Indoor Ice Climbing Intros

Back indoors again, but this time training slightly differently. I'm going to be taking a small team of students on an Ice Climbing trip to Norway in a few weeks, so today was spent doing some preparation. We had a bouldering session, but instead of holding on with our hands, we used some ice axes that had been adapted to 'hook' over the climbing holds! Very strenuous, but great for technique. 

Also, as we'll be operating in temperatures below freezing, we practiced some 'gloved dexterity' skills, such as belaying and tying knots without taking our gloves off!

Mountaineering Decisions and Moel Elio (726m)

I've been out on a training day with a team that I am going to take trekking in the Alps this summer. Conditions for hill walking were less than ideal first thing and the 90mph winds were going to make walking difficult and my ability to teach anything severely reduced. So we did what all good mountaineers would do - went to Pete's Eats and had a brew while the storm passed!

There is an excellent (free!) facility above the cafe, in the form of a map room for expedition planning and a classroom for teaching in. We made use of both. The map room was perfect for looking at where were are planning to climb in June, then after ordering a round of hot drinks, I gave a lecture on understanding mountain weather. It was the perfect environment to be learning and discussing all things mountaineering and by the time my lecture was done, the wind had eased, the rain stopped and the sun was even making an appearance! 

And best of all, there was still time for a quick ascent of Moel Eilio. We walked from the cafe, straight uphill, through the village and up onto the hillside!

The snows have melted, but the ground is still really saturated and boggy, which gave rise to a few comedy slips! It still required a decent effort walking up, as the wind hadn't completely given up  (still gusting about 50mph at times), but at least it was at our backs for the descent!

Hash House Running

Hash House Running is basically a non-competitive form of cross country running. Traditionally, a member of the team would set off on a run, ahead of the pack, leaving a small trail of flour for the rest to follow. A set of symbols would be agreed and the 'Hasher' would do his or her best to leave false trails and dead ends to help slow down the chasing pack. If the hasher made it to the pub before being caught, they were declared neither winner nor loser and a great celebration would ensue regardless. The Hash House Harriers official UK Website describe themselves as 'a drinking group with a running problem' and consider the sport as 'a healthy way to work up a decent thirst'.

Today I've been 'hashing' a trail through some woodlands (sadly with no pub to aim for!) for a group of young students. It was great fun setting up elaborate false trails that led to dead ends or back to where they'd just come from! The event was a great way of starting debates about decision making, having faith to carry on following a trail and also teamwork - should the group stick together or split?

All the teams that took part during the morning, made it to the finish point (eventually!). I was there waiting for them along with this little Robin, who followed me around while I laid the trail!.

Indoor Bouldering

Noticed that the evenings are starting to stay lighter a little longer! Still too damp for climbing outside today, so had a bouldering session indoors to keep the fingers limber! 

White Water Kayaking on the Afon Seiont

Watching my kayak cartwheeling off across the grass at the river bank, I was reminded of the strength of the wind today and wondered if kayaking was the sensible option for today. As of about 6am, the wind has been howling and the rain lashing down. Just driving out from The Cottage seemed like an ordeal. We'd planned on a descent of a local river called the Afon Seiont. Given the weather conditions, and the fact that the river was already 'full', we decided to play things safe and just paddle half of the normal run, as it was clearly going to burst its banks very soon. A quick shuttle of vans was organised, then it was off and away...

The river was at a good level for kayaking, but there were reminders everywhere that it had been much much higher. Where we stopped to inspect, then portage a rapid, there was a huge 'dam' of debris from the Christmas floods, showing that the river had been meters higher! Scary!

It's been ages since I've paddled this section of water, so it really felt like a holiday - somewhere new! The rapids provided plenty of interest without being too technical, and the wildlife was brilliant too, We saw four herons take off in formation and struggle into the wind as well as two huge buzzards at close quarters. Thankfully, there were only a few sections that were exposed to the wind and rain, where we were forced to paddle almost with our eyes closed to protect from the driving rain!

By the time we returned to the start, the river was across the fields and later when we looked in the Ogwen, it was also raging! What better use of a spectacularly grim morning. Worth being early - and cautious!

