The mountains of my life: Ben Nevis

This blog post is part of a series of articles on mountains that have a special significance for me. See also: Bowfell, Tryfan, Stob Ban, Castor, and Aonach Dubh.

Like most people, I first climbed Ben Nevis via the Pony Track: a relentless grind up the bleak western flanks of the mountain. It was only my second visit to Scotland, in September 2006. I had only climbed a handful of Munros to date, but I was ambitious and impatient to build up my mountaineering credentials,. Ben Nevis seemed like the natural choice.

I was staying in Glen Nevis and had just ticked off the Ring of Steall in a two day lightweight bivvying expedition. Blisters plagued me and the forecast was terrible, but undeterred I crossed the River Nevis at Achintee and set forth on the adventure. 

The Pony Track is an unrelenting grind up a stony zig-zag. The difficulty of the walking is very low, but it goes on and on; even on a fine day, it's unlikely to be memorable for aesthetic reasons. People climb the Pony Track simply to get to the highest point of the UK. It's far more useful to climbers as a quick way down.

A gap in the cloud

I got to the summit in thick mist, saw a lot of stones, and thought to myself that Ben Nevis wasn't that good a mountain after all. I naively thought I had 'done' Ben Nevis, but as I would come to appreciate over the next few years, I had seen only a tiny proportion of this grand mountain.

~ FIRST EXPERIENCE OF THE NORTH FACE ~

James climbing the lower steps of Castle Ridge

By early 2008, James and I were getting into more serious climbing and we decided to revisit Ben Nevis. Our trip coincided with some grand conditions on the North Face and we selected Castle Ridge as our first route. At the time we had some experience on Grade II climbs but had never attempted a III before. Castle Ridge would be our first.

Me belaying above the crux

We were fortunate to find the ridge in benign condition: a thick lathering of powder on top of old, firm neve, and the rocks largely free of rime ice. However, several sections were quite difficult and I climbed the infamous crux chimneys after a committing battle. Nowadays this section is frequently given a technical grade of 4 and Castle Ridge has a reputation as a 'cruxy' III. Nevertheless, both of us managed to heave ourselves over this fierce obstacle. The rest of the ridge was easy.

~ LEDGE ROUTE ~

I had previously scrambled up Ledge Route (the easiest climb on the North Face) in summer 2008 with the UEA Fell Club, and was keen to try the route out in winter conditions. It's one of the best Grade II climbs in Scotland and frequently soloed. At that time I hadn't done much soloing in winter, but headed up there in the first week of December with my bivvy bag. It snowed heavily overnight (waking up was certainly uncomfortable!) and getting to the start of the route required a bit of a wade.

Post-route photo. At that time I climbed in a ragged old garment which became known as the "Death Smock." It wasn't waterproof but it was very lightweight!

Ledge Route became a favourite, and in 2009, 2010 and 2011 I managed to climb it after the first snowfall of the winter (usually October).

~ THE CMD ARETE ~

May 2009

Ask any ambitious mountain walker which is the best way up Ben Nevis, and 9 out of 10 will tell you it's the CMD Arete. This shapely ridge connects Ben Nevis with the peak of Carn Mor Dearg and provides a link with the chain stretching east to the Grey Corries. The route is technically easy but has a distinctive elegance and is a coveted route for aspiring mountaineers.

I first traversed the arete on a beautiful morning in May 2009. The previous day I had bivouacked in the huge corrie east of Aonach Beag, and in the early hours I climbed a Grade III ice route on the immense North Face: perfect ice and deep snow, but with the constant risk of avalanche in the rapidly warming conditions. From Aonach Beag I made my way over to Carn Mor Dearg and paced out the arete before crossing the summit of Ben Nevis and making my way back down to Glen Nevis. It was an unforgettable journey, made more special by the unusually good late winter conditions.

The view of the Ben's North Face from the arete is unsurpassed from any other viewpoint. In this photo you can get an idea of the sheer scale of this wall.

I went back and crossed the CMD Arete for a second time in November 2009 with my friend and fellow wanderer Isi Oakley. Conditions were very different that day - more atmospheric, less Alpine. The sunset from the summit was sheer magic and I have never seen light like it before or since.

~ THE GREAT RIDGES OF NEVIS ~

The Ben's North Face throws down a brace of ridges into the corrie beneath, several of which are steeped in legend and mystique. By summer 2009 I had already climbed the lesser two of these ridges (Ledge Route and Castle Ridge) but three remained: the world famous Tower Ridge, the gigantic North East Buttress, and the relatively obscure but technically challenging Observatory Ridge. That summer I would tick off two of these ridges.

