UKC

Stayed over on a few hills & snowdon a few times. Did Brecon last year in minus 15 deg C, not wild camping as such, just bivvy bags & good sleeping bag! Really wild camping! Probably going to stay up Ben soon, looks like we may be digging a snow shelter!

Anyone else done / does do anything like this? Or are we a crazy select few?

In reply to uberdude: I used to do that kind of stuff when I was in my teens but soon as I could afford b&b's i packd it in. Did it a lot when in the services too but it's pretty miserable i reckon when you could be warm and having a beer somewhere!

In reply to abr1966: Well, that's half the reason for doing it, to get out of the house and away from the wives! We are always somewhere cosy having a drink!

In reply to uberdude: Whereabouts on the Ben were you thinking?
Lots of people camp in the vicinity of the CIC hut for winter climbing purposes but that's usually (just) below the snow line. You could camp higher if you like but avoid a regular avalanche path!

In reply to pec: Well, the idea is to camp on the summit idealy!

In reply to uberdude:

There's a bivi hut on the summit anyway!

In reply to uberdude:

The summit of a mountain is not a very suitable place for a snow shelter; these are normally dug into the side of a sheltered drift. Your choices are:

1. Summit shelter - cramped, cold, smells of pee.
2. Tent - Nice and cosy if you have good kit, but not viable if the wind gets up.
3. Open Bivvy - can be amazing if it is a still, clear night, but liable to be very cold.

Enjoy.

In reply to uberdude:

Did this April '09. Was not the most pleasant experience of my life!

Chris

In reply to IainMunro: That's an awesome pic! Snowdon was fantastic, near no wind and 99% clear skies, the view was fantastic.

In reply to pec: Yeah, that's our last resort! I'm assuming a lot of the old ruins are still present - finding them may be difficult though! Considering digging into them if we can find the plot! Got flysheets / tarpaulins to finish off if needed.

In reply to uberdude:

I don't know if you're on Facebook (or if you need to be to see a pic) but here's my bedroom last Monday night, Ben Nevis about 100m above CIC hut...

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10150112874958556&set=a.10150112...

In reply to Tony the Blade: Yeah, but can't open link.

This was Snowdon Feb 2010 after spending the night up there. Wind chill at the summit was bad, drop 50M or so and no wind!

youtube.com/watch?v=bj6QxQkUrjM&

In reply to uberdude: It is absolutely always worth camping up on the summits at any time of year- just keep any eye on the weather forecast. There are plenty of nights when the wind is not gale force.

In reply to Siward:

Yeh.

There the ones when it's storm force or greater.

In reply to uberdude: Spent one new years eve in my tent above the ZigZags. Was nice and toasty. So much so, my mate refused to get out and go to the summit for the bells.

In reply to uberdude: Some of the replies have mentioned bad weather on the Ben and it's tent shredding possibilities. I topped out of Zero Gully a few years ago and had crawl to the summit because the wind was so fierce, it was moving my parter and I around and we had no control if we even half stood up. We contemplated spending the night in the summit shelter with no sleeping bags, just belay jackets - but the lure of warm chips and cold beer forced us out into the storm and we crawled on a baring for about a mile or so until we could stagger down the red burn. We got the chips and beer! I wouldn't personally rely on a tent. Use the summit shelter or make something out of snow.

Yes, 3 of us camped on the summit of the Ben and took in New Year in 1966. It turned out to be an epic in a gale. Our tent was almost covered in snow. We were lucky to get down in the morning in a total white-out.

In reply to leeangell: Both look awesome, but they always do from a nice warm cosy house, with a beer in one hand!

In reply to uberdude:

Yes, I have, e.g. and many others I know. Why do you need to ask, just get your bivibag, your stove and camp.

BTW This is a very sexist comment

H

In reply to uberdude:

Lots of people

In reply to Heike:

I love getting away from the wife, preferably somewhere cold and wintery. Strangly enough when she wants to get away from me she goes somewhere hot and sunny... I dont get it, but hey, if thats what she's into.

In reply to Heike:

Oh FFS... ..

In reply to Heike:


In which case if you have ever, even secretly, wanted some time alone without your spouse/partner etc. around then you too are part of the sickening sexist conspiracy of "me time".

Or, more charitably, if a comment is meant as a joke a smiley goes a long way...