Blustery at the beach

There were a few brave souls out in the surf today, but after sitting and watching for a bit, no one out there was making it look enticing enough to want to get in! The wetsuits stayed dry today as we wrapped up for a walk along the beach instead.

There has been lots of debris, logs and plastic 'stuff' washed up on the high tide, but this was the coolest thing we found!..

We had no idea what it was at first!? A tropical creature perhaps?... On closer inspection it might just have been some seaweed growing on a chunk of blue foam, but that's nowhere near as exciting as our initial guesses...
Things were quite rough out to sea further along the coast, with big waves crashing over the rocks and loads of foam blowing across the sand.

Away from the sheltered bays, it was hard to stay upright on the exposed beaches!

Where the tide was in, I had to time a run between the rocks to keep dry feet!

We took respite in a cosy little cafe, nestled in the sand dunes. Splendidly warm, we found a comfy leather sofa, good coffee and a flick through the papers and felt like we'd been transported into a different world. It was quite a challenge to leave! We checked out a couple of potential surf spots on the walk back to the van, but decided (rather sensibly) to give it a miss today and just enjoy the walk.

Bushcraft on the Island

Dreadful weather in the mountains, sent us hiding out down be the Menai Straits today. There was a big spring tide which created a few little islands along the shore, but conditions were much calmer and (generally) drier there.

We were running a bush craft session, lighting fires, whittling sticks and cooking some camp pizzas. As usual, everyone was keen to get a bit of action with the axe!

While the pizza was cooking, I used the 'Kelly Kettle' to get a brew on. The Kelly Kettle is a really cool little device - it's a cylinder kettle, that you light a fire inside of. You only need a tiny fire in it and the water boils really quickly.

Rain stops play on the Slate

Rain has stripped away any ideas of more skiing or winter climbing this weekend! But after a dry morning, we took our chances in the Slate Quarries above Llanberis..

We were hoping to get a quick climb in, but after getting the ropes out, racking up and setting off, this happened...

...and a few minutes later, it was tipping it down! After some brief indecision to see if it might stop, Clare reversed the starting moves and we legged it! Some rock types are ok to climb in the wet, but Slate isn't one of them as it becomes very smooth and slippery. Back to The Cottage...

Walking in the moonlight

Summer has returned to North Wales!?! Yesterday it was -2 degrees in the morning and we had to defrost the van; today it was +11 and rose even higher during the day! 

I've been doing some woodland work in the Conwy Valley today, and the clear skies remained into the night. After dinner, under a bright full moon, we took a walk along the track to have a look at the mountains. A lot of the snow has melted now, but what was left, was reflecting brightly in the moonlight. Walking back to The Cottage, our shadows were clear and our torches not needed.

Indoor bouldering in the sun

The mountains were still glistening with snow again today, under an almost cloudless, pale blue sky. So tempting! 

I however, was mostly indoors today, re-setting the bouldering wall. With the big doors pinned wide open though, we had sunshine streaming in! This gave a perfect combination of warm sunlight, good friction and plenty of keen climbers to help aid the creative process of inventing new 'problems' to climb!

Ski Touring in the Carneddau

Seeing the colours of the dawn light in the mountains is one of my favorite things. Getting out of a warm bed in the dark, early enough to witness it, scores much lower down on my list. However, watching the snowy peaks glowing pink and seeing the reflections in Llyn Ogwen this morning was simply breathtaking. In fact, it was so absorbing that I didn't even take any photos; just watched in wonder. There was not a breath of wind in the mountains today and the lakes really were like mirrors.

The snow is no longer right down in the valleys, which meant that we had a bit of a walk, before we could start skinning uphill on our skis.  

Up at Cwm Llugwy, the reflection on the lake was so good that you almost didn't notice it; it started to play tricks on our eyes...

To climb the headwall, we had to carry our skis again, but it didn't take long to get up to the col, where the views kept getting better and better...

At the col, we stopped briefly for some food and drink, before carrying on over the little rocky summit...

Then it was back onto skis and up onto the summit of Carnedd Lleywellyn, which at 1065m, is the second highest peak in Snowdonia. Being 'second highest', it sees no where near as many ascents as Snowdon, and as predicted, we had the whole mountain to ourselves.

