The end of winter, but not quite how I had envisaged it.

Early Spring, around late March/early April, is often the best time of year in Fort William. Long days, settled weather, good skiing and/or ice climbing in the hills, and dry midge free rock in Glen Nevis. That is what I had hoped for this year, but it didn’t quite work like that.

Aonach Mor on the 7th April 2010; Blue skies, light winds, great snow.

Aonach Mor on the 6th of April 2011; High winds, heavy and persistent rain and +7°C on the tops. Not quite as nice as this time last year.

Until about the 20^th of March, winter was very much in charge. Although the snow cover was good, it was pretty windy, not what you could call settled weather. Then it all changed, bit not in a good way. Conditions returned to November style weather, windy with persistent rain. These seemed to last for weeks, well until a few days day, when suddenly summer arrived.

With the rapid demise of snow and ice in the mild conditions I rapidly lost interest in winter activities, and turned my attention to rock climbing. This year I have been putting a bit of effort into getting strong for the summer, and was interested to see how I would be feeling when I got out on the rock. The answer was quite positive. I had a couple of days up at Sky Pilot, trying the classic traverse Beetle Back. It still feels a long way off, but my attempts this year were certainly more positive than those of previous years. I then had a day at the Ruthven Boulder, and was pleased to repeat a problem that I had climbed there last year, and felt that a big traverse that I would like to do there would certainly be possible if I was able to put in the hours to get all the moves slick.

Enjoying the outlook from Sky Pilot bouldering area on a rare dry day.

Another great out look, this time from Goat crag. Gaz Marshal can just be seen in yellow below the classic 7a+ Mactalla.

Finally I had a day at Goat Crag. It was baking hot, and I didn’t really do anything I hadn’t done before, but enjoyed the atmosphere of the place.

However, that is likely to be it for my Scottish rock climbing this year. The reason for this is that I yesterday I moved South to Llanberis in North Wales. I will miss the space there is in Scotland, and the outlook you get form many of the crags. However, living down here will be great for my climbing, and I certainly won't miss the Scottish midges (they like to pretend they have a midgy problem down here, but compared to the West of Scotland they don't really). 

 

Snow Patch Survey

As readers may be aware, I find snow a very interesting material. I have always been impressed by a few patches surviving right through most summers to become incorporated into the following winter's snowpack. It appears that I am not the only one to show an interest in this. In the summer of 2008 a bloke called Iain Cameron got in touch with me. Each year he collates information about snowpatch survival in Scotland through the summer and autumn; a summary of which published in the Royal Meteorological Society journal Weather. He, and Mark Atinkson (another interested person) were going to do a survey of the remaining snowpatches on Ben Nevis and the surrounding hills. It happened that 2008 had been quite a snowy winter, and even through it was late August we found an impressive depth of snow high in Observatory Gully. 



Myself and Iain Cameron examining the Observatory Gully snowpatch on the 23rd of August 2008,  which had an estimated depth of 10 metres. Photo: Mark Atinkson

The Observatory Gully snowpatch on the 23rd of August 2008. This is probably the most permanent snow patch on the West Coast, and there has been snow here continuously since October/November 2006. The top photo is taken in the bergshund at the top of the patch. Photo:Iain Cameron

I have taken an interest, and where possible been involved with these snowpatch surveys since that first trip up Observatory Gully This year we decided that we would head up to investigate this patch in early spring when it would be at it's maximum depth. This time Iain, Mark and myself were joined by Eric Gillies, a aerospace scientist from Glasgow, and his wife Jenny who is a meteorologist. Between us there was a fair bit of knowledge about snow and weather. Last Saturday (2nd April) we made the long plod up Observatory gully.

Team snow geeks; Eric and Jenny in the foreground, Iain and Mark in the background.

The plan was to recorded the depth of the snow against the steep sides of the gully, and to discuss possibilities of more sophisticated ways to measure snow depth that could be used in future years. Unfortunately visibility wasn't great, but we did manage to get some pictures of  the build up. By comparing with pictures taken in the summer (such as those shown above), and measurements of the snow depth then, Iain estimated the depth of the order of 20 metres at it's deepest point.  Hopefully we will be able to estimate this more accurately by returning in August to what snow remains, and measuring the heights of the rock features the snow was banked up.  However, with plenty of snowfall high up and lots of South-Westerly winds to pile the snow into locations like this, it is looking hopeful that the snow will survive another summer in Observatory Gully.

 Heading off down. The snow up toward the narrowing of the Gully above is very probably the deepest snow on the West Coast hills at the moment. This picture was taken a bit downslope from the position the second picture in this post was taken.

