Lovelly climbing on our last day

We met up at 08.00 hrs. to get into the upper Coire Cas carpark before it filled up. The day's weather didn't sound too promising with low cloud, strong winds and a freezing level of 1600 metres being forecast!

The morning actually turned out to be an alpine cracker with no wind, sun and hard frozen neve on the walk in!

It was the last day of the Winter Mountaineering course and as weather and snow conditions were so good we decided climb a gully route putting into practise everything we had learnt over the past four days.

Snow conditions were excellent with Stew and Joe and Phil and Fi quickly leading up Jacob's Ladder onto the the plateau for an early lunch.

It was only on the last pitch that we notice that the weather had deteriorated and by then we were more than happy and thinking about the New Year celebrations!

Video to follow...

Slow thaw and consolidation

It's been fairly mild with recent avalanche debris from cornice collapse noted in Coire Laogh Mor. Overall the slow thaw is consolidating the snowpack which will set like concrete with the return of colder temperatures on Saturday.
Stew, Joe, Phil and I had a good day looking at basic ropework and constructing snow belays.

Leashless Aztar mod!

Following a few requests about my leashless climbing on the video with the Petzl Sum'tec and the Aztar. I've now uploaded a photo of the modification to the Aztar using the Sum'tec griprest!
A couple of videos of the modified axes being used can be found at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bsfFaNl7M8w&feature=channel_video_title and at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MSMbc6LH8KQ&feature=channel_video_title

Winter instruction and courses

Fi been running day's one and two of our festive Winter Mountaineering course while I've been running some private instruction.

Yesterday at 900 - 1100 metres the weather actually felt quite mild and relatively benign. There were lightish winds in the sheltered corries with the temperatures just a degree or two below zero.

A few more climbers about but still fairly quiet compared to normal. Simon and pals headed towards Patey's route and Andrew and Gaz's pals climbed Red Gully.

Despite heavy drifting of snow in the southerly winds the NW facing slopes were being scoured and were surprisingly icy as height was gained.

This was excellent for step cutting on the lower crusty ice and then really great for perfecting good crampon and self belay techniques higher up!

Initially Andrew and Gareth wanted to build on their summer rock climbing with a bit of winter climbing. However it soon became apparent that learning and practising the basic winter skills was essential before progressing any further up the icy slopes...!

Fi's Winter Mountaineering course found completely different conditions lower down. The Ciste's NE slopes had caught the drifted snow and were nice and soft for ice axe braking and building snow shelters though not so great for cramponning!

Today the southerly winds were very strong first thing in the morning which meant a change of location before they dropped later.

See Fi's blog here for photos and full details.

Still excellent snow cover in the mountains but lower down in the valley the snow and ice has been receding fast. Many of the roads are now clear and the roadside icefalls ready to collapse...

A White & Merry Christmas...

Yet another frosty snowy Christmas in Aviemore.
There's a slow change in the weather from the bright settled conditions of the past week with more wind and snow forecast!

The the uncut YouTube video above hopefully gives an idea of how good the climbing conditions were on Wednesday (22/12/2010) when we were testing the Contour HD helmet camera. WARNING - This is not the video to watch after a few glasses of sherry and a full stomach or maybe it is!!! You can view the video in HD at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bsfFaNl7M8w

Excellent buildup and good climbing conditions

Great conditions as long as you don't mind the extreme cold (-15 overnight in Aviemore). The roads, weather and climbing conditions have been really excellent in the Cairngorms over the past few days.
There's firm conditions on the plateau and a lot of ice is developing on sun exposed aspects.
The Coire an t-Sneachda and Lochain buttresses are rimed and icy and the gully lines filled with good snow and ice. This gives good first time axe placements below a thin covering snow and hoar frost.
Although the climbing is excellent, finding quick reliable protection and belays can be tricky with the rock and cracks covered in a layer of ice.
The popular easy to mid-grade ice routes are all well formed with water ice although the ice is brittle and isn't fat enough for reliable ice screws in some places.
Today the exits on the NW and N seemed solid and very straight forward due to minimal cornice buildup.
We had a late start and easy amble into an unusually quiet Coire an t-Sneachda.
We saw one team in Hidden Chimney, two teams on Patey's Route and Terms of Endearment, a team on Pygmy Ridge, a couple of teams in Central and the Runnel. Alan F and George Mc were on Wavelength (variation?) also two others were in Broken Gully and a team on Fingers Ridge.
Considering the excellent climbing conditions, calm weather, clear skies and sun a total of about twenty odd climbers in Sneachda must be a bit of a record!!!
We finished our route and had an easy walk across the plateau and down into the well covered Cairngorm Mountain ski area. Cover on the plateau is excellent though not the ideal silky smooth surface for skis! On foot conditions were firmish with a mixture of snow and water iced rime just below the surface that provide fairly easy walking.

