This winter in December I took a little escape from work to the Cairngorms national park in Scotland. I had been curious about riding a fatbike for quite some time and after seeing “Mountain Bikes and Bothy Nights” by Alastair Humphreys, a great video about bothy culture I thought this would be the perfect area to do so.
Other than that I Recently have been intrigued by steel bike frames. This for a couple of reasons. Steel bike frames are usually stiffer, tough heavier than aluminum frames. They are cheaper and more durable than carbon frames. And overall they just look cool.
There is one manufacturer of steel frames that stood out for me, Surly. So I looked on the internet for a Surly dealer and found one in Aviemore. From Glasgow city there are frequent trains up north so the destination for my escape was set. I stayed in the Scottish Youth Hostel Association’s hostel in Aviemore which had a great vibe to it.
Apparently Aviemore is also a great base to go iceclimbing. I had one day left at the hostel and agreed with another traveler to go hike as far as we safely could towards Ben Macdui. We took the bus out of Aviemore to the ski station from where we started. As we reached the first pass at the end of the valley the wind started to pick up and snow started to dump like crazy. We continued for a little bit more but started to sink in knee deep in the snow. As we were not equipped to take on this conditions we turned around.