The Winter of Nae Climbing

Well the past couple of months seem has come and gone with very little winter climbing action for myself. Winter climbing seems to be a fickle beast, and I find that weather, conditions, partners and days off all have to coincide for success on a hard route.  My main problem is the last of these, days off. The reason for this is my work (avalanche forecasting). I love doing this job, I find it interesting, get out on the hill, get some good skiing in, earn some money and it gives me time to train for rock climbing during the evenings. This year in particular I have been offered quite a lot of work, which has been great, but has also meant that I have not had too many days off, and the ones I have had are off are random mid week days which can make finding a climbing partners quite awkard. 

Take February for example. Between the 1st and the 12th I had some training to do at Plas y Brenin in North Wales for a job I have there over the summer, and so this meant no winter climbing. I got back up the road on the evening of the 12th. From then to the end of the month I had 5 days off, the 16th and the 22nd to the 25th. On the 16th I tried to go climbing with Andy Turner and Nick Bullock. I figured getting dragged up something hard by those boys would get me going climbing wise. Unfortunately the weather was pretty foul, and we ended up blethering in the carpark for Stob Coire an Lochan with various other teams who were also bailing before heading back to Fort William for a coffee.

Charlie seconding Cutlass as the temperature rises (although it hadn't quite started to drizzle at this point)

On the 22nd, I did mange to get out, but the weather turned mild and drizzly through the day. We made a quick ascent of Cutlass on the Douglas boulder, before heading home. Then next few days the freezing level was miles above the tops, and it rained. So winter climbing wise, in February I have managed one short and quite easy grade VI,7. Not exactly ground breaking stuff, but there you go.  

Has your luck run out?

Enjoying some sunny rock in Spain. Photo Jack Geldard

"Has your luck run out?" she laughed at him'.
"Well I guess you must have known it would someday”

Lyrics from Lily, Rosemary and the Jack of Hearts by Bob Dylan.

I have always found these lyrics quite profound. Though my early to mid twenties my luck seemed to run out in various aspects of my life. This tended to result in a fair bit of both physical and mental pain, as well as a few trips to various hospitals and physiotherapists. 

Looking back to that period, and although it didn’t realise it at the time, the reason my luck would run out are pretty obvious. I was really pushing what I was trying to do, without a particularly high level of skill or experience. Since then I have been a bit more successful, and despite plenty of hard training, I had managed to stay almost totally injury free. I have definitely got a lot stronger than I was, and although not as “go for it” as ten years ago, my improved technical skill tends to make up for that. I am beginning to stack the odds more in my favour.

In November, I was on a sports climbing trip to Margalef in Spain.  When doing the crux moves of Dr Feelgood, one the classic 8a’s of the area, my knee made a horrific ripping noise that everyone at the crag heard. Above, although my knee did not feel sore exactly, I knew something was not quite right. I muttered something a few friends who were watching from the ground, and pushed on.

A repoint attempt at Doctor Feelgood. It was a couple of moves above this point on the

successful redpoint that I hurt my knee. Photo Jack Geldard

The next day my knee was pretty sore and I had trouble walking. With the winter avalanche forecasting season approaching (time of year I when I earn most of my money) the prospect of not being able to work or winter climb was not too appealing. I felt perhaps my luck had run out.

Getting back to Britain, I went to see a local physiotherapist. Fortunately the knee was not as bad as I had feared, there was no major damage, and although it might be a bit stiff and/or ache for a while, it was fine to go climbing/skiing on it. To hear her say that was a great relief.

Although we can vary the odds of causing ourselves an injury to some extent, some level of risk always remains. People have been injured doing the simplest little things, while others have got away some really bold routes and huge falls. I guess in climbing, as well as the rest of life, we all rely on luck to some extent, and I am aware that mine could run out at any point. Guess we just have to accept this, and enjoy things while our luck holds.

Note; I wrote this back in Decemeber, but did not publish it due to difficulties in getting hold of the pictures. My knee is now fine I am glad to say.

Rules of the Road

“An' though the rules of the road have been lodged              

It's only people's games that you got to dodge” Bob Dylan

To be honest, this winter has not been the most successful for me from a climbing point of view. This has been due to a combination of factors; more work than in previous years, a decision to put some effort in training for rock climbing and a knee injury. I hope to write about some of these in the near future. Anyway, I recently decided to make an effort to get out winter climbing. With a good weather forecast, and Donald was super keen to try a new route that he had his eye on I decided to turn down an easy day’s work to get out climbing. However, things did not go entirely to plan…

The evening before our planned climbing day, Donald called round mine for a brew, and announced that he had just come over from A&E, where he had spent the previous few hours, and that he could not climb the next day. To save his energy for climbing, he had decided not to go on the hill, but to go for a mountain bike ride instead. Unfortunately he had taken a tumble over the handlebars and landed on his shoulder. Although not broken, it was pretty sore, and climbing was not really an option. Luckily, Donald had found me a replacement climbing partner, Andy, who would head up from Glasgow in the morning. This meant that Glen Coe was a much better option than Ben Nevis.

