Extracts from Newsletter 25
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Usual thrash to North Wales knowing that Snowdonia had received a spell of cold wintry weather earlier in the week that was hopefully defying the warm front that was making its way inexorably across the country.
Waking to warm temperatures in the concrete, and hence normally bloody freezing - bunkhouse (OK so it wasn't that hardcore but we only booked it because we were trying to tempt Pete and Angie away with us) we peered outside to find zero snow in the Llanberis pass. However never one to be discouraged by such minor details, a plan was hatched to tour Llanberis and Ogwen in order to find the best possible conditions.
Plan A. A few tendrils of ice were hanging out of the Devils Kitchen so up we headed. On arrival (in a heavy sweat despite being in only a thermal top) the “ice” was found to be so out of condition that I think we were all greatly surprised to see that it was still vertical; it certainly wasn't attached to anything.
Plan B. A long traverse to a broad gully line up the side of Y Garn contained a snow plod to the ridge. A 30ft ice fall that hadn't quite melted to nothing (yet) and in the warm sunshine to boot was too tempting to walk past and an easy pitch it was too. Funny how you don't really think about belays before you start something. On reaching the top a large and very unstable scree slope stretched steeply away. Running the full rope out I finally managed to get a sort of reasonable belay. Mmmm, don't fall off Sarah !!
Sarah's first bit of technical ice this, concentration face came into play big time. Smiley face at the top... oh dear, I think the men in the white coats are on the way with the long sleeved jacket with the strings on the end.
Derek, Steve, Harvey and Stuart have topped out on Y Garn and descended early. Not content with a mere half day in the hills particularly when the weather is reasonable, Sarah and myself dropped down from the shoulder into the combe below the North Face of Y Garn to try a pick a reasonable line out. And so we did. A couple of grade two pitches with interesting ice steps to negotiate, fun, fun , fun, with Sarah leading through on her second winter lead. (We won’t mention the rope drag at this point because that would be unsporting of me.) Moving together on the rope alpine style to the summit on mixed ground was fun as was the bum slide down the big easy gully to the side.
So to the pub, drink, bladders and a serious piss take (pun intended) out of us chaps by Sarah. And I would like to point out at this juncture that ladies boasting about big bladders and excellent muscle control is not necessarily a good thing !!!
Wales living up to its normal reputation produced some typically dire weather on Sunday. A walk up Carnedd Llwellyn in the driving rain did little to inspire anyone except for the discovery of an interesting looking winter crag that is not in any guidebook that I have seen; not that it'll ever come into condition.
So ended another great trip.
Trevor
Friday night traffic on the M25 meant that I didn’t arrive at Wintor’s Leap until midday Saturday so I had missed Martins drunken “Smutathon” in the New Inn the night before. By the time we got to the north wall most of the routes where being ascended with varying degrees of skill and finesse. After a quick bit of metal arithmetic I realised that this was a girlie weekend! could this be a first? more girlie climbers that men?? After passing the time of day shouting insults and encouragement where it was needed, Angela and I went off to do our first multi pitch route of the year, and what a route. The Angel Eye creeps up the side of the north wall in three pitches, each pitch with it’s own character. The first was demanding, the second an outing and the third a romp. Halfway up the first pitch it became painfully obvious that Angela and I had not been on real rock for a long time. We had rope and knots all over the place. We had to keep explaining what we were doing which led to conversations such as:
“If I undo this knot then .....”
“..... there is 150 feet of rope between you and the
belay”
“Ah, so it’s this knot then”
“Yes”
“Do you need some nuts?”
“They might be handy!”
“Does the rabbit come out of the hole and ....”
“... before the Farmer shoots it”
Before long we where back into the swing of things and reached the rock platform in time to see Martin disappearing up a face and Colin emerging over the edge. It was about now that I realised the folly of climbing in a tee shirt in March.
After a lot of pratting about at the bottom of the North Wall during which Martin seiged the first pitch of a VS and Angela fell over to produce the largest bum bruise of all time we headed to the pub to wait for the others. Two pints of waiting later the sun had gone down, another pint and a basket of chips later they finally arrived with tails of epic mountain routes and possible benightment. The stories where confused but it seems that the last pitch had not gone quite to plan and ended up with Catherine doing the whole pitch in the dark!
