Tower Ridge

Charlie, Simon and I climbed Tower Ridge today on what has been another stunning day in the Highlands. We walked in with the intention of doing Ledge Route but the ridge had been on the boys hit list for a while and it was calling me like a siren so they didn't take much (any!) persuasion to change objectives. We were the only team on it and the snow was generally good although deep! Getting out of Tower Gap was more challenging than normal but lots of fun. Another great day.

Dorsal Arete

Today is the first day of one of our winter mountaineering courses and has been superb here in the Highlands. I have been joined by some regular faces, Simon, Charlie, Andy and Steve and fellow instructor Huw. Today saw us head up Dorsal Arête where the snow on the route was great, nicely refrozen albeit with most of the gear lower down buried. The snow apron took some careful route finding to avoid the windslab but we had some stunning views until we topped out and a snow squall hit us! A great day out. Thanks to Simon for the photos as I forgot my camera. 

Fresh Powder Skiing

I have the weekend off and with more fresh snow overnight decided that skiing was the way forward. I headed to Nevis Range where the pistes were lovely, queues non existent and we even had some blue skies. Once the visibility had improved I dropped into the back corries which gave some amazing off piste action, fresh powder on a firm base and fresh tracks too - superb! The odd whiteout added to the challenge, this is the UK after all!

Ledge Route, Ben Nevis

I took the boys up Ledge Route on the Ben today for the final day of their winter skills week. Its a bit more than you would expect on a winter walking week but we had dropped down to two people for our last day so decided to push things on a bit and the boys were mad for it. The snow in general was softer than we had yesterday on Aonach Mor but once on the ridge it was great, giving confidence inspiring foot placements and of course looking amazing. There were fresh snow showers all day and we had to forge the route as the first party on it for the day. Not a lot of other people out today and some more white out navigation from the summit - awesome end to a brilliant week, thanks folks. 

Glimpses of sun and crisp neve

There were stars in the sky last night and the resulting freeze was just what was needed to give some lovely neve for us to skip across on Aonach Mor today. We also enjoyed some lovely views when the clouds parted as well as some proper white out navigation when they didn't! We were able to use the neve to perfect ice axe arrest and crampon technique, looked at the use of a rope to approach an edge in winter and did some great poor visibility nav to the summit. Another great Scottish winter day out!

Traverse of Stob Ban

I really like the traverse of Stob Ban from Glen Nevis and today it as as good as I have seen it with beautiful slender snow ridges and good snow higher up. We ascended the East Ridge and did a spot of ice axe arrest practice as we made our way towards it. Once on the ridge we were able to focus on axe and crampon techniques in context, look at safe travel techniques and discuss the use of a rope as a navigational aid. The poor vis on the summit gave us the ideal opportunity to practise bearings and pacings in winter and then the descent of the North Ridge was just unadulterated fun! A great day out. 

Soggy!

It has been pretty wet in the Highlands today! Russel, Mark and I were joined by Ben for the second day of our winter skills course. We headed up Buachaille Etive Beag and as well as ticking the summit of this Munro we looked at snow stability and emergency shelters along the way. We managed a bit of crampon practice but the very soggy snow was not ideal. It was above freezing on the tops which is exactly what we need together with a good re freeze to create some great conditions for us to make the most of all of this snow. 

Scottish winter skills

I have been out with Russel and Mark today on the first day of a winter skills course. It has been a great day to look at the effect that aspect and altitude have on the snow pack and we spent the morning looking at the distribution of the snow on Aonach Mor, understanding the layers that have built up in successive storms and the major impact of the wind in determining safe travel in the mountains in winter. We also focused on slope angle and trying to accurately assess the slopes we were travelling on as well as natures clues to snow stability. As we gained height the breakable crust we had endured lower down thickened enough for us to look at the use of crampons, movement on the snow and  introduce ice axe arrest. 

It has been a much better day than forecast and we had some lovely views, some fresh snowfall and bearable winds. The overall snow cover is fantastic, loads of the stuff to play on and in, it should be a great week!  (Apologies for the quality of the photos at the moment, I have no wifi so am having to upload at a fairly low resolution) 

SAIS observers out enjoying the skiing. 

Ben Nevis

Charlie and I headed up onto the Ben this morning with an open mind after the big storms. We headed to the SW Ridge of the Douglas Boulder but it was totally buried in fresh snow. All of the snow we encountered had gone through an initial melt and re-freeze giving a breakable crust. Whilst this helps with stability it made for epic wading to get to the routes! We descended off the SW Ridge and plan B was Fawlty Towers but this was also unclimbable as the snow was just too deep and the crust too thin! I hoped a change of aspect would help so we headed round to the East side of Tower Ridge and gratefully followed the footsteps of a team ahead of us. We climbed the East Gully to Douglas gap with Charlie brushing up on his rope work ready for his winter ML assessment later this winter. We looked at methods of descent and Charlie organised an abseil off as the sky changed colour above us to give some of the beautiful light that is so amazing at this time of year. A good physical day out!