By: Blonde One
Mountain walking in Scotland is a far cry from walking on Dartmoor. The skills needed are more technical, the preparation needs to be more robust and the consequences of making bad choices are far more extreme.
Luckily the Mountain Weather Information Service is there to help with the planning process.
On one of my recent Scotland days the mountains had to wait as the MWIS forecast was for ‘ferocious gusts’ of wind and a feels like temperature of -22°. Despite it looking quite benign out of our cottage window we took the advice given and did not, on this occasion, Get Outside!
It’s a great service that provides a detailed forecast to stay safe on the mountains of 9 upland regions across the UK. It began in 2003 as the brainchild of Geoff Monk, who still heads up the organisation. The 5 Scottish forecasts are funded by Sport Scotland; the rest is (inadequately) funded by sponsorship. (Should you have a spare few pounds, then I’m sure MWIS would happily take it off your hands.)
If you’re heading into any of the areas covered by MWIS make sure you follow their excellent advice.