We had taken over a climbing hut on Mendip for the duration and chef Martin had “offered” to make pizzas for us all, entrance was by a bottle of red wine and drinks master Tilley was put in charge of mulled wine. Once the ingredients of the evening were mixed thoroughly the result was another memorable evening, unless of course you are an old fart who falls asleep at 11:00 ....
The next morning we where greeted by rain and Martin in his under pants (unsoiled) offering us tea. We where going to climb! The rain eased and the convoy headed off to Goblin Coombe with Trevor on point. To say that we took the long route would be an exaggeration. Not only did we go round the houses but across the airport and along the country roads. At least it gave Dave a chance to splash his four wheel drive with mud.
We kitted up and headed for our chosen routes. Martin started on some HS horror crack from hell whilst everybody else did the nice routes. The rain held off until the crux move on every route was reached when it would dribble down just to add a little more interest. To round the day off and to entertain the gathered masses Martin provided his very own leader fall. I was round the corner and will not comment but suffice to say that everybody's account was different..... The truth is out there .. somewhere.
And so the girls mooned out of the land rover as we made our way home.
Pete
Taken from the new all action, happening, exciting and thrilling forthcoming book “Touching the Cloth” with tales from mountains as far away as North Wales!.
It’s 2200ft and it’s -30C in white out conditions, my radio is out of order, no money for the phone box and my food is at an end.
Meanwhile back in reality, Myself and I went to Morocco, To wander around the Atlas Mountains, The range which run East to West rising out of the plains of Marrakech to a height of 4167 Metres and then drop down into the sandy pre-sahara.
Marrakech is the Ideal place to kick off from. I decided to stay for a couple of days to explore. Here every night is Friday and every morning is Monday, a place of extremes, real poverty, kids deliberately blinded to be more effective whilst begging to those in suits tooling about in flash Mercs. (These are usually the tourist police keeping the beggars from the tourists). The state of some of the beasts of burden is indescribable. All the hotels where full so I slept in a storeroom of the Hotel Ali (includes breakfast) which caught fire on the first night (the hotel, not the breakfast).
I travelled out to the village of Imelil (which is where they filmed Seven years in Tibet), at the end of the road I got myself a Muleteer, the road being a dried river bed. You have no need to look for a place to stay here, or to look for anything in fact, it all comes to find you.
My Muleteer found me and arranged to carry my gear up to the Nelter hut which was 15km uphill at about 3500 Meters. The hut belongs to the French Alpine Club, who own several though out the range, this one being open all year round. Briahib my muleteer agreed to a 6am start, and was 15 mins late, so I started off up the trail to meet him coming from the village of Arasnd, by 7:30 we were at the little hamlet of St. Chamhararach where every house was a shop, cafe or both. Unfortunately all the residents were asleep so we had to wake one chap up before we could have our morning coffee.
Two hours later saw us arriving at the Nelter hut drenched in sunshine which gave me an opportunity to do all my washing, once I had broken the ice! The hut was quite busy whilst I was there so I slept outside in my tent amongst the rocks. There were mainly French climbers here tacking over every thing with their guides. The Brits were a little thin on the ground.
Arriving here early in the day and relaxing helped with the acclimatisation, which is not a big problem at this height. It was up early the next morning to climb Mount Torbkal, the heighest at 4167m, but also the easiest, certainly the most popular. It was an easy day rewarded by superb views across the pre Sahara. There was snow at this time of year with some of the waterfalls frozen but not enough to warrant a lot of ice tools.
Most rewarding was climbing the 2nd highest Tineguida n Ouanoukrim (4089m) following a path that leads to the high point of the Tizi n Ouagare pass clad in alpine gear I met a passing Berber in slip on shoes and little clothing with just a sack slung over his back smoking a Jamaican Woodbine. He just said “Good Morning” and wandered off into the snow.
A good sharp ridge with loose rock takes you to Tizi n Ouanoukrin then you cross a great gently angled snow field to the large dome of the true summit, which had a good remote feel to it. The number of people climbing Toubal is very few and its is much more worthy, the snow was a fortnight old and mine were the only tracks to be seen.
Every day was blessed with sunshine from 7 to 7 and the night stars shone brightly. It was a little chilly at -7C in my 2 season sleeping bag. I did much more than this and if you want to know more then ask
Stuart