I climbed Tower Ridge on my birthday, the 3rd of June 2009, and once again Ben Nevis delivered an unforgettable day out.

Me beneath the final tower

Winter still gripped the cliffs, but reports indicated most of the snow had gone from Tower Ridge. Isi and I opted for a lightweight approach: we took only a 100ft rope and no technical equipment, although I opted for rigid boots and a long ice axe in case any steps needed to be cut. Most of the ridge was indeed bare rock, although the cave pitch was filled up with hard ice that needed to be cut to allow a through passage.

Isi in Tower Gap

These were the days before the Tower Gap rockfall and we negotiated this infamous obstacle with relative ease. Nowadays a block has been detached which makes descending into the Gap more difficult.

Once again we topped out to stunning views over the mountains of Lochaber, and descended at speed. We reached Glen Nevis before 11am - a truly fast and light expedition!

James and I returned to tackle the North East Buttress a few weeks later. This ridge is quite a bit longer and harder than Tower Ridge, and thanks to its lower level of traffic maintains a slightly wilder feel. On Tower Ridge the right way is rarely in doubt; on NE Buttress a labyrinth of possible routes stretches out ahead of the climber, and the hard bits are much harder!

The gargantuan outline of NE Buttress, one of the biggest rock climbs in the UK

We wasted a lot of time just trying to find the First Platform, hidden behind the back of the ridge, but once we found the start of the route we made good time.

James changing footwear at the First Platform

"Es geht?"

I enjoyed the NE Buttress tremendously. Although we took more modern kit and pitched more of the route, it felt like a good old-fashioned rock climb: noble, defined, and ending at a major summit. The difficulties were testing but not too dangerous, and famous pitches such as the Mantrap and the 40 Foot Corner lived up to their reputations. I found myself incapable of surmounting the Mantrap and was forced to avoid it by a dodge to the right.

The 40 Foot Corner

~ FURTHER TRIPS TO THE BEN IN WINTER ~

I never climbed on Ben Nevis again in summer, but returned several times in the winter months to sample the almost limitless possibilities for ice climbing contained within the various corries of the North Face.

Over the years I climbed South and North Gullies, failed on Raeburn's Easy Route thanks to windslab, and enjoyed yet another unforgettable climb on No.2 Gully in May 2010. I'll let the pictures speak for themselves. Ben Nevis has always given me quality days out, and even when the weather gods decline to provide the coveted blue skies and sparking ice, the atmosphere of the cliffs never fails to inspire awe.

South Gully (III)

North Gully (II)

No.2 Gully (II)

Raeburn's Easy Route (II)

Ledge Route in October conditions

No.2 Gully in May

The monster cornice of No.2 Gully

The author about to face the cornice pitch

So there you have it. I have climbed on Ben Nevis many times over the years and it remains a favourite mountain, but it's obvious to any climber that I have only just scratched the surface of the climbing potential on these cliffs. I have yet to climb Observatory Ridge, or any of the classic ice gullies, and I think that's what is truly special about this mountain: there is always more to do and look forward to, regardless of your grade.

The mountains of my life: Aonach Dubh West Face

This blog post is part of a series of articles on mountains that have a special significance for me. See also: Bowfell,Tryfan, Stob Ban, and Castor.

Aonach Dubh. For me the very name has the ring of adventure about it. This mountain wall in Glencoe faces west and is vast in scale, divided by near-impossible gullies into a series of battlements, turrets, terraces, rakes, and a hundred lonely and hopeless places where humans rarely venture.

The West Face was the first object to catch my attention on my initial visit to Glencoe in January 2007, and over the coming years I waged a determined campaign to explore this sublime and frequently baffling place. In many ways the West Face came to personify my life in Glencoe and became something of an obsession for me.

This page from my Glencoe crag book perhaps illustrates what I mean by 'obsession':

~ THE LURE OF THE OBSCURE ~

On B-F Buttress

My first climb on the West Face was conducted on a wet and stormy October morning in 2008. My partner in crime was Rachael Murphy, an old friend from my university mountaineering days, and the route we selected was a little-known Grade 3 scramble known simply as B - F Buttress Route. Neither of us understood the confusing topography of the cliffs and from the very start it intimidated us. Our route proved to be a brutal struggle largely consisting of vertical squirming through mud-choked chimneys and pulling on clumps of grass instead of the clean rock holds we had expected.

It was an old-fashioned adventure and I absolutely loved it!

