Sunday 24 May 2009

Tower Ridge with Davy and Heather






Tower Ridge with regular clients Davy and Heather today. We headed up fairly early to make the best of a good morning forecast and could see the Great Tower from the bottom when we started. The snow still comes down to the base of Observatory Gully and there is plenty of evidence of rock fall and wet snow slides at the end of the winter season.
A healthy breeze was drying the rock nicely until we reached the Eastern Traverse where it rained a little. The thin slushy snow of Friday was gone leaving some really firm ice and snow (but a little less overall cover than 2 days ago). We crossed Tower Gap as the wind picked up a little and were glad we'd taken an axe and crampons to make the last slope straightforward.
On the way down we passed the hoards heading blindly for the summit, many looking quite poorly prepared for the winter conditions that still exist on the plateau.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

In photo 5 it looks like the screwagte is not screwed shut - sloppy ;-)

Alan said...

Hi anon. it was 'squeeze tested' at the bottom - but then the ridge is a long route and it could have come undone. Good job its just a backup to tidy the end out of the way. Al