Sun 7 Feb, Climbing

Day 2 of our winter climbing weekend and the rest of The Glasgow Academy team were on various mountaineering and winter walking journeys using the skills they worked on yesterday. Sam, Adam and I went back to Sneachda looking for a short interesting climbing day andf headed towards a busy Mess of Pottage. However, after the team ahead of us backed off of The Haston line this gave us a clear run and a great route. The snow ice is good and firm 90% of the way but the icey steop up left is thin and well hacked up brittle ice. The lads relished the challenge and charged up the upper two pitches. After that we just had to pick our way up to 1141 and down to the cafe.

Many of the cramponed paths on the coire rim are perilously close to the corne lips (i.e. 1m or less in places) as the vis has been so poor you can't see the edge until your on (or over :-( it at the moment. Take care and rope someone up to find the edge or navigate well in from the coire rims in poor vis.

Back at Glenmore Lodge next week teaching winter lead climbing.

Sat 6 Feb, Climbing

After ending our Glenmore Lodge Winter Mountaineering Course on Friday with a day reviewing ropework and navigation around the centre (bad forecast) I moved onto a weekend climbing course with 2 pupils from The Glasgow Academy. On Saturday Sam and Adam and I went into Sneachda at speed along with university groups from Manchester, Newcastle, Cumbria, Leeds and Aroochar MRT amongst others- a busy day in the offing and the toughest challenge was finding the crags! Standing at the base of the Goat Track one team asked if we were below Aladdins Couloir and we had to aim off left and traverse right to be sure of Fiacaill Couloir. Surprisingly the team ahead of us included a former pupil from Glasgow Academy, Olivia and all 4 of us had been in Greenland together this summer. This made for a sociable climb until we stepped up a gear and headed off into the mist at the top of the climb. After a careful descent of The Goat Track we swung right and climbed Goat Track Gully for our second route of the day before carefully picking our way along the coire rim (veeeery white and the beaten path is on the cornices in places) to 1141 to descend to cake and excellent catering from the Glasgow Academy's volunteer chef! Well done Adam and Sam for keeping up a cracking pace all day.

The Twin Ribs

Day 4 of our Winter mountaineering Course at Glenmore Lodge and my goal today was to get Anatole and Emma to put some of the skills they saw yesterday into practise and review some of what they have been doing on summer mountaineering trips. we chose the Twin Ribs as an accessible venue with appropriate terrain. The right hand rib was quite busy with a party with Andy Nisbet, James and the rest of our team and Nick (well done on the MIC Assessment mate) all making good use of the ground so we headed across to the other rib. The guys led their way up using conventional climbing belays and rock gear and a variety of direct belays in a more mountaineering style until we hit the crest of the Fiacaill of Sneachda. Here we dropped down a little to look at snow bollards and abseil retreats.
Plenty of climbing teams out in Sneachda and Lochain today, mostly avoiding big snowy areas like the trident gullys (plenty of windslab in evidence today after last nights fresh snow and winds).

Coire Garbhalach

Day 3 of our Glenmore Lodge winter Mountaineering Course today and I took Emma and Anatole into Coire Garbhalach for a change of venues. Great walking conditions underfoot meant we were soon into this stunning coire running into Glen Feshie. We spotted a good mountaineering objective in a ridge on one side of the coire and started moving up it looking first at different ways of using the axe on steeper ground and then, once the rope was out, at choosing belaying methods appropriate to the ground. Topping out on the ridge below Meall Dubhag the blue skies had faded and the wind was blowing a lot of spindrift about, fortunately this eased as we made it onto the plateau to navigate to our descent near Carn Ban Mor. A brisk trot saw us back down to Achlean where James and the rest of the team were waiting with the bus. Top day out!

Snow anchors

Day 2 of our Winter Mountaineering Course at Glenmore Lodge and we went to the Ciste carpark area and took a short walk up into the gully to find some steepish snow slopes. The topic for today was snow anchors so we looked at how to attach to the rope, create a bucket seat and how effective it is with a body belay. Then we reinforced these with a horizontal axe and held some sliding leader falls before trying to overload the anchors and test them to destruction. Light winds and minimal precipitation today. Neil reported firm conditions on the Runnel and a big cornice at the top.

Cairngorm Winter Mountaineering- Day 1

Today I started a 5 day Introduction to Winter mountaineering at Glenmore Lodge. James and I took our 6 students to the north end of the Fiacaill Ridge to revise some basic winter skills. After navigating in we revisited kicking and cutting steps, self belay and self arrest before going on a short journey to the bealach on the Fiacaill and dropping down into Coire an t Sneachda.T eams were out climbing on Hidden Chimney, the Haston Line and Fingers Ridge- the crags are still plastered. There was some blown snow gathering around the tops of gullys (Jacob's looked quite unpleasant).

Ice on Ben Nevis

Sunday and I was on the Ben Nevis with Mike and John. The brief was to find them some water ice to climb on which is fairly easy at the moment. After the walk in we were soon eyeing up the CIC hut icefalls which are easily accessible and still in good condition. I led a long pitch of IV and then we moved round to the 'gulch' - the burn coming out of Coire na Ciste. On the way we got a good view of Andy and Ian making short work of Route I. The ice below the Ciste was a friendly place with Rocio running a little 'ecole de glace' and descending paties stopping to chat and Tony soloing around. Mike and John each led a pitch of II/III and, after abseiling off of a 'v thread' then I led something steeper off to one side. Parties were on Castle Ridge, the Compression Cracks icefall, Tower Ridge and the routes low on its west face, Green Gully and others. On the walk out however we had almost an inch of fresh snow fall on us- making the road down through the forest an interesting drive.