ADs adventures...

Well I’ve certainly had enough time on my arse to reflect on a few things. Other than breaking one of the worse bones to break (the talus has a dodgy blood supply) and not having a flask of Yorkshire tea with me, it seems things could have worked out far worse. For starters I was with great friends (who didn’t get splatted) that did a marvellous job of sorting all the mess out and being great company despite my bad jokes. Priceless. The Clapham cave rescue team were grand too and even had good banter to top it off. The chopper was good but had a limited view and I think I’d enjoy helicopter rides more if I had morphine before them.

The NHS care at Harrogate hospital was excellent and so fast on that Sunday night to try and save the blood flow into my foot. Do you know if you listened to Mr ‘unt you’d think hospitals closed down for the weekend and yet loads of people came in on call to put my foot back on my leg at 11pm on a Sunday night. I ended up in a lovelly little side room that was nice and cool during all the heat and even had the best room service you could imagine! 3 weeks in one room is a bit much mind, so having had the grimness of the x-frame on my leg for a while I was a bit disappointed not to turn into a Transformer. I certainly wasn’t disappointed to get the various pins unscrewed from my leg and through my heel. It feels like the surgeons have done a good job pinning and plating the ankle joint back together. It’s been brilliant to see so many great family and friends so far, which has made such a huge difference for recovering, as well as the cards and messages that people have sent. So all in all it’s probably a good job I broke myself in Yorkshire, because that’s where I’ll be best mended! I wouldn’t touch Yorkshire Limestone with a barge pole though!

Trad climbing is such an intense and demanding activity that really requires good experience for the complicated decision making that is required. After 12 years of summer and winter climbing, with a few new routes and a virgin peak in the Tien Shan, I had thought that I knew what I was doing... The Lake district was growing it’s lakes again, so something further south was called for to avoid the showers. After nursing our hangovers in Leeds we headed to the Yorkshire Dales for some quiet rock climbing and beautiful scenery. My initial decision on the tight timescale was between the Dales trad Limestone (that offered suitable grades) or Eastby crag. Eastby is great crag but it is south facing, so I knew heading there on a sunny day would end up in me being half way up a run out E1 with a bad sweat to gear ratio! Besides its always nice to climb in different places...

I had visited Oxenber scar several years before and the lower grade ** routes with a nice view over Ingleborough looked perfect for an introducing my mate to trad climbing. The 2 stars also suggested reasonable rock quality... 2 routes later we were enjoying the Limestone for a change and soaking up the views. There were only 1 star routes left to do but a nice groove to the side looked good from below and well protected. It wasn’t looking as good halfway up! Committing to the pokey (5a) crux had landed me in loose land and I was on full on ‘delicate climbing mode’, whacking anything that looked suspicious and trying not to pull on anything... Above looked like sketch city so I decided to get back on the Severe (Grandad **) that we had previously climbed. Carefully working my feet up on good placements, I then made the mistake of putting my left hand sideways in a crack. As I weighted it the section of rock at chest height came straight off and onto my right leg just above the knee. It was bloody heavy and seemed enormous. I hung on with my right hand and swung (I think) with the block (1m+) falling away to my left and relieved to see my good friend in one piece to my right. I had very different emotions when I looked at my ankle to see the lower leg had been forced through it to leave the foot wonkily (but no blood) to one side. Obviously I had to lower off and ring mountain rescue, who seemed a little surprised to have the patient talking to them calmly on the phone. My mate had done a great job getting the rock shoe off, the weather was good, the view was nice and I knew I’d be in good hands with my friends and the excellent UK emergency services. I could have done with a decent cuppa though!

It stopped raining and we got some great views with some climbing.

It rained again the next day but we walked all the way up to the hut anyway and got very excited when the sun started to shine.

The next day we did a nice white line to a pointy summit that made us feel like big mountain boys.

On the last day we climbed an even pointier summit which made us feel really happy before we cried when we found out people had been fooled into leaving a club with all our friends. We felt very sad and lonely driving back to our country that didn't want to look after other people anymore.