In reply to Heike: WTF? How is that a sexist comment? I'd have understood if I'd said women are crap at this sort of thing, but I said nothing sexist!

I'd like you to try and ask our other half's why they don't want to participate in such events! Something to do with the cold.....oh and a bit of exercise.....

In reply to uberdude:

sorry, uberdude, didn't mean to offend, but I just found it personally a typical sexist sterotype, cos I am a women and love doing stuff like bivving and climbing and it's just stereotypical to say women don't like this sort of stuff. And I am not the only one of the female variety to enjoy things like that.
Anyway, as I said loads off people do it female and male...

Oh, and your last sentence is yet another stereotype (i.e. that women don't like exercise and the cold) but then you thought, I was a bloke....

In reply to Heike:

Um, dont think he said anything about women not liking climbing. The only thing he said was that he wanted to 'get away from the wives'. I think you're imposing your own perception on the text here.


For the record, I know lots of women who climb, but very few who are into winter climbing. In my own anecdotal experience its the same reason time and time again that women dont go for it - too cold. Shame I think, because those few birds I do know who get out in winter tend to be damn good.

In reply to Heike:

Heike, surely you should be gettin the dinner on at this time on a friday night rather then posting on internet forums?

Frodo

In reply to Heike: You'd have a strange User name for a bloke if I assumed that, and I doubt any bloke on here would be arsed typing such a comment anyway. Yes that was purposely sexist.

And my sentences don't require 'in-depth reading between the lines', the context is there to reply to not scrutinise. And I was talking about OUR other half's, not women in general. I'd be living in some strange time assuming that all outdoor pursuits etc. were just male activities.

I'd actually like to see more women doing the stuff we do, but from my personal experience, the majority of women I have encountered prefer to do things in a more comfortable environment. (Trying to watch my wording so I don't offend you).

Anyhow, just for the record, we went for it this weekend just gone (12th March) and got to the foot of Ben around 12pm, snow was beginning to fall, and the path was ok for the first hour, but people coming down said it was bad, most didn't make it to the summit, and most had the right gear. Our party of 4 slowed down too much and one of our guys just couldn't muster up the willpower to continue, and we had to make the decision to head back down. Quite annoying but the only real sensible option in the end. Just a shame we travelled so far to not summit.

We were trekking for 7 hours, and eventually managed to get a premier inn for the night, nice warm shower, food and bed! Good for setting back off early in the morning, but frustrating at the same time. But, an experience to learn from.

We've already decided to go back in about 5 weeks, minus our weak link, so no excuses for failure this time!

Some pics of the 2-3 day snow pile up! Only made about 820M vertical ascent.

https://picasaweb.google.com/Prof.Leigh/BenNevisMarch2011?authkey=Gv1sRgCML...

https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/_5RPcDJWtZrY/TX0pH2tT0sI/AAAAAAAADFk/n227...

https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/_5RPcDJWtZrY/TX0pJ1EY6pI/AAAAAAAADF4/M88Z...

In reply to uberdude:

You made the right call; you wouldnt have been able to sustain a summit camp through the 80mph winds on Saturday night. What was your camping strategy going to be?

In reply to Jamie Bankhead:

Well, option 1 was a snowcave of some description, which wouldn't have been great, so more likely option 2, dig a hole and pitch the tent. As long as we had shelter from the wind and further snow fall, all else would be fine. But yeah, the winds were gusty on open ground half way up so up top would have been bad. We had plenty of equpiment with us, which was half the reason it took so long anyway. My pack was about 25kg!

In reply to uberdude: #
Are you aware of the winter grade that Heike climbs at?!!

In reply to The Watch of Barrisdale: For what purpose?

In reply to uberdude:
For a reality check!

In reply to uberdude:


Diging straight down into the snowpack? If you've ever studied snowhole principles you'd know that the norm is to dig sideways into a sheltered drift. You'd have been hypothermic long before you had a usable space.


Apart from the hole filling with snow and burying the tent! You were lucky indeed that you turned back..

Admire your spirit but think you need to research this more thoroughly.