Some more details and photos on Fi's blog here
Away from the mountains there is a thin covering of fresh snow as well as the old snow from last month. Many of the low level icefalls are starting to look fat again though some are still thin towards the top.
At the Slochd the cross country ski tracks aren't particularly good compared to the past few weeks being a mixture of solid rutted ice and frozen mud from the foresting which is covered with powder snow... The tracks at Glenmore may be better due to Bill Wilson's £30,000 piste machine!!!
The sunny cold and calm weather and good winter climbing conditions in the Highlands are set to continue for quite some time....

Christmas and New Year winter skills courses

We've added a couple of new Winter Skills dates onto our calender for the Christmas and New Year period.
The courses are based in our home town of Aviemore in the heart of the Cairngorm mountains. All specialised equipment such as ice axes, crampons, helmets, ropes and snow-shovels are provided for free.
The dates for the three day Winter Skills course are listed below and include the option of an extra two day snowhole expedition if wished!

• 27th to 29th December 2010: Winter Walking Skills (three days)
• 2nd to 4th January 2011: Winter Walking Skills (three days)
• 30th to 31st December 2010: Optional Snow-hole Expedition (two days)

Full details of our winter courses can be found here

Freezing again

The brief low level thaw over Friday and Saturday has stripped much of the knee deep snow from low levels. However above 500 -600 metres the snow cover is still good though now very icy. The temperature has progressively dropped since Sunday refreezing the old snow and any exposed ground.

Unfortunately all the roadside ice falls have collapsed and the forest trails are either broken or now very icy. It's a different story above 5- 600 metres where the snow cover is still excellent though icy where packed or crusty as height is gained.

The classic Northern Corrie gully and ice routes are now well filled but are still reported to be a bit insecure and crusty especially on some of the snowy exists!

The buttresses are icing up and the pistes firming up too! The Cairngorm Mountain ski area runs are complete and most are well filled though will benefit from the fresh snow being forecast for Thursday onwards...

Thawing...!

Never thought I'd say this but we have a good thaw on at the moment which is what we need and great for Scottish Winter climbing in the NE!
In the meantime it's very icy on the back roads and a lot of the low level ice routes although fat are now very fragile and extremely dangerous....
Hopefully several days of thaw and the forecast of several days of hard freeze next week will bring a lot of the lower to mid level classic winter climbs into reasonable condition...

Giant icicles and more great skiing...!

Not a great fan of skiing at the weekends but conditions and visibility were forecast to be good on Sunday so we just had to go and put up with queuing! Great alpine downhill skiing throughout the mountain especially the White Lady's east wall and the Coronation wall :-)
Lovely and sunny this morning with several cm of silky fresh powder which was ideal skiing but not for driving. However the Cairngorm Mountain ski area was closed today (for staff training!) so we removed the 30 Kg 'Sword of Damocles' giant icicle from the house gutter instead. See the YouTube video here. We then had a good day checking out the hills and ice falls on our cross country skis.

A beautiful winters day

Last night it was well below minus 20 again in the Highlands. Today it was a sparkling powder and sun day with the Cairngorms having good visibility and great downhill skiing. The cross country ski trails were really good too with the skis gliding well on the cut and pisted tracks.

If anyone is interested in a day or two of skiing, winter skills instruction or snowholing before Christmas and the New Year please get in touch...

Surface hoar and pisted trails

With lows of below minus 20 in the Highlands the temperature have not risen much above freezing since last week. The snow is still unconsolidated and powdery in most areas and there is a high avalanche risk in places.
The Cairngorm Mountain ski area is open with a wide covering of powder snow and a high avalanche risk off-piste.
Away from the high tops the ice on many low level waterfalls and seepage lines on road cuttings is getting fatter :-)
At low level you can ski almost anywhere on Nordic touring kit, so we were out on the local cross-country trails yet again.
At Slochd the skis were gliding well on the already pisted upper loop. Today we conpleted the lower circuit and in contrast to Monday the skis were sliding well on the thick layer of surface hoar that's growing fast and likely to affect the future snow stability in the mountains...