The highland mountain ranges in Scotland are rough, beautiful, and magnificent places that attract many international visitors, but their slopes have a darker side that has terrified many people throughout the years.
With a height of 1309 metres (4296 feet), Ben MacDhui is the highest peak in the Cairngorms and the second highest peak in Scotland, but it is claimed that the mountain is haunted.
Many mountaineers are certain that the regions of the Cairngorms and Skye harbour a malign humanoid entity known locally as 'Fear Liath Mor' (meaning big grey man) that is grey in colour, big, and fearsome in appearance. The legends tell of these beings stalking anyone who trespassed into their territory.
Actual sightings of the Big Grey Man have been rare, but "eye-witness" descriptions of his appearance describe him as being around ten feet tall, covered in hair, with very long arms and legs.
Ben MacDhui's sinister occupant first came to widespread notice when eminent climber Professor Norman Collie made an announcement to the members of the Annual General Meeting of the Cairngorm Club during their 1925 gathering. He reported that in 1891 he had been descending from this mountain's summit through heavy mist when suddenly: "I began to hear the sound of noises in the loose rock behind me coming down from the natural cairn on the high plateau. Every few steps I took, I heard a crunch, and then another crunch as if someone was walking after me but taking steps three or four times the length of my own."
Dismissing this as an aural hallucination, he continued, but so did the mysterious steps. Gradually he became more and more apprehensive, until he was seized with terror and fled blindly down the mountain for five miles until he reached Rothiemurchus Forest.
Although he was unable to catch any real sight of it, Collie was left with a sinister impression of being stalked by a huge and menacing creature. He vowed never to return to Ben Macdhui alone, and remained convinced that there was "something very queer about the top of Ben MacDhui".
Following his disclosure, he received a letter from Dr A.M.Kellas detailing his own strange experience on that mountain. Dr Kellas and his brother Henry were on the mountain close to the summit when they saw a 'giant figure' approaching them from the direction of the cairn. For a moment it disappeared from sight as it moved into a dip, but the men did not wait to see it reappear, and ran as fast as they could to get off the mountain.
This chilling account, coupled with the unquestionable reliability of professor Collie's story, attracted great media attention. Moreover, other mountaineers began to confess that they too had experienced similar sensations of uncontrollable fear and panic with no rational reason while on Ben MacDhui and had come away with the vivid impression that a malevolent, paranormal presence existed here, which sought to frighten away anyone venturing upon this lonely, desolate peak.
Read More:
The Big Grey Man of Ben MacdhuiOther Author's Experiences on Ben Machdhui
Ben Machdui-A Dimensional Gateway
John's Experience on Ben Machdui
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