In reply to uberdude:
Hey uberdude, no offence to you personally, but I am just a little bit tired off men harping on about women (whether it's THEIR other halves) or women in general. That's exactly what being "sexist" or any other "...ist" is about. It's like the comments people used to make about gays, black people or anybody else, saying, "oh I don't have anything against them, one of my best friends is ....(insert gay, black, women, catholic, muslim or whatever else)". The whole point is to not make those assumptions in the first place. This is where my response to the topic is coming from.

Anyhow, serious business aside, I happened to be on the Ben on Saturday and did a route (not a short one at that) and topped out at about 3.30pm, so yet another example that woman are more hardcore then men!!
Hehehe

In reply to Heike:


And of course they are not, because it's down to the individual...! Anyhow, good on you for getting out, cos the weather was truly minging!

In reply to Heike:

But of course, Uberdude, Heike will no doubt have kids one of these days and give up altogether.

<checks Heike's page>

Oh wait


PS Congratulations, Heike, how soon are you taking him up a VI?

In reply to uberdude: Sounds like you made a good call mate....the hill will always be there. Had many a miserable night in a snow hole up in Norway in times gone by and spent most of them dreaming of warm beds, beer and chips! Make sure you get back there, cheers

In reply to Jamie Bankhead: Well, option 3 = summit shelter! We had done a fair bit of research to be honest, but didn't get to put it into practice.

Anyways, without experience, you don't learn.

In reply to Heike:

Hugs all round then?

We turned back at just gone 4pm, back to base at 6:50pm. We were the last people we saw on the mountain track anyway!

In reply to abr1966: Yeah, plan on doing next month. Just time consuming, travel, costs, preparation! All in the name of saying 'we've done that!!'

In reply to The Watch of Barrisdale: Not following at all? She climbs, we walk, difference of opinion had nothing to do with either?

In reply to uberdude: Hey, Uberdude. Well done on a good effort on Saturday. Sorry to hear that you guys had to turn back but probably for the best - the Ben's not the best place to get caught out unawares. Just had a look at the photies - those packs look suspiciously like 100L+ bergans with side pouches? 25kg, by the way, is about, give or take a copuple of kilos, what I carry for a six-day trek in the Gorms (shovel, poons, poles, axe, tent, cook kit, food for duration, spare clothes, a few luxuries). Maybe you could look at what your kit list was for your attempt and see how you can reduce the weight a bit for next time.

Getting the balance between carrying too much weight but having all the luxuries (but possibly not achieving your aims), and carrying too little (as in the weight of 'goodies') and achieving your aims but being miserable whilst you do it is hard. However, you should always aim to carry nothing except what you need to achieve the task both safely and with an acceptable level of comfort...everything else really is just a luxury!

Look forward to reading about your next attempt.

In reply to uberdude:

If you insist

In reply to uberdude:

25kg? you're doing it wrong.
Now i don't get why this is such a scary prospect. People are saying "oh you can't use a tent in 80mph winds" well what d'you think folk in the himalaya do? No don't dig a snow cave, you're just making things harder for yourself, it'll be cold, and at UK temperatures, very wet by morning. Large risk of it collapsing and killing you. Your main danger with the tent is burying it. Set alarms, up to 4, to dig the tent out in the night, or you will suffocate as you sleep. If your tent's a sail with cocktail sticks in it, then get one that will stand up to a bit of weather. UK temperatures mean other than wind it's a walk in the park. Use synthetic because you will get wet, it's too warm here. If you were planning to bivvy on the summit, why didn't you just bivvy at 820m? It'd be a sight easier and you'd still get what you wanted. If you're just doing it for the view then wait for an anticyclone and pack your thermals.
Don't take on things you aren't ready for. Prevailing wind on the Ben will carry you off the north face.
Keep it up, abroad this kind of thing is a lot more common.

In reply to uberdude: btw if your username means a hardman mentality, then be careful not to overstretch yourself. too many people die on the ben for stupid reasons. not saying you're one.

In reply to uberdude:

Does anyone have a strategy for keeping/getting gear dry in a tent in shitty conditions? I can get my gloves and underpants dry in my sleeping bag, but the odd time I've bivvied in Scotland, pulling on wet coat and boots has been a bollox... not to mention the wet ropes.

A bigger tent? some sort of gas powered drying aparatus? Portable genny?

If there was a way, even if it involved humping an extra five or six kg each up to the CIC hut, it would really open up the amount and type of routes we could do.

