12/13 Winter Season Part 3 - Coniston

Coniston 30.03.12

Alpine

We had a long time off and just been mostly indoor climbing. I didn't expect there to be much snow in the hills and I had sent my Trangos off for new soles and didn't fancy long distance walks in B3s! On Saturday we parked up the hill by the museum and set off walking up to the quarry by the Old Man of Coniston. We made an early ascent starting at 8:45am and struggled up past the old mine buildings on packed slippery snow. Approaching the Low Water Elliott found a pound, stroke of luck.

Bottom Section of North Gully

We kitted up at Low water and stopped our route using the guide book. Today we decided to make an ascent of North Gully. We walked round to the start to find lots of ice, a little thin but generally good. Most of the snow was drifts and a little dodgy but there seemed to be a mixed bag of every thing.

P P P Power Lunge

After out ascent of the fist gully section which was fairly shallow, it opened out to a large snow slope surrounded by crags and closing in again at the top with a number of gully exits. in the middle was small 5m crag covered in ice which just had to be done. Elliott lead an soloed up, at the top was a small ice chandelier, to get past it he had to smash though some of it, this is where it got interesting.

"I've cut my head", I heard, "Its ok though". A few moments later..."I think its a worse than I thought". The thought of having to deal with a concussed climbing partner did not appeal, "I'll come patch you up" I shouted. I headed round the side of the crag up a steep ice slope and met Elliott at the top of the Ice fall sat down holding his head. I quickly got a bandage out and asked if he was ok, when he confirmed he was fine first thing I did was take a picture of him like any good friend would! A chunk of Ice hit his face, we agreed that if any one asked he had a fight with two wolves and a Yeti over the quid he found in the snow earlier!

Elliott's Ice Fall

Elliott Post Icefall

One he was patched up and I was happy that he was ok, we continued up to a 'V', the left was North Gully and Right was an alternative shallow gully covered mostly in water ice, maybe a grade II. We agreed to go right given his incident and that if he did turn for the worse it would be the safer route up as we were soloing. I went first over the step, there were a dodgy placements but it wasn't too difficult. By this time the sun was out and it had turned into a nice Alpine day. the snow began to improve and Elliott then took the lead position as we headed to the top. Looking back down was a steep(ish) snow and ice chute with a couple of nasty drops, feeling of being there in the sun was like nothing else.

Elliott top gully section

Me top gully section

As we topped out, we encountered the best snow of the day on the cornice. We headed for the summit and had a chat with some climber who came up Mulled Wine (Grade II) who reported poor snow, so we chose the right route and go the ice. We descended quickly with our crampons on and after patching up Elliott again at the car we went to The Black Bull for the obligatory pint of Bluebird.

12/13 Winter Season Part 2 - Helvellyn, Sharp Edge and Great End

So after a lazy month and a very lazy Christmas, The snow returned and I bought some new winter boots so it was time to get back out there. 

Helvellyn via Striding Edge - 19.01.13

This trip is becoming a bit of an annual event for me, and early season trip up the lake district classic route of Striding Edge to Helvellyn summit and descend via Swirral Edge. Two years on the run I made the trip with Dave Hughs and Richard Barlow. Dave has a vast mountaineering experience so I use this trip to gain as much advice from his as I can. On this particular day, Richard was out GoPro photographer and we were also joined by Elliott Standfield.

It was a pretty standard trip up with some atmospheric clouds going on, we made our way along Striding Edge and there was a few inches of fresh snow but nothing to warrant sharp pointy things on our feet. As with every trip along this route, we encountered impatient walkers at the bad step.

Striding

As we approached the head wall we saw there wasn't much snow unlike last year when it was coated in a thick layer of hard nevé. At the summit we encountered a few groups of climbers topping out, but I cant imagine it would have been much fun given the powdery early season conditions. The strong wind blasted snow in my eyes which promoted me to get out the goggles to protect my contact lenses.

Swirral

The decent of Swirral had the best snow of the day and it was starting to get into condition. We had another good day in the mountains and Richard took some awesome photos. 

Sharp Edge - 26.01.13 

Myself and Elliott had another early start and headed up the M6 to Scales to make an ascent up Blencathra via Sharp edge. I knew this was a little more full on that Striding edge so as soon as I caught a glimps of its steep head wall I felt a little nervous. When we set of walking we saw a skier on the side of the fell. The snow was pretty Fresh and was waist deep at Scales Beck as we approached the tarn. We stopped at the Tarn for a quick brew and a chat to a couple of other walkers.




We made our ascent as the third group in line. The condition was bad, fresh powder made it very slippery and crampons were necessary to grip the rock. About a third of the was along, the second group had decided to turn back as the first group had decided to rope up. The made them nervous and made me nervous too, they seemed to be uncomfortable with where they were so on realising this I felt betted and we decided to solo past them. At this point I had a little slip but my axe gripped a crack in the rock and stopped me falling into the gulley bellow, Twitchy bum moment!

