Wednesday afternoon ahead of the approaching winter storms we’re expecting over the coming few days we’ve installed a couple of low level webcams in Mountain Spirit (Backcountry Snowsports Shop) located towards the South end of Aviemore on Grampian Road.

This is a fairly temporary set up at present to assess the value of low level cameras to compliment the on mountain cameras. One camera is providing a widescreen format panorama of the distant Cairngorms and we hope will be useful for assessing snow level and cloud base / visibility.

A second camera provides a low level view of the Southern end of Grampian Road in Aviemore. Situated at 690feet, this will be useful for gauging lower level snow falls and thus road conditions in spells of wintry weather as well as seeing what the weathers doing all the time. Unlike the other cameras this camera updates all night and the road provides an excellent indication of whether it’s dry or wet!

Please remember we’re just testing this out, we’re unsure of how useful these cameras will be a distance from the mountain, but the Aviemore view in itself should be useful.

Unfortunately due to deteriorating weather conditions it was decided to abort an attempt to get the third camera working at the Ski Club Hut. With the Funicular closed due to wind, deteriorating overhead and expected ice underfoot it wasn’t looking like a good move to carry computer gear (including my laptop!) up the Home Road.