Thursday 16 January 2014

2 more days mountaineering in the Cairngorms

Yesterday…..
 Wet digging
 Soggy snowmen
 Sloppy shovelups
 Careful footwork
 Perfect pacing
 Nifty Nav
'Hang on… he's about to do what?'
A damper first of 2 days with another team of students from West Highland College yesterday. We were a bit soggy walking to the moraines, pretty soaked after digging an extension to my shovel up there (the original was occupied by some other students from the College intent on making a huge snowman). As the winds eased however we left Coire an t Sneachda behind to the sound of avalanches from collapsing cornices from Jacobs Ladder right round to the Trident Gullys and the group walked themselves up to windy col. They took me to 1141 and then on the side of the Cas ridge we dug bucket seats (as we could really get no wetter) and looked at holding sliding falls dynamically.

Today...
 Brighter but breezy 
 remote supervision from me
 Mountaineering on the Twin Ribs
 Squally weather 
 Nathan bringing them up
 Fiacaill Ridge 
 Matt repeating our route of Tuesday
 The team working
Which way now?

Today I was happier for the group to do some more work for themselves. So I arranged to meet them at the base of the Twin Ribs. They turned up there in one piece and Nathan and Cameron led the others up using some simple mountaineering rope work. Then the followed me up Fiacaill Ridge taking the easiest route. We finished off the week by having them navigate safely round the rim of Coire an T Sneachda to 1141 and down to the Cas whilst I observed.
Cooler today and breezy but the freeze was only partial leaving some variable snow around.

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