Near Queen's View

I had a moan about post RTA traffic disruption at the weekend.
The A9, the most used trunk road through the Highlands, was closed for 8 hours today. I was aware of the closure upon setting off for work this morning. Our destination was about 15 miles south of the obstruction. The accident happened about midnight and I figured, that despite no media updates to that effect, it was bound to be clear by the time we approached about 8.00am. Indeed messages started coming over the radio that it would reopen about 8.30am.
When you come over the hill from Laggan to Dalwhinnie you get a vast panoramic view of the A9 road cutting a straight line across the slopes on the opposite side of the valley. It was a solid ribbon of standing trucks and cars. This is the road we had to join after passing through Dalwhinnie village. We joined the end of our little own queue about half a mile from the A9 junction.
When things started moving it was with the pace of a glacier and the A9 was solid nose to tail for the rest of the section we spent on it.
If you wanted to consider a three point turn and taking the shortest diversion then this was 150 miles and 4 hours on to your trip.
I believe five people were hurt this time; one seriously; and I hope they recover soon.
This section of A9 is quite controversial. It switches between dual and normal carriageway several times but the dualed sections are too short and accumulations of cars build up behind HGVs very quickly. To exacerbate matters the trucks are limited to 40mph so if you get stuck behind two or three closely bunched trucks it is impossible to pass. As a result you see some absolutely crazy blind overtaking going on. I saw one clown at it tonight; less than a mile from this morning’s accident spot.
We arrived on site later than anticipated with a real mountain of stuff to get through. This was frustrating as it was a beautiful Perhshire day and the blip opportunities were countless, given any spare time to grab them.
This is one grabbed just before I took a reading. The instrument below the tree is pointing at me (or a pole mounted prism I am holding) and it is about to take a measurement.