Great report, Gerald, and some wise weather decisions made, too. Always good to get your teeth into a winter activation in GM-land, but better if it doesn’t involve a canine’s teeth 
A “sorry about that” from the kennels seems somehow inadequate. 73 Mike
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Mine does that sometimes. It seems to happen if I switch from SSB to FM whilst tuned to a frequency inbetween 25KHz steps. The fix on mine is to go back to SSB, tune to eg 145.500, then select FM. Pacifies the gremlins.
Great report, thanks, you had your money’s worth from that trip Gerald!
73
Adrian
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It’s most interesting seeing other people’s photos of summits I’ve done.
The view at Deuchary Hill is a bit good isn’t it? You know why I’ve done it so many times.
Blath Bhalg is a do it once kind of place. I did it in seriously miserable WX but you did a get view to Ben Vuirich and Beinn a’Ghlo. It’s done and I doubt I’ll rush back any time soon!
The view on Meall Bhuide when you come out of the woods at the transmitter building is bit off putting at first “What there’s all this still to do after tramping up the tracks for ages” but it’s worth it. It was that summit that forced me to actually get my Morse good enough to use for SOTA. I was there one Summer with terrible D-layer absorption and it took forever to work 4 on SSB (60/80m no self spotting) with the sky suggesting the big sparky stuff was coming.
The Eastern route up Meall Dearg is not as bad as it looks. 2.9km 364m. The heather is not the problem but the hidden boggy ground. I know I’m a little younger than you but I think it’s 1hr30 not pushing it vs. the Amulree route which to me looks nearly as long as the trek to Makalu Base Camp!
I think you were extremely lucky with the WX bagging some 2 and 4 pointers with winter bonus considering the snow that came for some shortly after. We had ice and cold here but never enough snow to turn the road white. Very lucky compared to some.
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I totally agree with you as I think this is worse than dog owner who lets their dog came running and barking up towards you say that “it won’t hurt you”. I am really scared of dogs and when a dog comes running and barking at me, I am already frightened so a dog owner saying “it won’t hurt you” is absolutely useless. Dogs owners need to realise that not everyone is a dog lover. If your dog cannot behave itself and out walking, it must be on a lead and I mean a short lead, not one of them elastic extendable leads which should only be used for puppy training. In the past I have had people on this Reflector strongly disagree with my views regarding those load extendable elastic leads and say that they are useful for dogs doing doggy things, this however does not stop dogs running up to people and barking at people and even worse is that dogs are still able to chase sheep when on a elastic extendable lead.
Jimmy M0HGY
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You’re right, Jimmy. I rarely go into the hills without my trusty SOTAdog, Sula, but despite being a well trained sheepdog, I make sure she’s kept out of any unpredicted mischief when I’m on the radio. Respect for others is a SOTA prerequisite. 73 Mike
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What Andy said.
Bloody hell Gerald, what a trip! Sounds like you had all the bad luck for the year in one outing.
Both radios playing up, your hip issue, snow gates closed, snow altering your plans and the dog bite!
The only bit I can blame you for is Blath Bhalg. I told you that was a grim place.
Well done for persevering and surviving!
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You look like that on every summit.
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I’m not smiling on that one.
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Don’t blame you. We had heather, snow, wind and poor band conditions. Scraped 4 contacts on 60 m. I’ve often thought of going back in decent weather to see if it was any better. @G4OIG Gerald’s report has corrected that thought.
You beat me to it 
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Well, thankfully I am not into selfies. If I were so disposed, I’m sure Andy’s expression would be considered to be like that of an angel by comparison.
Indeed you did Fraser. I only have myself to blame… I clearly forgot the details! I thought 3.5km each way and a GPS track to follow, well how bad could it be? Had I reviewed your report, I just may have reconsidered this one. I say “may”. 
Yes, I agree Mike, but I recognised that I wasn’t going to get anywhere pressing the issue. The dog was certainly not at fault; the gate should not have been open. Hopefully a lesson has been learned.
Many thanks for the info Adrian. I will test that out when I have a moment. Finding out why it entered repeater mode, well that will remain a mystery.
Indeed it is Andy! The walk through the woods is very pleasant too and that lochan a delight.
Well that was my original plan… I just wimped out. 
The track from Amulree is relatively benign until it swings right to ascend Beinn Liath. Then it becomes darn hard work up to the summit of Beinn Liath. Overall it is a long long way.
Despite all the hassles, I really did enjoy the outing. I certainly missed having Paul G4MD with me and I just hope it won’t be too long before he is well enough to join me.
73, Gerald
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I second that.
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Thanks for the great report, Gerald, and congratulations on some serious SOTA work! I’ve also been surprised to find 30m open to parts of the UK recently. Very unlucky on the dog bite, and I hope it hasn’t caused any lasting damage. My only experience with dogs on a summit so far is when one came bounding over and gave my radio a big slobbery lick! 
I had seen your alerts for some 2m SSB and was tempted to try and find a high spot to chase you - but sadly work commitments got in the way Well done again on what looked like a big trip, and look forward to reading about your next adventure!
73, Matthew M0JSB
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Many thanks Matthew. A three day Travelodge based outing was in fact what Paul G4MD and I considered our staple fare until life events got in the way. Our last outing of this kind together was in March 2020 just before lockdown. Between 2012 and 2016 we also managed to have a week away doing SOTA activations. They were good times and we are keen to get back to doing what we used to do… before we have to hang up our boots and sell our crampons on eBay.
73, Gerald
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Well I tried this Adrian. Bizarrely it reset the FM spacing in the menu to 5kHz which when turning the selector knob gave me 10kHz channel spacing. I therefore entered the menu and reset it to 12.5kHz in the hope it might give me the corresponding channel spacing, but no it gave me 25kHz spacing. Arghh… darn frustrating! So, I have left it on 6.25kHz in the menu to get 12.5kHz channels. At least I know how to sort this issue. Whether I will remember what to do if I am faced with it on a summit, who knows? 
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Love a multi-day SOTA expedition! Hope it’s not too long until Paul is able to rejoin you for more adventures…
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I think the problem with this photo was that you didn’t like the look of the person who was taking the picture!!
I would like to join the group of Blath Bhalg ‘never again - and shouldn’t have done it the first time…’ activators. Despite reading the horror stories I thought this would be a good idea as we were going past on our way home from a stay at Kirkmichael. All went well with the parking and finding the narrow route through the heather to the first bumps on the horizon. The path then wandered off and round and up and down… After a considerable time by enthusiasm waned (it had been MY bright idea) and I lost heart when stumbling along beside a fence with steep heather little descents and tricky ways up again. I seem to recall sitting at the top of one slope and suggesting I would stay there (this is not a common occurrence but it has happened before). I was persuaded that we were getting relatively close and staggered on (M0JLA had the map and hadn’t mentioned the final up and down - but the map had been freely available for me to peruse.beforehand). By the time I looked down… and then up to the real summit I was determined to get the job done and get the 2m mast up as quickly as possible. I heard talking on 2m fm - was I going to to win the pools and actually qualify this miserable little hill? After some struggles with high heather and a semi vertical mast (I daren’t let them escape while I actually pegged out my guys) I was heard by both contacts and my final tally was 5 on 2m fm and 2 on 70cm (thanks to GM0AXY and GM4ODW) in 30 mins. Back down the final slope where Rod was nestling and the long tedious walk back. Is this summit getting nearly as highly recommended as Sighty Crag??
Congrats on your expedition Gerald and thanks for all the photos which brought back memories - and reminded us of summits still to tackle.
73 M6BWA
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I enjoyed it. 
73,
Rod
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I won’t give a like to that comment Rod as I am fairly certain that it is tongue in cheek.
That final down then up is not that clear from the map and I must admit to at least a double expletive when I arrived at the top of the descent bit… it is more of a scramble than a path. I think Viki described the “pleasure” of the path more aptly than I did. Personally give me Sighty Crag any day, but then Blath Bhalg in winter does have the attraction of it being 5 points so people will still go there!