Bastow Buttress Variant

Tina, Ray and I headed up Bastow Buttress Variant (2/3) on the East Face of Tryfan today which was a little moist but good fun and we had the whole of the face to ourselves. We then enjoyed the upper section of the North Ridge and even had some summit views between the clouds as they parted temporarily for us. Thanks all for a great week of scrambling.

NW Face Route & Cneifion Arete

Tina and I were joined by Ray for the last two days of this week with grade 2 and 3 scrambling on the agenda. It stayed dry for the first half of the morning and we headed up North West Face Route and the Idwal Staircase (2) in Cwm Idwal before popping out into Cwm Cneifion and pushing the grade on a bit on the Cneifion Arete (3) in the drizzle. Lots of fun and giggling despite the change in the weather and the odd midge!

Evening Cragging

Paul and I managed to squeeze a route between work and a rescue team committee meeting last night. It was such a beautiful evening it felt wrong not to! We climbed Wind (HVS 5b) in the Llanberis Pass although it felt steep after 2 weeks on Kili! (Thanks for the photos Paul)

Sunny Scrambling

It has been another beautiful day in the mountains of Snowdonia today. Tina, Siobhan and I headed onto the North Ridge of Tryfan where we enjoyed some grade 1 scrambling before heading down to Tryfan Bach and enjoying the grade 3 scramble on its left hand edge.

Gribin Ridge

Harriet, Marcus, Siobhan, Tina and I headed onto the Glyderau for the second day of our scrambling course today. It has been a stunning day with beautiful blue skies, very little wind and warm dry rock - perfect for enjoying some great grade 1 scrambling here in Snowdonia. The Gribin Ridge gave some good sport for all and we had some stunning views from the summit.

Crib Goch

It has been great to be back out in the mountains of Snowdonia today. I was out on the first day of a scrambling course and we headed up onto Crib Goch to make the most of some dry rock and low winds. We looked at movement skills as we headed up the East Ridge, traversed Crib Goch in good style and then descended into Cwm Glas to make our way back along the Foxes Path and then over the Horns to give a lovely day out.

Is it wrong...

...to already be thinking about winter? (Only because its raining right now!)

Two New Courses Added

I have added two new courses to our range of navigation and hill skills courses for the autumn and for next year.

Mountain Craft is a new 6 day course looking at mountain navigation, emergency scenarios, grade 1 scrambling and wild camping in Snowdonia.

Advanced Navigation is a new 1 day course designed to develop your navigation skills by focusing on contour interpretation using contour only mapping.

Follow the links for more info and hopefully we will see you soon! 

100% Success on Mount Meru and Kilimanjaro

I have had an amazing couple of weeks in Africa with regular clients Charlie, Martin, Steve, Barry, Vic, Paul and Andy who joined me for our Kilimanjaro and Mount Meru expedition.

The trip kicked off at the beautiful Weru Weru lodge where we enjoyed 5 star luxury with all of the sights and sounds of Africa on the doorstep.

From Weru Weru we headed into the Arusha National Park and were lucky enough to see Zebra, Water Buffalo, Warthogs, Baboons and monkeys as we trekked under the watchful eye of a Park Ranger and his trusty rifle. Our first summit was Mount Meru (4500m) and the whole team summited together after a midnight start which gave incredible views of the sunrise over Kili. 

A big descent of 3000m saw us back at the lodge the same day for a good nights sleep and a shower before we headed off for the main event. 

I had chosen the Western Breach as our route to the summit and this was accessed via the Machame Route. The beauty of the route is it takes 6 days, which together with our ascent of Mount Meru meant we would have adequate time for acclimatisation. The other big appeal is that it is the most technical of the main routes to the summit, giving some great grade 1 scrambling and lots of hands on action on summit day. The route didn't disappoint and neither did the boys - we summited in two groups just after sunrise and enjoyed some celebratory beers two days later in the lodge bar. Well done all! 

Africa

I am heading off to Africa today on our Mount Meru and Kilimanjaro expedition. I will be out of contact until I return on the 20th June. Fingers crossed I can take this weather with us! 

Plexus

This beautiful weather is too good to waste so Paul, Gruff and I headed into the Llanberis Pass for some cragging. We picked the shady side and climbed Plexus (E1 4a, 5a, 5b, 4b) which lived up to the guidebook description of immaculate rock in exciting settings. The day was of course rounded off with obligatory ice creams at Georgios!