Rach enjoying typical West Face conditions

The pinnacle on F Buttress (Amphitheatre S Ridge)

Routes on this cliff rarely go straight from bottom to top. They weave from side to side, and are as much about the voyage as they are the destination. Prior knowledge of features such as the Middle Ledge, which traverses a series of undercut walls, or the Rake, which is blocked by a formidable barrier called the Great Slab, are essential to any ascent of the wall. Some places, such as the Amphitheatre, are impossible to escape without knowing the correct way. It's a serious place to climb, and I soon began to seek out the more unknown routes, always climbing alone.

The Great Slab. This evil slab of rock is treacherous in descent
and is the source of epic avalanches in winter.

Into the gloom in No.3 Gully

Cragrats sometimes come here, usually to the clean vertical sweep of rock on E Buttress, but rarely venture to the more obscure and vegetated buttresses where nailed boots and a long ice axe are a distinct advantage (even in summer!) It's a lonely cliff which echoes with the cries of ravens but rarely hears the tramp of boots in quantity.

The author alone with his thoughts in the vastness of the Amphitheatre

No.2 Gully Buttress, one of my less significant explorations

I started leaving the guidebook behind at some point in 2009 and began seeking out the routes which had never been climbed (or, at least, the ones which had left no evidence of previous ascent). A small number of minor and esoteric new routes in the lower grades bear the first ascent credits of A. Roddie in the journals of the Scottish Mountaineering Club.

~ THE DISCOVERY OF SHRIKE RIDGE ~

Me leading the razor arete on the third recorded ascent of Shrike Ridge in June 2010

If I have a finest hour as a mountaineer, this is it. In September 2009 I set out alone onto the cliff with a will to explore the sharp ridges of F Buttress, only one of which is documented. As I was to discover, the central arete is a fine climb and has subsequently become a minor classic at the grade - and one of the finest easy routes on the entire mountain.

Shrike is the obvious straight edge in the middle

I climbed the initial arete with a rising sense of commitment. The technical standard is nowhere excessively high - it weighs in at Difficult, or rather easy by modern standards - but the exposure is fierce and at one point the ridge is only a few inches wide, with a big drop on both sides and only a wobbly spike for the feet! One particular move is extremely committing and it took time for me to summon up the courage to make it. Even on my second visit, with a rope and my brother James on the other end for safety, I found it difficult.

This route is no pushover but the integrity of the line and the quality of the rock, unusual for this side of Aonach Dubh, make it a superb adventure. The first ascent remains one of my finest days out on the West Face and a moment of pride in my mountaineering career.

~ NEAR-DISASTERS ~

Avalanche conditions on the Middle Ledge

I've already mentioned that Aonach Dubh is a serious cliff. During my time at the Clachaig we saw headtorches of climbers stuck on the mountain several times, and I've also had my fair share of epics and near-disasters.

In 2008 I became cragfast while descending Dinnertime Buttress. I had spent over an hour helping a lost walker on the summit of Bidean and was late for work, so was hurrying in my descent of this easy scramble. A combination of poor visibility and ice on the rocks caused me to lose my way, and I found myself wedged into a funnel-shaped chimney, unable to move! It would have been funny if it hadn't been so frightening, and it took me almost an hour to extricate myself (which I succeeded in doing by removing my rucksack and dropping it down a ravine). Needless to say, I was late for the start of my shift.

In 2009 I was avalanched after retreating from unstable snow conditions during an attempt on C Buttress. The avalanche was terrifying to behold. It began simultaneously in Gullies 2 and 3 and swept towards me as I descended the grassy front of B Buttress. Fortunately most of the force had been expended by the time it hit me, but a wave of snow washed over the front of the buttress and sent me cartwheeling some sixty feet down the slope. I survived with nothing worse than a few bruises and a lost mobile phone.

Finally, in February 2009, the most harrowing incident of all! I have already written up an account of the Pinnacle Face Incident so I won't repeat it here.

~ THE DISCOVERY OF 2B SCOOP ~

2B Scoop (I/II)

One of the challenges of climbing on the West Face, particularly before a shift behind the bar at the Clachaig, was choosing an escape route. Prior to my discovery of 2B Scoop, I believed there to be only two easy escapes from the wall: go a long way left across avalanche-prone slopes to Dinnertime Buttress, or aaaaalll the way right past F Buttress and into Coire Bheith (a big detour also across avalanche terrain). In January 2010, after climbing the ice route No.3 Gully, by chance I discovered a tiny little gully veering left into the slabby rocks above No.2 Gully Buttress. I investigated, and by chance discovered a short easy route on snow at about Grade I/II which provided a shortcut to the easy slope of Stob Coire nan Lochan above.