In reply to ruaidh:

No such strategy exists, which is why (IMHO) camping at the CIC is a flawed plan in all but benign conditions. If you're prepared to start humping up portable gennys, etc, you surely have the fitness to do the walk-in daily? (Re-invigorated by the comfort of the Glen and dry kit!). You could always stash the hardwear under a boulder.

In reply to uberdude:


What an all-or-nothing approach. After backing off from your initial objective of bivvying on top of Ben Nevis in the middle of a winter storm, your fall-back option was to check into a Premier Inn?

In reply to ruaidh: double skin boots mean you can keep inners on in your sleeping bag, and half the point of softshell is comfort when wet - try them, i think you'll be surprised how much easier things are

In reply to ruaidh: Much kit will be damaged with fast drying, especially ropes and leather boots.

In reply to arctic_hobo:

Fast drying damage doesn't stop at kit, split ends (hair), dry skin and chapped lips are fairly common. Found E45 and Aloe vera Vaseline jelly pretty effective for the latter 2, well fitting cap usefull for concealing the former.

In reply to Gav M: Not really, I just think that one of our group members just underestimated how difficult it was for him, and although our best option was to get further up to a better, more secluded spot and bed down, he pretty much said he couldn't go up any further, so we had no choice really.

I was happy to camp at about 600-700 M, but the mindset was done, we were going down and that was it. Either way, I think we were all pretty happy about getting dry and warm!

Cheers for all the input too guys, always good to have other recommendations / opinions. I'm particularly interested in the theory of the snow cave being too warm and melting. I'll look into this one.

The only reason we didn't want to just bivvy was the simple fact it was snowing! Didn't fancy waking up to have to dig ourselves out of holes!

In reply to ruaidh:


Yes. Don't get wet.

Gloves get wet sometimes, but more often frozen, as long as you have several pairs and dry one out in your pocket while using the other it'll be fine. Frozen ropes are a hassle but what can you do, dry treated ropes would help but it wears off. Jacket being wet is not a problem as long as it's dryish on the inside. Brush everything clean of snow before putting it in the tent.

Boots I have got wet rarely, once when falling through a snowbridge into a deep pool in a river, fell up to my waist in water before partener stopped me. After that, I knew I had no chance of drying out my boots, so I wore plastic bags over my socks before putting them in my boots which worked well, as long as you have two pairs of socks you can dry one while wearing the other. If your clothes are dryish, keeping them in your sleeping bag makes them alot easier to put on in the morning as they'll be warm.


As for your underwear, if you wet yourself, perhaps take up a different sport, or wear a nappy.

In reply to Calum Nicoll: Aye....water, wind and temp are killers for sure. Always best to keep a dry set of clothes and wear at night and no matter how cold or awful to do so....get the cold wet ones back on during the day when you are moving and generating heat. Good routines and total concentration with mates reminding eachother are the key.

In reply to summitjunkie: Yes, they are the std size bergens. I'll tell you now, the only weight I could drop from my bag would have been the tent&poles (about 2.3kg) and my rope/harness/carabiners (about 3kg). We had our sleeping bags & bivvy bags (3.3kg), enough water to get up (approx 2 L each & melt sow for more), few bottle of coke (1kg), carb drink for going up (750g), food for night / morning / snacks(about 1.2kg) few spare clothes, milk, brew tackle, crampons/axe and that was about it. Bergen is about 3kg itself. The weight is not an issue for myself, I hauled around 28kg in the Brecons - that was on my limit though!
Other gear was with other people, stove/fuel/pans/shovels etc.

The fact I was back in work on Monday and the calfs and shoulders were the only tender points was surprising, thought I'd ache more than that. Been for a swim tonight just to see how I felt!

Going a lot lighter = spending a lot of cash! Going heavy = improves appreciation of toughness! (And gets you fitter!).

Even if my mate had no weight, I'm seriously doubting if he'd have felt much better. It was just the mindset he'd got himself into, he wasn't psyched up enough for it I don't think, as soon as the negative thoughts encroached, it was impossible to think any other way.

I think if we had have made it, we'd have had a miserable, uncomfortable night and driving back 6 hours the day after wouldn't have been a happy occasion!

Like I said, it was a good experience, and we can plan it better next time.

