Ventriloquist and other climbs…
Its been an amazing week out in Scotland and I already cant wait to come back this winter. The weather was pretty horrible and we were subjected to full on scottish gale winds and full on rime ice and powder clearing. Anyway a massive thank you to Di Gilbert and Derek Boggan for being such amazing hosts and putting up with me all week. Here are a few photos from the last week
Neil on the crux of Ventriloquist
Neil on the crux of Ventriloquist
Myself on the crux of Ventriloquist, © Neil Mackey
Myself on the crux of Ventriloquist, © Neil Mackey
Graham enjoying the first hot aches of the season
Headed up to Lochan to see what was in with Gav and Graham. The
picture of the first pitch of hoarmaster in the guidebook just looks
amazing so I was itching to get on it. Very kindly I was offered the
lead and away I went. Its never hard with bomber hooks and feet for the
first pitch. An amazing pitch to lead though and was buzzing. The last
pitch is a bit sketchy though and nice one on Graham for the lead.
Mark on the first pitch
A brief clearing of the clouds, climbers on Savage Slit and Deep Throat
Exiting Deep Throat
Grim weather on the plateau
Headed up with Di Gilbert yesterday to check out conditions on Coire an t’Sneachda and headed up towards White Magic. It was still pretty warm even though there is a fair amount of snow around. There is no ice or consolidated snow yet but White Magic looked good so we had a crack at that. In short it was a brutal re-introduction to Scottish climbing and glad to have got my ass kicked on it. Very different from the Chamonix granite that i am used to I got slammed on the crux crack pitch and had to rest a massive three times…pathetic
Di Gilbert seconding the crux crack pitch