The weather forecast was about as depressing as the prospect of Brexit, so we headed to the Ecrins and hoped for the best! The Ecrins (or Oisan) Alps are a national park and they seemed to have been managed well with no chairlifts/teleferiques anywhere. The area had a relatively wild feel for the Alps...

It was great to be able to park the van up in such a beautiful spot and watch Chamois grazing within 100m. The area had some great cragging, but I couldn’t decide whether bolting everything went against the ethos of protecting the environment. Whilst we noticed lots of good trad lines with useful cracks, these where often vegetated and perhaps it is better that they have left the vegetation alone and bolted the clean rock? It was good to be back on Granite and there were some good lines with the pick of the pitches being a hanging 6a+ slab/arête...

The caver in Mr Orange was keen for some Limestone action and the ‘classic’ route on the Aiguillete de Lauzaret (Difficile) was a very eye catching objective! It was certainly classic in the traditional sense and Rob  put his Limestone expertise into practice and led through a series of ‘interesting‘ chimney pitches that were peppered with loose Limestone chips. The pitches higher up had superb exposure and provided a very satisfying mountaineering trip, with a more liberal amount of bolts.

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When arranging the AC Arran meet I never even dreamed that the weather gods may bring ‘winter’ conditions to the island and transform it into a Scando paradise for snowy mountaineering. What’s more, a paradise that is only a relatively short (compared to the Highlands) drive and a cool 1 hour ferry ride that makes it feel like you are going abroad! Although hopefully this will continue to be just down to the ferry and the Kingdom remains United (and part of the EU!). It was good to talk politics with John as we headed north and I can’t help but wonder whether socialism increases as you go north and west across the UK... The scenery certainly gets more dramatic anyway! Having a van tea and a couple of excellent pints of real ale in the very welcoming Catacol Hotel with a view like this was a great start to the trip!

After nearly missing the ferry in the driving 3C rain, we were outrageously psyched to wake up to a beautiful view of the Glen Sannox horseshoe in full winter garb! This is described as one of the best ridge scrambles/walks in Scotland in summer, nevermind winter! We headed up the glen with high hopes and soon made it up onto the spur (centre of the image). This provided some great snowy scrambling in superb situations.

A series of excellent grooves took us through some tricky route finding terrain and delivered us on top of Cioch na Oighe, by which point we were grinning like Cheshire cats and knew we were onto something special.

The views down to the sea and over the West Highlands were absolutely superb, with high quality mountaineering to match amongst great rock architecture. With the Witch’s step provides a tantalising sting in the tail towards the end of the traverse.

The elation was starting to be tempered by the realisation that 1,700m of height gain in soft snow is actually quite a lot... So descending down the ridge from North Goatfell was enjoyable mountaineering, but it meant a big climb up to the ever impressive Cir Mhor!

Cir Mhor is one of the most under-rated mountains in the UK, with up to 400m long high quality rock routes on one side and up to 350m high quality winter routes on the north side, both of which look immense.

By this point it was clear that the guidebook had not over-hyped the traverse and it also seemed that having an AC meet on Arran was turning out to be a fairly good idea and not just because there weren’t any midges!

Caisteal Abhail provided yet more fantastic rock architecture and a great snowed up rock climb to the summit tor, with possibly the best views of the day. They were the kind of views that you just didn’t want to leave, even if I didn’t have any tea bags with me! But the Witch’s step was calling and there was even more excellent mountaineering before we got to that, what a shame. 

It was certainly a shame that we had to descend, although it was still a bit nippy on’t tops! Even the ridge walking at the end was a brilliant end to one of the best days I have had in the mountains.

Let’s get to the point and cut the blogging language nonesense. Whacking ice with an axe is fun and doing this to climb up a mountain is better still, especially when it’s an eye catchingly straight line to the top. It’s like the snow gods have drawn lines on the mountains for you to climb. So we got on it, The White Line 300m III** and did the Hale Bopp Groove finish III,4* (although more like IV,4**). Grades don’t mean the same in winter and too many people obsess over grades anyway. One of the things that makes me feel content in life is being able to judge my own abilities and just getting on with things, especially if there’s teamwork involved. It was great to finally climb with Al in winter, as well as the mighty beard (and Kris). Shame the whole team couldn’t have climbed it together but we enjoyed sharing our experiences of the day afterwards.