I'd personally like to have a crack at Mont Blanc, so all this is a good experience towards that possibility. Just need to save up for a few years!

In reply to uberdude: I've carried twice your quoted weight before now in a std bergen because I was paid to do it and we weren't trying to summit and bed down on the Ben. There's a time and place for lugging a big pack around and the Ben in a snowstorm is not the place. Mountaineering and the carrying of excess baggage do not go together. I appreciate that you can't afford the kit that might enable you easily achieve the task that you were trying to do but maybe the result speaks for itself - the Ben + crap weather + heavy packs = no summit bivi!

Try a few easier (and safer) mountaineering problems, get used to what the mountains can throw at you, accumilate quality usable kit, build your experience and then try again.

'Going heavy' is never a good idea and, in the context of mountaineering, is not necessarily an indicator that you are tough or necessarily going to get you fit... though it might break you!

In reply to uberdude:
If you're hiking, ditch the climbing gear. Ditch the bivvi bags, you don't use them inside a tent. Ditch the coke, it'll dehydrate you and you're already carrying fluid. Ditch the carb drink and take powder to mix with water or just cereal bars. That's a lot of weight gone already.
Your summary also doesn't add up to the weight you said you'd taken...
No problem with carrying lots more than you need, it's up to you really. If you're hiking in the UK it's unlikely to put you in danger, as it might in the greater ranges. You WILL have more fun with a lighter pack though.

In reply to uberdude:
I'd agree with arctic hobo - it sounds like you were carrying far more fluid than you needed.

You said you had a few bottles of coke, plus an energy drink, plus 2l of water.
How many bottles of coke? That sounds a lot of weight in liquids!

I would reckon 2l of fluid would be ample for the ascent, especially if you neck at least half a litre before starting off. Pay particular attention to drinking at the start of the walk, so you maximise your hydration and minimise the load on your back. How much weight would you have saved by limiting yourself to 2 liters of liquid? Your liquid doesn't need to be all water, though if money is an issue (and it sounds like funds are tight) I would drink water and eat biscuits rather than expensive energy drinks, or else make my own energy drinks by dissolving sugar in water. If you have a flask, hot blackcurrant is nice on the hills (don't get the low calorie version!), or hot apple juice with some cinnamon.

So you could drop weight and save money!

The other thing to look at was spare clothes. As has been said already, clothes for walking and clothes for sleeping, and just put on the wet clothes again in the morning. Only changes would be dry socks and possibly dry undies. I do take several sets of gloves, as it is always nice to have dry gloves. Pile and pertex mitts should dry overnight in your sleeping bag, so these plus shell mitts make a good choice for several days in Scottish minging weather. And I take a couple of spare hats, as it is easy to lose a hat.

As for going heavy getting you fitter - up to a point. Long term going heavy can lead to permanent joint and spine damage. Short term, the heavier the load the more likely you are to stumble, and the more likely a stumble will lead to a sprain. The armed forces are starting to worry about the short and long term injuries to infantry from carrying all their body armour plus weapons plus electronics plus water...

As for giving an appreciation of toughness - if I can be just as comfy as the person next to me and that person is carrying 50% more weight than I am, are they giving an impression of being tough or of being daft? Toughness is mental as well as physical, and part of the toughness is the discipline to take all that you need and nothing you don't need, and a few wee luxuries too.

In reply to uberdude:


You're portraying him as the weak link whereas in fact he sounds like the sensible one; your plans for tents and/or snowholes on the summit were unrealistic in the prevailing conditions (I was on the hill that day). If you'd ditched 2/3 of the crap and targeted a night in the summit shelter (along with a selection of frozen turds) you might have made it, but carrying a 25kg load through those drifts and those winds sounds like torture to me. And why the climbing gear?

You chose to ignore what more experienced mountaineers told you about the difficulties of snow-holing and/or camping in stormy conditions; why did you actually start the thread?

In reply to Jamie Bankhead: Most of the replies were after we'd been. I'd hardly call the snowy weather a storm that weekend either!

Since we were planning on staying up there, the fluids were essential, and not everyone had 2L water or coke. I've not included the rest of the bits and bobs that weighed whatever, but they did add up!

I'd rather have plenty of readily available fluids then have to wait to boil up some snow. I personally think some of your thoughts are a bit OTT, but I respect everyone's input and will put it into context for next time.

