys and “who woke up in which bed” was an interesting one to listen to, but the most amusing / shocking was definitely the man who was in a bit of a pickle as he had been dog-sitting for a friends Chihuahua and have come home one day to find his cat had mistaken the dog for prey and eaten it and he wasn’t sure how to break the news to his friend…  like, I don’t even…

All in all, yeah, I didn’t do much at all, but I did pretty much the same thing I would have done at home in my flat, and so why not change the scenery a bit? I might even try my hands on skiing next time!

Have you ever been skiing in the Cairngorms or elsewhere?