There were a few tricky bits that made you think and that’s what I like about winter. It’s a big challenge and there is a huge amount of decision making with approach route/gear/avalanche awareness, which make a successful day out on the hill in winter so much more rewarding. 

It’s also amazing seeing how fast conditions change and sections of the route that were too thin to climb the week before had built up substantially and about 2ft of snow had built up too. The ice was better as it was colder, which can be unpleasant on the belay and a lot of people never see past that, but you have to work for the best things in life. Kris has had to work hard growing his beard, just over the last week or so and it was truly a sight to behold and the envy of most winter climbers...

It also made hypothermia virtually impossible and the sun even came out near the top too! For a while...

Ridges define mountaineering in many ways. They often present eye catching lines to the summit that demand an extensive skill set and ability to deal with the added exposure and commitment they so often present. The big ridges on the Ben present some of the best winter mountaineering challenges in the UK, so naturally they had caught our eye. Indeed, Tower ridge had caught Deakin’s eye many years ago when he was a slip of a lad. Not that he behaves much differently now mind and after we’d despatched Castle Ridge III** 275m the day before, we had to get on Tower (centre of image: E. Deakin).

We even added a sit start to The Douglas Boulder. This boulder clearly demanded a sit start and it makes it much easier to put your crampons on. The lower section of the ridge went smoothly and we even had time to sit down for a picnic, maybe there is something good about these sit starts after all...

Being fine Alpinists, we thought it was best to regain our fine form and enjoyed despatching the Little Tower before pressing on to the Great Tower above. Things start to get a bit more proper up there and the view down Observatory gully from the Eastern traverse gets the mountaineering juices flowing nicely. (Me flashing the Eastern Traverse. Image: E. Deakin)

Above this was covered in a fairly unhelpful crud, all bread and butter kind of stuff for mountaineers though, best washed down with a cup of tea though. Deakin seemed a bit disappointed that we couldn’t stop for a cup of tea (Yorkshire of course) on top of the Great Tower, so he just had to settle for a moment in the sunshine.

Tower gap is a bit like a missing tooth really and adds a bit of spice to the route, especially when the summit plateau (and a decent brew) are so tantalisingly close...

Needless to say we were soon across and hoaring up (no rude jokes please) on the summit plateau. Being good chaps, we waited for the rest of the team before summiting in sunshine! Good eggs the lot of them! (Image E. Deakin)

It turns out Dizzy G had taken fast and light quite seriously and dispensed of one of his crampons near the top of the route, which seemed a tad extreme, but he is that kind of athlete. He is also the kind of athlete that is very partial to a good bum slide descent (aren’t we all) and Coire Leis provided fine sport for ourselves and some people on planks that looked quite cumbersome. All in all it was a good outing with some jolly fine chaps and downright time for a proper brew in the CIC! (Image E. Deakin)

The key ingredients for successful UK Alpine style are great mates, a good hut and even some alcohol. So when Dizzy G, Matt Marvin G, the mighty beard (and Chippy), Messers Ship and Deakin were heading up to the CIC hut loaded with a bottle of whiskey per night and enough fine food to feed the entire hut; a great trip was guaranteed! We even managed to do some mountaineering too, once we had got our sizeable packs there...

Conditions weren’t exactly prime, but prime athletes need exercising and the mighty beard hadn’t tasted Nevis snow for a long time... After 2 days exploring the cultural delights beyond Cobbs cafe in Fort William (we had been kicked out twice at closing time) psyche for the white stuff was seriously high. I’m not talking about cocaine here, this stuff is way more addictive... and unpredictable. Nevis snow comes in many forms ranging from loose slop that wants to get to the bottom of the mountain as soon as possible right through to styrofoam ecstasy sent by the snow goods. Unfortunately day 1 revealed far too much of the former and dreams of becoming Ueli Steck faded away into just getting a route done. The climbing was so intense we didn’t take photos and after reading other people’s blogs, I realised that I just had to get the experience out there... 

