Winter......ah yes I remember now!

It's been quite some time since I wrote anything on this blog. When I started it it was a winter blog...... last year I missed out on winter so it changed a bit. Well this year I am mostly missing out on winter by living in the Peak District but I have just had my hit to Scotland so thought I'd share what I've been up to.

My main reason for heading north of the border was actually work, I had a week hanging out with the University of Derby students. We had a great week of mixed weather and pretty lean conditions but managed a day on Aonach Mor, a lap of Dorsal Arete, some Ice Factor action and then I got nasty snotty germs so sent Andy out for an extra day whilst I stayed snuggled up under a duvet.

Team photography - pointing their big lenses at Andy

Next on the list was Andy working for Mountain Equipment over at Alltshellach on the winter skills courses for Cotswold staff, and boy did they have some good kit testing conditions - a whole lot of damp and windy days out.

Then we headed east for Lukasz's Photography Workshop, Andy was the model and I was the safety/chef/logistics/anything else person. Luckily the sun shone and the crags were white so all turned out perfectly.......a bit more snow would have been good but can't have everything.

Enjoying some scottish spindrift.

Work over, Andy and I decided that it was high time to get me back on a proper winter route. Now Andy has a slightly over inflated view of my ability to mixed climb - I know I'm incompetent and have not the faintest idea what I'm doing, Andy just thinks I'll be fine!! That's the trouble with these people that are too talented for their own good! So he decided that we should head into Coire an-t Schnechda and get on The Message. All sounded fairly feasible, but after a weekend of beautiful cold and super calm conditions it had of course, decided to start being quite breezy and snow, so the route was somewhat buried by fresh snow. This does not make it easy to spot the placements for your axes and crampons especially when you have no idea what you are really looking for either! I think I'll gloss over the crux pitch.......I suspect it was good there wasn't anyone else close to us on the crag to hear the wailing that was going on. More than once I heard myself say "I just don't know how to do this. I don't understand how to get up here" and other phrases along the same lines, some might not have been quite so polite either!
It's a very strange feeling to be standing on a crag looking all around at the various holds and just not knowing what to do.......I know it would be super easy if it wasn't covered in snow and I was wearing rockshoes, but I wasn't!

Anyhow, I survived and managed not to drop any axes although it was a pretty close thing at one point with me catching the axe between my thigh and the crag! Phew, I don't think I'd have been too popular if I'd chucked a Nomic off the crag.

The look of confusion.....

The next day we were back west and heading out with Dave Macleod for a blast on his project which became Castle in the Sky - check out M.E. blog and Dave's blog for more on that.

Now back home and happy to have done a route but think I'd have preferred something a little easier in hindsight......or maybe just less buried in snow would have been better, that's what Andy tells me anyway.
Good PINK jacket though - thanks Gus.