This discovery was minor in the annals of Scottish mountaineering - it barely deserves a footnote at best, and has probably been climbed before and left unrecorded - but for me it made a huge impact. Suddenly short climbs on the Middle Tier before a 3 o'clock start at work were feasible. No longer would I have to worry about crossing lethal slopes laden with unstable snow and waiting to avalanche. In the following few months I made use of this shortcut many times and its presence was a great source of comfort to me, although in a perverse way it took some of the spice out of climbing on the cliff!

~ THE GREAT AVALANCHE OF 2010 ~

Part of the crown wall at the top of the face. The slabs of snow broke away from this point.

In 2010, after a particularly harsh winter with low temperatures and a great deal of snow, the West Face was struck by an avalanche of vast scale. Thousands of tons of snow broke free from the upper slopes and swept the wall, emptying itself into the gullies and ravines below.

Locals were heard to say that they had seen nothing of the like in living memory, and one Mountain Rescue volunteer of my acquaintance proclaimed that anyone climbing on the cliff at the time would certainly have perished. Fortunately there were no casualties, although the enormous floes of snow in the corrie beneath remained in evidence right into April.

Another crown wall in No.2 Gully

Debris floes in Coire Bheith

When I walked through Coire Bheith weeks after the avalanche I was astonished to see smashed trees, boulders shifted around, and entire watercourses hidden under metres of snow. These mountains may be small by global standards but they have punch!

~ AN OLD FRIEND ~

In summer splendour

For all its glowering moods and ferocity, I have nothing but the greatest of respect and fondness of this mountain. Every morning for nearly three years I opened my curtains and looked out on the cliff. It became, quite simply, part of the framework of my mind. I would spend hours every week just looking at it, getting to know it in every weather, learning its ins and outs before I even set foot on its perplexing ways. At work I would peer out of the window when I got a spare moment in between serving meals, and there it would be, looking back at me.

Aonach Dubh is an old friend, and although it has done its best to kill me more than once I think of it as a benign figure which has enriched my life and given me dozens of happy memories. Every walker or climber has a particular hill or crag they get to know better than any other - one which fills them with delight whenever they come back, and yet can always surprise them. The West Face of Aonach Dubh is mine, and I like the fact that no matter how many times I might return, I will never get to know it completely.

From my old bedroom window in the Clachaig

The mountains of my life - Castor, my first Alpine peak

~ My brother James and Castor in the Swiss Alps ~

This blog post is part of a series of articles on mountains that have a special significance for me. See also: Bowfell, Tryfan and Stob Ban.

By early 2007 I was immersed in the culture and history of mountaineering. I had climbed in the Lake District, Snowdonia, and been to Scotland several times. I had climbed Ben Nevis, been winter mountaineering in Glencoe, and stopped off at the Clachaig for a pint after a long day on the hill. In short, I was well on the way to becoming a mountaineer.

But two words challenged and provoked me, kept me awake at night. Those two words were the Alps. I dreamed about gigantic snowy mountains. I read stories of the pioneers, wished I could have been in Zermatt in 1865 when Edward Whymper and his companions set out to climb the Matterhorn. Out there in that vast expanse of ice and cold and searing heat, I felt certain, was where I belonged. I was determined to make it happen.

July 2007

After months of planning, my brother James and I finally made it to Zermatt in the heart of the Swiss Alps.  Everything I knew about the town was based on Whymper's classic Scrambles Amongst the Alps; consequently I had expected a small and isolated community, albeit one friendly to tourists with a hotel or two and a train station.

The reality in the early 21st century is quite different. It's a frantic, cosmopolitan place--a clash of cultures and times. Ancient and modern meet in a fascinating blend of the heroic 19th century and the present day. Zermatt has a MacDonalds and every modern convenience you could wish for, and yet all you have to do is slip away from the main street and explore the little alleys and courtyards just away from the centre of the town, and you're back in the 19th century again.

Cars are forbidden here. The hotels operate electric buggies to convey guests from the station to their rooms, although the grander establishments still have horse-drawn carriages.

Modern Zermatt

Zermatt inspired me like no place I had ever been to. Everywhere I walked, I could sense the past just beneath the surface, influencing the present.

Our ultimate objective for the trip was Castor / Il Castore, a huge peak standing at 4,230m above sea level--well above the level of the perpetual snows. It was first climbed in 1861 during the Golden Age of Alpine exploration, although for a modern climber it is not a difficult proposition, being a simple glacier ascent with few specific difficulties. We spent the first week and a half of the trip preparing for this ascent by acclimatising on lower mountains and gradually building up our skills and fitness.

Lyskamm, Pollux, and Castor (right) from the Breithorn Pass

Castor is some distance from Zermatt. To get there, most modern climbers use the ski lift from the town to the summit of Klein Matterhorn, a peaklet next to the bulk of Breithorn. From there, an easy glacier crossing leads to Rossi Volante, a hut on the Swiss/Italian border.