At the Top of the Head Wall

By time we got to the head wall the two nervous roped climbers caused a bottle neck which soon caught up with us and we encountered as few impatient people who may as well have just stood on my hands. We decided to take our time take in the views and enjoy it instead of push our way past other walkers in dangerous conditions.

Heading For the Summit

We made our was to Blencathra summit, encountering more waist deep snow and after a sandwich, we made our decent away from the crowds via the ridge of Gategill Fell, when the ridge ran out we resorted to sledging down to the bottom and then made our way to the pub.

Above Gategill Fell Ridge

Great End - 09.02.13

The previous week much of the snow had gone and decided to do something different so we had a go at the Via Ferrata at Honister Slate mine, good fun though a little tame so I think we need to head to the Dolomites. The days following brought some more snow and a good bit of freeze thaw action. On this Saturday myself and Elliott headed to Seathwaite for and ascent up Great End via Cust's Gully. Parking up at Seathwaite there were a lot of cars but didn't see many people on the way up, In fact we didn't see any one else until we go on the side of Great End. Heading up there was no snow until about 200m then hit deep snow around 400m.

Me on the first step

Heading up the side of great end to the gully we noticed a queue of three groups of climbers on Window gulley. At the bottom of Custs we bumbed into two of the Instructors from Blackpool Climbing wall (our local centre). After a chat we headed to the start of Cust's and they headed for One Pitch Gully round to the left of Cust's.

Elliott on Cust's

The snow was deep and slippery and the first big step to the start of Cust's that we struggle with last year was not there and just a snow slope. This was Elliott's First Gully so I let him lead, the snow start of soft and soon firmed up to pretty good nevé. There was that much snow that we simply stepped over the step under the chock stone; last year we had to crawl under the slab at the step!

Me on Cust's

After topping out we descended round the east keeping close to the crag and back round the front. We followed a nice traverse with crag on our left a steep drop to the right which I spotted as out decent route on the way up. With plenty of time left we decided to make another ascent, this time with me leading and we really started to feel it!

Elliott

This time we descended down the main path and found a safe slop which meant it was time to get the orange safety bags out and go sledging!

12/13 Winter Season Part 1 - Crinkle Crags & Wardsstone

I've been out there a lot over 2012 including a few brief winter adventures (Including my first grade I winter gulley (Cust's Gulley, Great End)), and my first big wall climb (C Ordinary on Dow Crag). But I've had little motivation to write about it. I have a free evening an I've been inspired by the weekends adventure so thought I would write a little bit about My winter season in the lakes.

Crinkle Crags (Lake District) - 01.12.12

The Approach

Our New Friend

As soon as the snow fell in the lakes we were up there. The last week of November there was a few days of snow and we managed to get up to the Langdales for a stunning Alpine day. After parking up on the frozen ice rink car park at The Old Dungeon Ghyll Hotel, Myself, Elliott Standfield and Sam Richardson set off on a route that we took on a rainy summers day about 6 months earlier. On that day in summer, we came across two walkers with all new expensive gear and an old out of date OS map. They were a bit confused as to where they were and ignored our advice and continued in the opposite direction to where they said they were heading so on our approach we had a joke about them still wondering about Bow Fell and we might bump into them again.

Alpine

Although the Valley was a bit chilly and frozen, the snow started about 400-600m depending on the area. We wondered up to the Crinkle Crags and found knee and even waist deep drifts in some gulleys. On this particular day I was glad of the snow as myself and Ellott had mistakenly had a heavy night so I had to periodically lie face down in the snow to soothe my head.

Our route took us up Great Knott and over the Crinkle Crags. The bad step was as interesting as usual made a little tricky with the snow in all the decent hand grips so used an axe for assistance and practised my camming technique. When we sat down to have something to eat, we were joined by Crow who seemed to have a taste for Maryland Cookies! We continued over to Bow Fell, missing out the path and scrambling up the crags through some deep drifts in the small gulleys. The Great Slab on Bow fell look stunning covered in the snow an frost though for some reason we didn't take a photo.

The fresh snow mean that this was going to be a walking day and we didn't require crampons, it would be many weeks before there was any kind of condition of climbing, but it was worth the walk for the spectacular views of the surrounding mountains in Bluebird Alpine conditions. We didn't complete our full route as the deep powder made it hard going and this was something we hadn't encountered since February so with tired legs we decided to miss out Esk Pike and head down the frozen path via Angle Tarn to the Old Dungeon Ghyll Hotel for a well earned Pint!