Winter mountaineering is great and it really makes you appreciate Spring mountaineering even more (although there is less tea drinking potential in the Spring). Just the little things like not having to put your head torch on in the morning or if you get really lucky you may even get some sunshine!

I always think that reaching the top of a route leads to wanting to do about another 5 routes that you have seen during the ascent. I’d seen the classic  Upper Couloir II** on Stob Ghabar many years ago and caught my imagination. It certainly didn’t disappoint and provided a classic mountaineering day for myself Dizzy G, MG and dirty Dave! The approach is great and felt quite Scandinavian with frozen lakes and plenty of good neve on the steep approach slopes, which added extra atmosphere to the route and some great photo opportunities for the sponsors. 

It seems a shame to leave the summit on days like these, but actually we had some pretty important projects to attend to. We take our recovery very seriously and had to have a long ice bath session before the tea drinking could begin. I’d post a video of Dizzy G in the stream but it is too graphic and he wanted to use it for something else. On the note of water, we saw a lot of water droplets on Ben Nevis on Tuesday, which isn’t ideal when ice climbing...

Thankfully the summit of the Ben was the only thing sticking above the clouds of dampness, so we did the sensible thing and had a good sunbathing session whilst drying our gear out. Now this is why I go mountaineering!

Winter climbing can be a rather testing activity at times, but that’s ultimately what makes it intensely satisfying. It’s been a challenging winter season and I can’t remember a season with so many days out that would have been much better if I hadn’t taken the climbing gear for a walk! Bizarrely I think failing on a route and backing off is at the core of mountaineering and makes return success all the sweeter! There have been some wild days out, which have involved some very ‘dynamic’ belays (wind assisted). Operating in difficult mountain conditions makes the ‘after ale’ session in front of the pub fire taste so much better! It also makes those clear sky no wind days so much sweeter!

After a testing day out (70mph winds) climbing in the Cairngorms, the temptation for a sunny day out in the Lakes was too much and also great to do my first grade VI route, which I had been eyeing up for a few years! Conditions were pretty good (at last) so I knew it was time to attend to a few projects (got to think of the sponsors!)... 

I’d first spotted Messiah back in 2009 when I saw some of the UK’s top mountaineers on it. It takes the striking line up the right hand side of Creag an Socach, which you can see above Rob’s head. I was totally chuffed that he could make it as so much of winter mountaineering satisfaction is about having adventures with good mates and what an adventure!!! It may have only been 85m long but there certainly isn’t any walking involved and it is fantastic climbing from top to bottom, which is incredibly varied...

I’ve not been very active in the ‘blogosphere’ of late and that’s mainly because it actually got cold enough for some winter climbing! With some winter surfing thrown in for good measure. The most important thing is lots of banter with good mates, fueled by God’s own energy drink; real ale!

It’s been a hard winter season for getting things done and for the first time I had a trip to Scotland without climbing a winter route. Strangely enough we still managed to have a good time, although the banter was getting a bit outrageous...

Thankfully some crags in the Lakes came in to condition and if you knew where to look conditions were pretty good, especially for frozen beards. 

St Sunday crag is very exposed so it’s a great place to climb and can come in quickly with a good cold westerly, we came away with a new route ‘Return of the Frosted beard’ 160m IV that’ll soon become a Lakeland neo-classic for sure! Things were starting to look good, but then the 5 day turbo thaw arrived as I departed for Scandinavia...

Rjukan is a valley pretty much designed for ice climbing... Sabotorfossen 100m WI 5 just had to be done, as it is billed as a classic of the area. It was a classic, but it has to be said that I’ve done better routes in the Lakes and Scotland. I also liked the tribute to the heroes of telemark and it felt like following their footsteps creeping around the back of the heavy water factory!!!