On the summit, we enjoyed a leisurely lunch and after a while, some clouds swirled in from the south, threatening to spoil our fun for the way down. We sat it our for a bit hoping it would clear, but the whiteout had soon reduced the viability to just a few meters, which is particularly disorientating when the ground is also white and featureless! We had just set a compass bearing and started gingerly to ski away, when thankfully the clouds parted, allowing us to cruise off towards Carnedd Daffyd.

The skiing was simply fantastic! A firm base, with a fresh covering of snow about 1cm deep. Perfect for skiing, but hard, hard work, for anyone on foot as the base wasn't firm enough to hold the smaller surface area of a foot. If we weren't on our skis, we sank in, upto our shins!

After descending from the summit, we put our skins back on our skis and continued up along the ridge above the Black Ladders...

Then came the best part! Downhill! After downing the last of our food and drink, we tightened up our boots, donned helmets and whizzed off into Cwm Lloer on perfect snow!

We skiied right down to the lake, by linking various wide snow gullies, then had some fun finding a safe passage down as low as we could. Tight turns and fast reactions helped to avoid the rocks (and the stream!). Eventually though, we came to the end of the proverbial road and had to carry out for the last half an hour.

Thanks to a bit of forward planning, we had left a car where the foot path meets the road, so didn't have to finish the day with a long walk back to the van where we had started! Fifteen minutes later we were back by the fireside at The Cottage for tea and cakes! Sometimes it's worth getting up early...

Down by the Straits

Took a walk along the Menai Straits today. Very peaceful. Was overcast, but warm enough for a little picnic down by Mandwyn, with the Shell Ducks, Oyster Catchers and a couple of Herons...

The North East Ridge of Y Garn (947m)

For the third time this week, I was back up in the snowy mountains of the Ogwen Valley, enjoying some winter mountaineering. It's been incredibly busy in the valley over the weekend, with cars lining the roads and some questionable parking skills by some! Luckily, we got a spot in the car park at Ogwen Cottage, and escaped into the hills before things got too crazy. I was leading a group of students who wanted to climb a 3000ft peak, so we chose to go for an ascent of Y Garn. 

Walking up to Cwm Clyd was easy enough and although we were soon in the snow, it was soft enough to not need crampons on. From there we joined the NE ridge, where we put our crampons on and took out our ice axes. As we ascended the ridge, right on cue, the clouds lifted and we got great views of the summits as well as back down into the Nant Ffrancon Valley.

The summit ridge, while not technically hard, was a fantastic finale to our climb that finished with a short snowy step onto the summit plateau. The cloud swirled around dramatically as we headed over to the main summit. There is a descent sized cornice overhanging Banana Gully which we were careful to avoid - especially as there was a 30cm wide deep crack running parallel to it about a meter from the edge! 

Conditions were positively balmy on the summit as we settled down for a spot of lunch. There was hardly a breath of wind. Before long a few other groups arrived at the top and there were soon about twenty people up there! After a bit of food and some chatter with the other summiteers, we decided to descend the same way.

The reason for this, was that after descending about two thirds of the ridge, there is a spot where you can take your crampons off and bum slide down a big snow slope. After checking the slope was safe, that's exactly what we did! Great fun! We were down by the little lakes in no time! After a quick snowball curling match on the frozen lake, we descended carefully back down to the mini bus, rather tired, but all very very happy.

The Association of Mountaineering Instructors

I am a member of the Association of Mountaineering Instructors (AMI), which is the representative body for professionally qualified Mountaineering Instructors in the UK and Ireland. AMI is committed to promoting good practice in all mountaineering instruction and the qualification that I hold - The Mountaineering Instructor Certificate (MIC), represents the highest level of UK mountaineering qualifications. All AMI members adhere to a professional code of practice and undertake continuing professional development training (CPD). Look for the AMI logo as assurance of high quality instruction.

AMI members are highly experienced mountaineers who have undergone rigorous training and assessment to qualify under the Mountain Training UK (MTUK) Mountaineering Instructor scheme. This weekend was the AMI's AGM and instructors from all over the country converged at the National Mountain Centre, Plas y Brenin, for a weekend of training, continued professional development (CPD) and some general socialising. I was only able to attend the Saturday evenings meetings and meal, but it was great to see so many Mountaineering Instructors, while catching up with old friends from around the country as well as meeting some new ones.