Angle Tarn

Wards Stone (Trough of Bowland) - 08.12.12

The Following week, Myself, Elliott Standfield, Aaron Gow and Karl Norwood headed to the Trough of Bowland just above Abbeystead to walk my annual slog that usually gets my ready for winter. The route took us from Jubilee Tower along the main road and down into a small Village marked on the map as Tarnbrook, where we met some turkeys, we guessed they weren't going to be around much longer as it was fast approaching Christmas.

We acsended up Tarnbrook fell which is the first hard slog, its not too steep, just long and the frozen path made moving uphill difficult. When we hit the fence on the top of the moore came the next slog over heather and frozen bogs. We Finally reached the kilometre wide summit plateau and stopped for a quick brew while we his from the wind behind a frozen rock.

We then made our decent from Ward's Stone rock to grit fell, again the frozen path made this a 'fun' route. We passed the the lonley conifer that, one year when I passed it, was covered in tinsel; and by this time the weather had closed in as is usually does and the sleet began.

As we descended from the summit of Grit fell, the wet snow turned to rain and the miserable damp atmosphere of the slog began to take its strain. I was happy to see Jubilee Tower and the cars appear through the dense wet cloud as this mean an end to the 10 mile walk, the warmth of a weak car heater and inevitably, a warm pub.

Scale Force and High Style 19.11.11

No more than setting off, Sam had an indecent with his hydration pack and got a bit wet! Once sorted we set off to Crummock water from Buttermere to head up top via the impressive Scale Force. The path up the side of Scale Force and Scale Beck was steep and heavy going and once out of the Beck the imposing Red Pike and even more impressive High Style appeared in the distance. The Path through the heather and seemed to keep going for ever.

Sam and Scarlett at Scale Force

 Eventually we huddled, hiding from the wind and top of Red Pike that had not bothered up on our ascent up the beck, and had a brew. The view was impressive with a low auturm sun lighting the valley. From there we headed to High Style and then along the top of combs crag where we found a shelter for some dinner and mulled wine!

Windy up Red Pike

On the ascent with Grasmoor behind

The next stop was High Crag and down to Seat via the steep shale path that is Gamlin Pass. I think Buttermere is my favourite place in the lakes, particularly High Style which was the first place I experienced a view with the steep drop down to the bottom of the valley.

Haystacks and Great Gable in the distance

Oxford & Cambridge Direct

The original plan was to continue over Haystacks, another favourite, and down Fleetwith Edge, but with light fading we decided to head back via Scarth Gap Pass. We walked through Burtness Wood alond Buttermere with high Style looking over us and finished our walk at The Fish Inn for a Pint!

Fleetwith

Crummock Water and Mellbreak

Langdales Via Jacks Rake 12.11.11

Pavey Ark From Harrison Stickle

So with an early start we set out for the Langdales to have a go at Jack's Rake before the snow and ice came. We had arranged this a couple of months in advance and going off last season's weather I was expecting it to be a little icy. Surprisingly is was a mild day and just a bit damp, I was gutted as we walked up the killer path to Stickle Tarn into the clouds and no view of Pavey Ark and the scramble we were about to climb.

Approaching Stickle Tarn

Pavey Ark From Stickle Tarn

Then as we sat at the tarn to have a brew and catch out breath the clouds began to clear and Pavey Ark and Harrison Stickle eerily emerged through the clouds towering above us. In the distance we could see a party begining their ascent, in scale they appeared to be ants climbing the side of a house. When you can't see it as you climb up the path to the tarn, you forget how big it is!

Stickle Tarn from Half way up Jack's Rake

We walked round the tarn and ascended the shale path up to the foot of Jacks Rake one last brew and prepared for our assault on the face. With it being November, we were the only group at the time we started like the previous year in April 2010 where we were in a slow shuffling line to the top. Lower down the rocks were slippy but dried out from about midway up. I noticed this year there was a lot more loose rocks, probably due to a harsh winter and increase in traffic. The group I lead had little or no climbing experience and to say they impressed me would not do them justice, they turned out to be regular mountain goats with the exposed sections not phasing them at all. About half way up a spaniel appeared, a mountaineering dog, excellent!

Jack's Rake Top Section

Bit of exposure!

After we topped out and had some dinner up top we then headed to Harrison Stickle and then Pike'o'Stickle which had a little bit more scrambling. Stood on the top of Pike'O'Stickle I can see how the Langdales are a favourite area of the Lakes for many people with the sudden steep drop down over 600m down to the bottom of the valley. We made our decent down Dungeon Ghyll to the Stickle Barn for a well deserved pint and then home!

Sam Excited by Thorn Crag!

Me and Paul on Pike'O'Stickle

Cheesy Summit Shot!

Jack's Rake Bottom Section