Andy looking at a rather dry looking Coire an Lochan

I had been working over in the Cairngorms for a few days, and had lost touch with exactly what conditions were doing in the West. I assumed the higher crags in Glen Coe would be okay. Summit Buttress was looking quite black from the carpark, but we assumed that was due to the fact it was still semi-dark. However, arriving into Coire an Lochan we saw that things really were black. There was some neve on the ledges, and the easier routes were in good nick, there was no snow or rime on any of the steep routes.

We did discuss doing East Face Route Direct, a large steep groove which did have a few blobs of neve in it. However, it reminded me of a time back in 2003 when being I had climbed Inclination in well frozen, but not very white condition.  Although it was probably acceptably white; no-one ever commented about the conditions we climbed it in, and there were plenty of other teams out on steep routes that day, I always felt I had some thing slightly wrong or that our ascent was slightly tainted. It is a similar feeling to having rested on gear on some classic rock route that should have been cruised. I have always wanted to return to do Inclination in proper winter nick, to restore honour, as it were.

What constitutes a route being in acceptable winter condition varies from person to person, and depends on a lot of factors. Andy said that he thought that the conditions people accept as winter conditions as slightly different than ten or so years ago, and that by the standards of today, East Face Route Direct would have been acceptable.

I don’t know whether other people get this tainted feeling by doing routes which are not super white. However, I know that had I climbed East Face Route Direct, it wouldn’t have felt right, and it would have and it would have hung around the back of my mind like Inclination has, until I finally did make a winter ascent of it.

In the end the did Spectre (V,6) which was in good condition, and then soloed up easier ground to the summit of Stob Coire an Lochan. It was not quite the day I had originally envisaged, but that is often the nature of Scottish winter climbing.

NH snow cover peaks (or does it).

It is usually around late January that the snow cover in the Northern Hemisphere reaches it's maximum. Some years of course it is a little earlier, such as 2009 when it reached it maximum around early January, and some years it is a littler later, such as last year when the peak was around mid February. This year there was a slight peak around the 9th of January, and it has dropped slightly since then. Whether this was the maximum for the season, or it will surpass that in the next few weeks only time will tell. At it's maximum about 23% of the northern Hemisphere is covered by snow and ice. The minumum is a value is about 3% which occurs in late August or early September.
These graphs and images were copied from the excelent website http://moe.met.fsu.edu/snow/ Plenty more images and graphs there if you find this sort of thing intersting.

Pottering on the Ben

Carn Dearg Buttress. Castle ridge takes the crest of the furthest right buttress in this picture

Sometimes climbing plans work out, sometimes they don’t. In this case my plans to try something hard didn’t really work out, the main reason being, for various reasons,  I didn’t really have a climbing partner. I wanted some good pictures of Carn Dearg Buttress in winter, and so decided to wander up anyway, take some pictures and see what happened. It is quite nice sometimes not to have a fixed plan, and to be free to move around and see where the mood takes me.

A few photographs later, I found the mood taking me over toward Castle Ridge. Castle Ridge was the only main Nevis ridge that I have not done, and being described as the easiest of these I thought it would make a pleasant solo, especially as these was nobody around that part of the mountain.

A lonely tree high on the Ben

Being on my own, able to move at my own pace, and just with my own thoughts for company felt free and satisfying. As I ambled up the lower part of the ridge I found a small and isolated tree in a hollow between the rocks. I paused to contemplate its lonely fate; to struggle and ultimately fail to grow to maturity, and eventually be killed off by the wind, cold, and lack of nutrients. I hadn’t known that there were any trees up amongst the great cliffs of the Ben, and it felt fitting to find one when on my own.

I ambled on, enjoying the views and continuous upward movement, up to the crux barrier wall. The route takes a short but quite steep and exposed groove. I made a move or two up this, but in such an exposed position, without the security of the rope, everything felt a bit insecure. I did not even know for sure that I was in the right place, especially as Godfery Peroux tells a story in his guide about going the wrong way at this point. I was not really in the mood for fear, so stepped back down, and bypassed the wall via a traverse the left.

A jam bagel and cup of tea at the top. Brillant!

At the top of the ridge I paused for a bagel and cup of tea, and stared out across the frozen Lochaber landscape. It had been a successful day, and it was still only about 1pm. I considered heading on upwards towards the summit, but decided instead to head down.

After a quick snooze back at the house, I headed down to my local wall for a wee bouldering session.  The warmth, the non-serious situation, and the feeling of unencumbered movement on the wall felt like nice way to finish the day.