It was great to get climbing with a good mate who also introduced me to cross country skiing. Obviously I was a natural, at sliding along on my arse, interspersed with sliding along actually stood on skis! All good fun. In fact it was too much fun, so it was time to get back to Scotland for a sufferfest...

I don’t remember having a winter season with so many highs and lows. Some moments have been amazing, other moments have been amazingly bad. When I brought two of my best mates up to the penultimate belay on Crest route V,6*** and they were both nearly sick from hot aches things were clearly getting too epic. We appeared to be fairly close to the top and having felt pretty good on the crux pitch the top was too tempting, but I was getting close to hypothermic and having 50mph gusts across the route wasn’t exactly ideal. I have never felt so gutted to back off from a route, especially given I had felt so good on it in contrast to scaring myself on it back in 2011. It was the right decision and the Clachaig was the place to be at that point in time. The beer tasted good and it was so sweet to climb Crest route the following Tuesday I just had to take a photo looking down the top pitch...

Following Saturday’s tropical antics, it was clear that we needed to do something... So despite the wild weather, we decided to head in to a bothy and train for disgusting weather. We certainly got the disgusting weather and also a night in a fine bothy (south of the border!!!) with some good power drink.

Photo courtesy of AS.

After much tales of past winter seasons and crazy banter fuelled with plentiful mince pies, brandy butter and whiskey most of the team had a good nights sleep despite the roaring snoring inside and a bit of wind inside and out! Always keen to do our bit for society, AS nobley volunteered to carry out a big bag of other people’s rubbish, whilst myself and MG took a bottle each... Surely the ground must freeze down soon!

This weekend was quite a contrast to last weekend and as the van thermometer hit 16 C in mid December the mild madness had started to set in! The madness may have been milder than the temperature’s, but the training is certainly going well as you can see in this weeks film...

The pressure was on with an international climbing partner arranged for the weekend, which the potential sponsors were very happy about as news about the best tea will spread through eastern Germany and Canada... The Scottish mountaineering was pretty good too!

Glen Coe was the obvious choice for early season snowy mountaineering combined with important real ale training. Thanks to my equipment suppliers the walk in was relatively pain free and the stunning weather added extra inspiration for wading through the snow.

Sron na Lairig II 300m *** is a fine mountaineering route with plenty of scope for different lines on the lower buttress that leads up to a fine narrow arete perched above a quiet valley. A perfect setting for our photo shoot. The best photos will doubtlessly appear on some of the leading mountaineering company websites soon...

Watching the sun set over the Etive fjord was absolutely stunning and showed the West Coast of Scotland at it’s best. It’s nearly as good as Yorkshire!

We were tempted to do a round of Glen Coe and finish along the Aonach Eagach traverse, but there was still important training to undertake in the Clachaig. A key aspect of British mountaineering! The training didn’t go too well, so we had to go mountaineering the following day. Buchaille Etive Mor seemed like the obvious choice.

We had a late start to add a bit of extra pressure to the climb and keep us on our toes. Unfortunately our toes spent most of the time buried under knee deep powder! The turf underneath wasn’t well frozen, but it was also hard to find under the heavy blanket of powder. Pretty similar to the conditions on the big faces of the Alpennines of Yorkshire. After a quick bit of training in how to scratch around and convince yourself your picks are on something substantial, we despatched Curved ridge II/III 3*** fairly quickly and were tempted by a quick route on Rannoch wall.

Here it is...

So winter has started and winter climbing psyche has got to ridiculously high levels...

This is what happens when it gets cold for snow to fall on the hills, but not freeze the ground down sufficiently to be worth driving hundreds of miles for. Our sponsors weren’t happy that we hadn’t cranked out some new nails winter routes, so we felt we owed it to them to put a serious training session in. Even if some of us felt like we had been left with egg on our face...

The real important thing here, is not the egg on the face or the egg sandwich that had fallen to it’s doom, but the return of the mighty beard. Here it is after 2 days growth and is promising for a good winter season... The team is pretty strong now and nearly ready for some outrageous onsight first ascents, once the training is complete...

Here’s one of the new lines from today, it’s pretty much 8,000 mm long.