Leica CL in Scotland 2018 - Part 2

The Leica CL Scottish mega-test continues apace. Part 1 is here.Today saw high winds blow my tripod over (yes, I know) and the CL hit the snow and managed to fill itself with the white stuff. The pic above sums up the situation quite nicely. After a quick dust off, normal service was resumed and the little CL didn't miss a beat.Today saw Gordon and I get up early to head up the Quinag mountains for dawn. This is a spectacular set of summits overlooking Loch Assynt, and make a superb dawn location. However, though conditions were rather tricky with snow and ice all over the roads, we hadn't bargained on the state of the little car park next to the start of the trail. This was full of deep snow so we couldn't get in (and wouldn't have got out) so we called it a day on that (before the sun came up), and instead we headed lower to have a look around Loch Assynt itself.Dawn looked promising with a pink glow kicking off in the East. We found a derelict cottage above Ardvreck castle with some nice lead lines to play with. Unfortunately, dawn went all crappy on us and the promising glowing underlit clouds made way for an all encompassing grey dullness.Shortly after I took the above shot, the high wind blew my tripod over, complete with mounted Leica CL and 18-56 lens. Everything embedded itself in the snow. Granted it was a nice soft landing, and no harm came to the Leica. However, it was full of snow. Now the CL is not "weather resistant" like the M10 is, so I was a little concerned. But after a wipe-off with a cloth, and emptying the lens hood of snow, everything was fine. Added to the fact that it got a bit damp yesterday (though definitely not soaked), the CL stood up well to everything thrown at it so far.We wandered down to Loch Assynt itself. Loch Assynt is beautiful, even when the wind is blowing like crazy. There are little islands with photogenic Scots Pines sticking up in various states of disrepair. This morning the loch was frozen in this sheltered bay, with a dusting of snow blown in from the morning's storm. A target-rich environment.As per Part 1, I just had the 18-56 and 55-135 L-series lenses with me today. I have a 24 Summilux-M, 50 Summilux-M and 90 Summicron-M sitting back in the cottage unused. However, any sign of the aurora borealis and I'll be out there with the 24 lux. But for this sort of photography, these two lenses are ideal. I seldom shoot anything wider than the 27mm that the 18-56 gives me as 35mm equivalent, and the 18-56 was on the CL for 99 pictures, and the 55-135 for only 9 images.After recovering from the major trauma of finding the pie shop in Lochinver closed for the day, we set off to a tiny little hamlet called Achmelvich which is just north of Lochinver. We were there at Gordon's behest to photograph the little-known Hermits Castle, but before we got there we stumbled upon a gorgeous, small beach just north of the main beach. It was one of those beaches with crystal-clear turquoise water and the softest sand. The light was as soft as the sand, as was the surf which smeared itself gently up the beach.Another advantage of the CL over the M10 is the built-in horizon level display. This is something that the M-240 had, but was inexplicably left off the M10. For this sort of work, a horizon display is really useful. Additionally, the CL's built-in viewfinder is so much easier to use than the clip-on electronic viewfinder of the M10. Being integrated, it doesn't flap about or get knocked off which is another thing that you don't need to worry about. Additionally, using filters is simplicity itself as you can see what you are getting, and you don't need to remove the filter holder to focus.  The clarity of the sea up here in north west Scotland is astounding. I found a nice spot down by the rocks and tried a few slightly slow shutter shots using a polariser on my Lee Seven5 filter set. During the day I'd taken quite a lot of pictures (compared to my usual behaviour) as I was trying to get waves in the right place, blowing snow in the right place etc. And it was cold. -4C to start with in the morning with major wind chill, and the camera out in the open a lot. So the battery called it quits at this point. I had 105 pictures on this battery, with constant live view, before replacing it with a spare.I bought a couple of spare batteries from eBay before this trip. The make is "DSTE" and they look just like the real thing but are about 10x cheaper than the ludicrously overpriced Leica version. They come with a nice plastic cover to protect the contacts and seem absolutely fine in use. This is the first time I've had a low battery warning, so it will be interesting to see how it performs in more reasonable temperatures. I only used a spare battery in the M10 once. I was used to a couple of weeks usage from my Canon 1D bodies!After some additional fannying about we found ourselves at Hermits Castle itself. This is a rather weird thing. It's set above the shoreline near Achmelvich and it looks like it has escaped from some sort of Orwellian movie. It's a concrete structure that is dropped into this matching grey landscape. It's made of concrete, and the kicker is that it's no more than 8-feet tall. From the picture above it looks like it's about 80-feet high, but that little black hole on the right side is an entrance that you can just about squeeze into, where you find yourself in a tiny "room" complete with "used" tissues littering the floor. Hmmm....all very incongruous.So there you have it. Part 2 in summary:

• Leica CL gets filled with snow and keeps working
• Still not missing M10
• 18-56 and 55-135 are all the lenses you need
• Battery life somewhat disappointing, but take into account the cold temperatures.
• Horizon level is handy
• Inbuilt EVF is great

In Part 3, more details on the dynamics of using the CL - buttons and dials and stuff. Unfortunately the weather here looks like rain for 4 days solid so I'm not expecting much...In the meantime, here's all the (halfway decent) pics from my 2018 Assynt trip: