Not a day for routes...

Day 2 of my Intro. to winter Lead Climbing with Glenmore Lodge today. Having no wish to tangle with anything orange or yellow for that matter we stayed out of the Coires and off of the climbs today. We did however go to the Ciste Crag the top of which is below 700m. The ski road opened late giving us time to sort a rack and look in more detail at the guys wants from the week.
The Ciste crag was buried in snow as expected and always needs a lot of care as it is VERY loose. The extreme right hand side offers some short climbing lines but most things are much harder than they appear from below. The 2 Kierans led a 2 pitch line at about II getting lots of practise organising themselves, placing gear, managing stances and clearing huge amounts of snow all whilst well bundled up for winter.
1 flock of about 15 ptarmigan observed today- the most I've seen in one place at one time and also 2 white hares.

 Look out- coming through!

That was harder than it looked:-)

 Clearing

 Come on up!

 Ptarmigan

 On the lead

 In the groove

 Seconding

 Sam and team on the deceptively easy looking slab- its desperate

Kirk and team just 40m below us... yes... really... they are there!

Doing the back stroke in the Cairngorms

Today was the first day of a Winter Lead Climbing Course I'm working for Glenmore Lodge. Its quite snowy in the Cairngorms. Its was quite snowy in the car park. The random trails leading out of the car park took a while to hit the footpath because it was pretty snowy on the walk in. And it was very snowy in Sneachda. Snow was filling in footprints of people only a few hundred metres above us and there were deep drifts behind every rise, rock and bump making the walk in a bit harder than usual.
The wind in our faces, the fresh drifting and the amount of snow visible confirmed my plan not to go to the main crags. Facial Buttress held possibilities but not at the grade I was after so we climbed one of the lines to the right of the Hurting onto Fiacaill Ridge. Did I mention is was quite snowy? Floundering my way up grooves, wallowing onto ribs to try to escape the deep soft stuff and heavy snow showers seemed to be building more. Around 3 I heard a funny rumble but though little of it. Apparently that was a large slab avalanche on the Goat Track with an 18 inch crown wall I'm told. No real surprise there then, except for the folk who triggered it on their way down.
The lads did well building their own belays and perfecting their wade, wallow and floundering techniques. Tomorrow's forecast looks.... unhelpful....

 Hmmmm, what would be a good decision on a day like this then?

 Kieran remembering what winter is all about

 A bit blowy and snowy

 The other Kieran wading

 Nick on the adjacent line, cheerfully resigned!

 Finding the fun bits

You have to laugh!!

2 days in Gairloch

MCofS FUNdas 1 and 2 for a keen mixed team (teachers, Mountain Instructors, Leisure Centre staff, keen teens from the local school club) over the last 2 days. The wee wall there is pretty good and the participants were all super keen!
Over at Glenmore Lodge now for a week's climbing work.

 Warming Jim up

 Step up

 Traversing quietly but why...?

 Bullseye

 Swapping feet by...?

 Watching for stable positions

 Opposing forces

 How far can you reach?

 Dropping a knee

Straight arms

Video of Ben Nevis routes yesterday

Tower Scoop and Good Friday- Classic Ben Nevis Ice from Alan Halewood on Vimeo.

A classic Ben Nevis ice outing

Out today with friends (work starts in earnest on Saturday so I've been enjoying my holiday) Steve and Dave. We passed a breezy CIC Hut and turned the corner into Observatory Gully to quickly find ourselves walking on firm neve-a nice change.
We watched a hopelessly optimistic pair trying Point 5 but they soon realised that all that white stuff isn't consolidated i.e. and baled. They then walked above us across the bed of the gully tied together with 10m of rope. Then they kept going and climbed up towards the base of The Great Chimney (which looked black). Each to their own but the rope was doing them no favours at all, if one had fallen the other would have been yanked off and as the climbed up towards the chimney it was just in the way. 2 minutes stowing the rope- even in coils around bodies and soloing unroped would have been safer, less faff and probably easier to manage. Sermon over.
We beelined towards the popular 2 pitch Grade III Tower Scoop which whilst far from fat was perfectly climbable and took screws nicely. The rock all around at this height was well rimed but there was very little ice on Smiths or Indicator Wall. 2 pitches (top of that second pitch is always good value for III) saw us at an in situ slot for buried axes (although Dave's bucket seat bottomed out on rocks). There was a pair pitching up Tower Gully above us at this point. We untied and carried the ropes in coils and headed across to Good Friday which we'd seen a team disappear up. Again its not fat but perfectly climbable at the Grade. We carried on soling around the corner to find another team were toying with the Direct. This let us leap frog ahead on the normal route (they retreated and followed us) with a pitch each for Steve and I to the plateau.
Amazing rime on the summit Trig Pillar- never seen it so long up there.
We headed down to the top of No. 3 Gully and descended it into a vicious updraft making it hard to look down at our feet. We chatted to Iain who we spotted soloing off the top of No.3 Gully Buttress. He and his partner had been climbing on Archangel in the Coire but had experienced strong cold winds in the morning and that combined with the fact that the rime is apparently covering an unpleasant layer of verglas caused them to stop play.
We chatted with 2 parties that had done No.2 Gully Buttress after reading my blog (a lot to answer for the blog) from the other day- more frozen but still no gear. Both Green Gully and North Gully were climbed but with little protection on the latter. We spotted a team that looked to have come up somewhere near Experts Choice, Tower Ridge was busy and a team were high in Glover's Chimney although the bottom still looks very lean (well done). Lots of folks enjoying one of the better days of the season so far. Its far from fat but is slowly getting better and the weather looks favourable for better conditions by the weekend.

 No Point 5 isn't in nick

 But Tower Scoop is!

 Is that really the best way to do it??

 Unformed Smiths and ice free routes on Indicator Wall

 But Good Friday goes

 Not fat but fine P1 Tower Scoop

 Steve swinging

 Dave on the top pitch

 Plenty of ice screws in

 Tower Ridge

 Party of 3 moving well

 Good Friday also not fat but fine to climb

 Dave agrees!

 Summit of Ben Nevis

 Long rime feathers indicating recent wind direction

Heading across the plateau

 Dave descending No.3

Coire na Ciste rime but verglas lies beneath

Maybe it was the venison?

Maybe the venison I cooked last night was too pink... maybe it was the overindulgence of Christmas... or maybe the cracking pace Gill set was too tough for me but 3/4 of the way to the CIC Hut today she and Nigel were watching me retch into the gutter.
We got going again. skipped the Hut and kept the pace up into Coire na Ciste. It was damp. It was grey. But there was quite a bit more snow around than 3 days ago so we kept going. My panorama below, from the 29th, shows the line of No.2 Gully Buttress was complete then and I know it was climbed on the 30th so we went for a look.
A little care moving around some suspect snow in No. 2 Gully and Gill led an intro pitch up to the base of the crag. Her belay showed us a steep wee ice line line above and left. What do I always tell people? "Ice is always harder than it looks." I went for a look. Stood at the bottom I could see it was steep, thin and the screw I put in the bottom (we only brought 4 stubbies) wasn't filling me with comfort. "I know, 'JP is Back' is just to the left. I'll go for a look at that. It wasn't there. Or rather the line was but the ice wasn't. Great now I've got to reverse that rising traverse on cruddy snow, get my ice screw back and we all need to be about 20m lower to get back on line.
Crud reversed, screw recovered, spike lassoed, abseil conducted, belay dug out. No.2 Gully Buttress it is.
A nice wide start up soft but sticky snow ice (don't think much of that screw) to a steepening. EEEk! Big loose block! Leave that alone. Decent nut. Ice bulge and a screw that would be better if the ice wasn't undercut by a small cave. That hole does make a nice foot hold though.
Ping! Pang! Hmm, where'd the ice go. Shouldn't have bothered sharpening those picks this morning as I watch them spark on thinly covered rock.
Over the bulge. Snow ice is getting narrower... up a bit further... snow ice is getting cruddier. Front points skid out. EYES BULGE. Up.
Axe placement to placement searching out the best snow ice feet never biting quite as well as I'd like picks always slipping a little in the crud (Gill said hers felt secure- she's a lot lighter than me!).
Spike?! :-) No :-( Well kind of. Sling goes on, well packed with snow but not confidence inspiring. Snow bay in sight... left to the ledge or up? Up. 2 more steps. Phew.
Flounder to a belay.
A wee pitch from Nigel then another longer, better one from him on a mixture of cruddy ice and good snow. A mixed step, hop and skip and we're on top. Grade III? The climbing wasn't hard, just insecure and run out.
Maybe I'm getting old? Maybe it was the venison?

It was raining gently all the way to the top of No.2 today. Rimed up buttressed though. The areas around the base of Comb Gully and No.2 had some deep patches of suspect snow (it had a bit of energy in it, when we made it fail it wanted to propagate) but folk came up No.3 and No.4 was fine in descent today (almost complete). No.3 Gully Buttress was apparently busy.

 Walk in

 Coire na Ciste

 Raining

Gill leading off

Come on up!

 Nigel on the lead

Soggy on No.2 Gully Buttress today from Alan Halewood on Vimeo.

 Disappearing into the murk

Soggy Gill