This is, as pointed out, only the UK, not some Everest trek! Either I'm really stupid, or some of you think the conditions that day were from another planet! In my opinion, it wasn't that bad.

In reply to uberdude:


Hi Uberdude, if you knew the experience of some of the people on here who have been posting on your thread, such as Jamie, and understood the reasoning behind the advice and comments made, I think you'd be a bit more accepting of what is being said. If you think the conditions on the Ben that day were not bad then it is clear that you have no experience of having to bivi out at altitude in a snowstorm.

The conditions that you were ascending in put down several feet of snow in some places - the past few days, I have been out in Glencoe and the Mamores, and the snow I have found myself up to chest deep in is wet, unconsolidated and greatly hinders movement. Don't know what it's like on top of the Ben at the moment, but had you made it I suspect that if you tried bivying or tenting in it you'd have been buried and spent most of the night digging yourself out.

As a team, you made the right decision and bailed. You will succeed in your aim one day, I'm sure, but be aware that in anything other than very good to perfect conditions the summit of the Ben (even in summertime) is not the place to spend a night if you haven't got the right kit, the right skillset, the right experience and the right attitude.

p.s. in some situations machismo, ego and 'having balls' can be no substitute for experience.

In reply to uberdude:
The weather conditions you may face camping high in the highlands in a Scottish winter are more serious than anything you will encounter on a Himalayan trek.

I speak as someone who leads treks in the Himalayas and the Andes, and who has bothied, camped and snow caved in Scotland in winter.

Yes, the Himalayas have added hazards like altitude and remoteness (and in some places sandstorms), but you are far more likely to get a tent trashed in Scotland than whilst trekking in the Himalayas. You are more likely to get hypothermia in Scotland, and more likely to get avalanched than if you were trekking in the Himalayas. Because the trekking routes avoid the most extreme spots.

Climbing in the Himalayas can be another story, especially on some of the higher peaks.

Of course, you do get great days in Scotland, and there are times when camping on top of the Ben would be glorious and easy. If you want to sleep on top of the Ben (and I think that is a fine ambition) then I recommend you pay close attention to the weather forecast and pick your night with care.

In reply to almost sane:

Doug, how would you go about digging a 4-man snowhole at the top of the Ben? I've been racking my brains trying to work out how these guys were planning to do it; I'd have thought digging downwards into the snowpack would be destined to failure, especially in those winds.

In reply to Jamie Bankhead:

I've been thinking about this.
All I can think of is finding a big enough snow bank in the lee of some structure or another, like the emergency shelter. But I don't know how likely you are to find such a place.
The op did mention tents, so I presume they were planning to camp on top. But I think you would need a fair degree of technical skill to erect a tent on the summit if the wind is blowing hard; to make sure it stays up; and to keep yourself from hypothermia or cold injuries while you are doing that.

You would also need a pretty good tent.

It would have been an adventure!

In reply to ruaidh:

Just booked the CIC hut.

They have a very effective drying room!

In reply to LewClimbs:

When for ?! When emailed, the guardian said the hut was book straight through till 2012...?!?

In reply to uberdude:


Why could they not carry their own fluid?


But bad enough that you turned around and went to a premier inn.

For comparison, I just did WML assessment last week. We camped out for 2 nights (forecast was too warm for safe snowholes), and walked for about 18 hours total over the three days, covering roughly 24km in knee-to-thigh deep crusted snow. My pack weighed about 13kg on the walk in, of which 4kg was food. I had a 1 litre water bottle, which I was able to refill from burns, although I had sufficient fuel to melt snow. Melting snow doesn't take too long (there's not much else to do once you're in the tent anyway) and gas cartridges or white fuel are not as heavy as an extra 2l of fluid. All my kit fit into a 50l Lightwave pack, with the tent strapped to the outside for the walk in and out. If I'd taken a bit less food I could have got the tent in, but I would have been less able to bribe the assessor with sweeties during the night nav.

My advice? Ditch the Bergen and get a modern, lightweight sac. You needn't spend more than £90 if you shop around, and you'll instantly save 2kg on your back. If you're not going climbing, leave the harness and rack - a rope, sling and krab should be all you need (and if you need to get it out on the pony track, you're in the wrong place).