This morning at 10.10 am I was standing at the bus stop at Crathie and in the trees down by the River Dee I could hear a cuckoo!

Definitely nearing Challenge time.....

He must have come up on the sleeper train, because the bugger was down here the other day.

Laura,

At 1200 hours today I was standing on the summit of Achnafree Hill (NN807307) in rain, sleet and then snow and with a freezing cold stonking SW wind with an actual temp on the summit of +4.3C.

Looking to the W/SW there did not appear to be too much snow on the tops but looking towards to Ben Lawers area there was a serious amount of snow with probably about 75% coverage down to lowish levels. Hopefully will be somewhere in the Cairngorms at the weekend or early next week and will report the situation. Lets hope the never-ending biting winds that we have had up here for weeks abates before Challenge time.

Colin