UKC

" In retrospect, I’d have been better stowing one or both axes and just treating it like a scramble, but this was the first time I’d used these axes in anger and I was damn well going to make the most of them."

Cold, tired and nervous - a tough introduction to winter climbing on a Ben Nevis classic.

http://www.ukclimbing.com/articles/page.php?id=231

In reply to Mick Ryan - UKClimbing.com: Horrible formatting Mick - can you do something so you don't have loose text off the side of the page? Having to scroll left and right to read a sentence makes me seasick.

In reply to Mick Ryan - UKClimbing.com:

Nice article, and a good topic as I'm sure many people (including myself) have this route on their winter wishlist.

But the formatting does need changed, I ended haveing to copy and paste out to read...

In reply to Martin Thompson:

fixed

In reply to Mick Ryan - UKClimbing.com:

Sorry Mick; still running off the page in Firefox 1.5.0.7

In reply to Mick Ryan - UKClimbing.com:

Still the same in my Firefox, even after a page refresh.

In reply to ultra montane:

OK on firefox latest update now, at least for me.

In reply to ultra montane:

Clear your cache.

In reply to Mick Ryan - UKClimbing.com: When did it become grade IV.

In reply to Mick Ryan - UKClimbing.com:

I'd have preferred the article if he'd climbed it and taken some lovely photos along the way.

In reply to Stormmagnet:

In the cicerone (sp?) guide to Ben Nevis and Glencoe I believe it gets IV, 3.

But was that comment not about the route on Aonach Mor?

Great article, describes emotions which I'm sure are familiar to most of us extremely well.

(Formatting OK on Firefox 1.0.8)

In reply to Removed User: No my comment was about Tower Ridge, it seems I have climbed one more IV than I thought.

In reply to Kinley:


I'd disagree with that. The world is overrun with articles about how people climbed things against all sorts of odds. I think it makes a refreshing change to read about someone who admits to baling from a route because it just didn't feel right on the day, especially as he managed to take away good memories despite the "failure".

It's nothing like 100 miles from Aviemore to Fort William, though! Also, the recommended approach to the north face these days is to use the car park in Torlundy and the path which runs from there, which were provided for precisely that purpose, rather than parking on the main road and walking across the golf course. The Torlundy car park has been in place since 1998 - see http://www.mountaineering-scotland.org.uk/nl/36d.html - and is shown on all the latest OS and Harveys maps so it's a bit disappointing to hear that people are still unaware of it or for whatever other reason failing to use it. Perhaps a footnote could be added to the article to make the point?

In reply to Mick Ryan - UKClimbing.com:

Nice article and brought back memories of when Natasha and I did it last winter. We were much luckier with the weather and no way was it grade IV on that day. It's a fine route.

In reply to Martin W: The guy can park where he wants and cross the golf course if it suits him. It's a free country!
Besides I still use the golf course approach occasionally for nostalgic reasons.

In reply to Willy:

thats me on the top in the first photo, taken by the guys we chatted with whilst waiting to do the eastern traverse who we followed up.

Great day after starting with italian climb right hand.