“If you don’t go, you’ll not know.” We were gathered in Fort William for the 50th Anniversary of the Association of British Mountain Guides and Alan Kimber was describing the attitude of his formidable 1970s climbing partner, Con Higgins and fellow members of the Creagh Dhu mountaineering club. This attitude is about going up to check how conditions are at the end of your nose, rather than sacking it off because it’s a bit grim at the car park, or indeed sat at a computer screen trying to work out what’s happening up on the cliffs.
If you don’t go, you won’t know. And, sometimes, mainly, it pays to be an optimist! This team carried their skis all the way in to Coire Sneachda and were rewarded with an improbably good couloir ski in 0.5 gully…
As long as your ambitions don’t trump your judgements over safety, optimism often pays off. If you don’t go, you’ll not know, but if you do, you will, and you might just get some good climbing done.
We were impressed with the team of skiers walking back across the heather moorland through horizontal driving rain! At first glance it seemed like a potentially futile exercise, but not at all. They were full of enthusiasm for the steep turns they had made in the fine snow couloir of 0.5 Gully high in Coire an t-Sneachda in the Northern Cairngorms.
Point Five gully….Not THE 0.5 gully on Ben Nevis but a fine grade half snow couloir, giving some good turns and fresh tracks to the right of The Goat Track in Coire Sneachda
Likewise, our recce showed that, despite the rain, the large amounts of snow that had fallen in recent weeks was hanging on and there was even still some ice, on Aladdin’s Mirror Direct, and frozen turf.
Ice still formed on Aladdin’s Mirror Direct which saw several ascents in early December.
We climbed Hidden Chimney Direct, the Haston Line in to the Messenger, Stirling Bomber and a day when we felt we didn’t need to go, to know that it was going to be wet, wild and warm. Storm Bram was in full force so we went dry tooling at the newly developed crags at Slochd, small but fun!
High on ‘The Messenger’ on the Mess of Pottage with Fiacaill Buttress beyond.
Prior to our arrival winter conditions had been excellent with good skiing to be had on the Cairngorm resort and plenty of climbing activity in the northern corries with teams climbing early season favourties like The Message, The Seam & Pygmy Ridge in Sneachda and Savage Slit, Fallout Corner, The Hoarmaster and Ewen Buttress in Lochain.
Danny and Dave ‘Dry’ Tooling at Slochd…actually wet and muddy tooling but good fun and great training. This is one of several thin D3 pitches on the left of the main area.
Thanks to Mark Chadwick, Dave Chapman and others for the good work bolting the dry tooling crag at Slochd. The routes are featured in the new topo ‘Inverness Sport Climbs’ available from Needle Sports for £22.
A comically short pitch on the far right at Slochd, but still with good climbing, fun moves and good training value.
On first arrival, the dry tooling crag at Slochd is underwhelming, small, wet and muddy and a little bit of motivation is required to get going. But on closer inspection the climbing is sustained, technical, well protected, fun and good training.
The ‘Compressor Route’ D5, on the far left at Slochd. Featuring plenty of bolts plus good sustained climbing with a a bit of exploration required to find the decent hooks.
The hardest current route, D5, on the far left gives a good sustained vertical wall climb with a bit of time hanging on required in order to find the more solid hooks. Along with the other routes here there is a feeling that the climbing is more like actual mixed climbing rather than the steeper, more strenuous drilled style pockets of other dry tooling crags.
The longest of the current pitches at Slochd. Still not a big pitch but fun climbing and the opportunity to place additional protection for training.
This style of dry tooling builds both technical skills with axe picks and crampon points plus develops the relevant physical elements of forearm and calf endurance. Overall it is an excellent form of training for mixed climbing and progression towards harder mixed routes both in Scotland and north face style routes in the Alps.
Windy Col and the well tracked return to the high parking at Cairngorm mountain via pt 1141m
Stay posted for details of our forthcoming series of ‘North Face Training Courses’ which will help build your technical and physical mixed and rock climbing skills towards climbing some
Apres l’effort le reconfort. This is the Pinemarten cafe at Glenmore. Recommended for post route recovery, as is the Tiso Cafe in Aviemore.
Cairngorm mountain, working hard to make the most of conditions
