Snow, yay!

The UK winter of 13/14 was the wettest since records began and snow events were at a premium, so it was with some anticipation with snow falling, that I made plans for a dawn excursion. Snow cover has the ability to reduce the visual complexity of a landscape, by blanketing vegetation and reveal land forms. So, great plans were made, winds were at an acceptable strength for longish exposures and I even allowed an extra 10 mins for clearing the car of snow in the morning. Sadly, the plan slowly unravelled during the journey. The majority of UK drivers seem content to carry on with normal tyres and mitigate the hazards of snow/ice by travelling at crawling speeds until gritted or snow/ice free roads are reached. If conditions get too bad, they simply abandon their car, which really adds to the congestion misery. Whilst slowly crawling along behind a dispiritingly long line of tail lights, I reflected on the aforementioned and that whilst my investment in winter tyres is a sensible move, I really should have set the alarm for 1 hour earlier when snow fell overnight and as the extended travel time, ate into the walk time, Dawn at Great Plan A was scuppered and others too, eventually a trip up to the oh so familiar enivrons of the Black Mountains southern flank was settled on.

Cumulonimbus Incus

The walk up was initially over a dusting of snow, until the Ffridd wall was reached and then the snow depth increased to several inches. Where the 'mountain wall' has been sited in empathy with the upland environs and not with a surveying line, I have noticed the 'mountain wall' often seems to demarcate fairly accurately the zone of snow accumulation.

Onwards and upwards and with views opening up, a band of cloud was present to the south extending across the horizon from the SW to SE, sigh. so no alpen glow or warm red light. It was very much a case of waiting for something to happen towards sunrise. A cumulonimbus incus cloud offered some interest and if the cloud had arrived 30 mins later there would have been some very nice lighting.

Instead there was the opportunity to experiment with the camera white balance (WB) settings, as sometimes manual settings have produced a more pleasing image colour than the camera auto WB. Conventional wisdom says WB can adjusted in RAW post processing, I think it is probably best to get it thereabouts in the field and it is something I'm still experimenting with, a better memory would help too.

A belated sunrise

The effect of snow and low angled light reduces the complexity of a landscape and highlighting landforms was  illustrated by the view across the Usk valley to Craig y Cilau on Mynnyd Llangatwg where the landslide scar/glacial cirque were revealed.

Craig y Cilau and Mynydd Llangatwg plateau

One landform that I'd seen on previous trips was a lobe or debris tongue, with depression and debris ridges. The snow cover highlighted the form and nature, with the intriguing possibility of a rock glacier origin, or alternatively winnowed landslide debris. The south facing aspect of the slope and the gradient are potential settings for ice cored debris flows that form in severely cold climates.

Boulder lobe from a rock glacier or winnowed landslide debris?

Spin drift rising from exposed ground was a visible indicator of the wind strength increasing, sadly my efforts to capture spin drift failed miserably. With cloud sheets approaching from the west and thunder snow forecast it was time to head back to the car, whilst the weather was still good and photograph the Ffridd wall and trees mantled in snow. An enjoyable trip and always a childish pleasure to walk on virgin snow that's not too deep.

Stock pen and Ffridd wall

Field beech and graze line