MARCH WORK

During March I worked for Glenmore Lodge on a winter mountaineering course, got Jane, Anne and Alan up their bogey Munro and ran a winter skills weekend for Kirkby Stephen Mountain Rescue Team.

Constructing snow belays below twin ribs

The 2 day winter mountaineering course ran on a blue sky, low wind weekend on rock hard neve. I was working with Nick March and we had a group of six clients. Day one was spent in Coire na Ciste and Coire Laogh Mor looking at snow skills, crampon work, abseiling from snow bollards and travelling over steep ground. Day two was spent in Coire an-t-Sneachda looking at snow belays and rock belays before climbing the Fiachaille a Coire an-t-Sneachda. A great weekend in idyllic conditions .and sun tans all round.

Summit of Beinn Chabhair

The following weekend was totally different with a conserted spell of snowfall giving very difficult travel conditions. Friday saw Jane, Anne, Alan and I heading up Beinn Chabhair in the Southern Highlands from Inverarnan on the A82. We had been friends at Durham University 40 years ago and have only just caught up with each other again. They are on the Munro quest and had tried this mountain twice before. After an initial steep ascent from the valley the route is quite complex going through valley floor moraine before heading onto the craggy west ridge, weaving through rock outcrops. Visibility came and went in snow showers and some of the rock steps proved challenging. However we prevailed and the peak was finally climbed in good style.

Slab released from a snowpit

Saturday and Sunday were spent in Glencoe with six members of  Kirkby Stephen MRT. Based in Kinlochleven we traveled to Glencoe mountain on day 1. After taking the chair up we navigated to the steep flank of Meall a Bhuiridh in whiteout conditions. We looked at avalanche assessment techniques en route and after releasing a large slab on a clean shear plane in a snowpit we practices some save travel techniques! After constructing snow belays we moved down to the transceiver park and practiced searching and probing techniques. Many MR teams now use transceivers when searching in winter and as ski touring becomes more popular it is possible that participants will be wearing them in case they are avalanched.

Trying to get into the Lost Valley - it remained lost!

On Sunday we tried to access the Lost Valley in Glencoe but gave up when deep snow slowed progress to a snail's pace. Instead we found a flat area below the rim of the corrie and constructed a large shovel up shelter, practiced course and fine avalanche probing before looking at the use of the Italian hitch to protect a climber examining a slope over an edge and other steep ground techniques on our descent. It didn't stop snowing all weekend and the team certainly got an insight into the dangers and problems presented by so much snow - quite a contrast in 7 days!