Bivacco Rosse-Volante m. 3700

We reached Rossi Volante after a trek of a few hours across the glacier. Neither or us had ever been on a glacier before, and it was quite an experience. Fresh snow had covered any crevasses but nevertheless we roped up in the approved fashion as a safeguard against falling through any hidden snow bridges. Fortunately a well-trodden piste marked the correct way around the back of the Breithorn.

The author abseiling down
to the hut

We soon discovered that Rossi Volante was not much of a hut--more a tiny little wooden box bolted to the side of a cliff. Getting to the hut proved to be an interesting exercise. Theoretically it would have been possible to climb down the slope beneath us, but the sun was fierce and the snow was in a terrible condition. We decided to abseil.

Apparently a chain is normally in place to act as an anchor, but it was hidden under the fresh snow. We excavated a 'snow bollard' and took turns to abseil down the slope of 50 degree slush and rubble. I hadn't done too many abseils before and it was all very exciting!

The hut sleeps twelve in squalor, and is furnished with a variety of rotting mattresses and a picnic table (which takes up about a quarter of the room inside). There were holes in the floor and the snow around the hut had obviously been used as a toilet by previous occupants. Fortunately we were the only residents, and we spread our gear around to prepare for the night.

Sleeping is difficult at high altitude. Breathing is rapid, and it's difficult to become relaxed enough to drift off. The sounds of the mountain and the creaking of the hut kept us awake. By the time 3am came round we were glad to get up and get on with the day.

Collecting ice for the 3am brew

The temperature was a long way below freezing outside and we both wore our insulated down jackets for the descent to the glacier. Picking a route down to the bottom of the cliff proved to be a complex job in the dark, and after faffing around for a while we ended up descending a snow slope that had obviously avalanched at some point in the recent past. Instead of rapidly soloing down this slope we decided to do it the British way with roped pitches. It wasted some time, but at that point in our climbing careers we weren't confident enough to solo steep snow in the dark (a skill required of every Alpinist!)

The sun came up soon enough, and we were treated to the spectacular vision of Alpenglow at dawn. Light burst above the distant Dauphine range and Mont Blanc shone like a new penny on the far horizon. It was a moment of wonder for us both.

Our first Alpine dawn

The West Face of Castor reared up ahead of us: a huge wall of snow and ice, seamed by crevasses and topped by a crest painted gold by the first rays of dawn. To our inexperienced eyes it was an Everest, but from my present perspective, looking back on it after years of climbing in Scotland, it was a straightforward if longish Grade I snow plod.

"Es geht?"

Me climbing the last few metres to the ridge

The ascent was relatively uneventful. A few other early birds were following the same trail: two ahead of us and a few behind. The piste zig-zagged to and fro across the slope and, I confess, was a little monotonous, but the unfolding view more than compensated. Breathing grew more difficult in the thin air and a few rests had to be taken. Near the summit ridge we encountered a crevasse which was spanned by a bold step, and then only a few metres of steepening snow lay between us and victory.

Breaking out onto the summit ridge of Castor was one of life's most memorable events. I stood on a tightrope of snow the width of a railway sleeper. Behind me lay the vast gulf of the West Face, ahead the even more precipitous drop to the Gornergletscher miles beneath. A panorama of jagged peaks opened up all of a sudden on all sides, a realm of snow rising above the summer green in the valley further below than I would have thought possible. For the first time in my life I stood on a mountain top above 4,000m. It was a defining moment.

The author on the summit ridge of Castor

James trying to coil the frozen rope

The view from the summit could not have been more spectacular, and to this day I don't think I have seen a finer one. The overwhelming sense was one of the sheer depth, of scale: the chasm below us was truly vast, and the mountains on either side, even higher than the pinnacle on which we stood, spoke of future challenges and a lifetime of adventure yet to be enjoyed.

We descended in good time, picked up our gear from the hut, and raced back to Klein Matterhorn in time for the cablecar down to the valley. To say we were pleased with ourselves would be an understatement; we had climbed our first 4,000m peak and lived to tell the tale! I think our expedition to climb Castor is a perfect example of all that is good about mountaineering. It wasn't about technically difficult climbing, it was simply about the sheer enjoyment of getting to the top of an aesthetically stunning peak.

This wasn't the last time we climbed Castor. The next year we returned and climbed it as part of a longer expedition to Lyskamm. On our way to this higher peak we had to climb Castor not only once, on the way there, but also on the way back to the hut! Now that was a big day out...

Looking back to Castor and Mont Blanc