UKH

I'm in temporary exile abroad and didn't get to "enjoy" a single pitch of winter climbing this year. Now that the season is almost over, make me jealous with your best moments/routes/epic retreats.

I've not got much to make you jealous, it's been a really poor season in the NW.

Hacking our way up Taxus (III) back in Jan during a very icy week was quite something. Topping out on a perfectly clear day with not too much snow. I hear the late season for the last couple of weeks has been great for the ice routes.

Sorry for your loss.

My highlight is easy, it's the only route I got done! Having a lot of trouble with my feet and took me weeks to recover from it. Nice little route though and good to get on some Welsh ice. 

Cleft Gully (V 6)

If it's any consolation I've had my poorest winter in years. Mainly due to work but weather and conditions haven't helped....

You back for next winter? That's were I've copy and pasted all my hopes and dreams!

Just getting started in winter climbing but managed three gully routes which have all been fun in their own right. Very addictive. Probably Central Gully on Diamond Buttress in Glencoe was most favourite, just deep cold and silence. 

I'm going to Lochaber in a week, so it might not even be over yet, but probably for me getting a proper route, George (IV 4), done in early December, in North Wales (third December in a row now for an early season Welsh winter tick), with two good mates was stand out. Top day out with great chats making the 6 hours driving there and back and decentish walk in/out a pleasure. But traversing Beinn Alligin in fresh snow and sunshine, taking my son around the Snowdon Horseshoe for his first time in crampons and taking my route tally for Coire an Lochain from zero routes to five routes (two easy ones in descent) in two days all are up there too. 

quite a few to choose from for me. Special moments included sitting on the Ben Nevis plateau having my sandwiches with not a breath of wind and a temp of 4 degress in an inversion, having done 3 routes with hardly anyone climbing. Another was also having my lunch on a little promentary just down from the NE Ridge of Aonach Beag staring at the huge East face with a raven circling overhead.  Or the most fabulous cloud inversion from Aonach Beag having come up the East Face from the bottom.  Or escaping the bowels of Tower Cleft with the spindrift pouring down, or a perfect sunny day soloing 4 routes on Bidean and Stob Coire nam Beith with no-one else in the coire, or the Climbers Traverse on the Napes with not a soul around and deep snow making it truly Alpine, or plodding through magical deep snow up Longsleddale and round the Kentmere Horseshoe when everyone got stuck in Ambleside.

Had a lovely crisp clear day on Postern Variation (VI 6) mid January. It went rapidly downhill from there!

After 2 previous visits, 3rd time lucky sending my new line on Ben Lomond.

Agree, season Started well November, went downhill from first week December onwards! 

Stuart 

Any more details? 

I had a miserable Winter last year, partly due to the continually grim weather and lack of sun, so I just had to get out this year.  Thankfully we've had some decent sunny days, even though I never made it to Torridon or Skye again (both top of my list for visits).  Every day out for me has had its moments, with the good weather contributing to my general sense of joy to be out in the mountains.  Axes are still out and I'm hoping there're a few weeks of Winter left yet.  If I had to pick one highlight, it's probably my second time climbing the Ceannacroc Couloir ten years after the first, and in lovely weather this time.  

I did The Overseer Direct at the end of November and thought 'This is awesome, climbing well (for me) in November, this could be THE YEAR!'

It wasn't though.

I had some great days with friends mostly revisiting some classics, but probably the best day out was Taxus, when we had the corrie to ourselves, with one of my sons as his first winter route. 

A return for me after too many years off. Not a lot done to be honest. Ive been trying to hone rope solo technique for winter climbing. I feel I'm too old these days to solo but still really enjoy being up there alone. I did a few short new routes each two pitches and only III but next winter I have a couple of plans for harder lines.

I know it's a bit of a faff but you can hone your technique to work quickly. You never have rope drag as the line is fixed. (No need to extend runners) No need for cold belays as your straight down clearing the pitch before the next.

Feck it's got to have some benefits!

I'd say doing the Cardinal on Beinn a'Bhurid was pretty memorable (I'm not a fan of the modern usage of 'epic'!). Trying to align all the factors to be able to attempt a route like that is really difficult (for me anyway), so when it does happen its pretty satisfying, especially in the context of other life shit going on.

An hour and half bike ride in the drizzle to the howff on the sunday, a more than 18 hour round trip to do the route from the bothy on the monday (another probably 3 hours of trudging in the drizzle), and back at the car about 1am on the tuesday. It felt like an appropriately long outing for one of the first ascensionists routes too! There was a point about 3 pitches from the top at night fall, with the wind picking up and vis dropping, where it certainly felt pretty out there.... Great trading stories and memories with Roger afterwards too.

The relief at finishing the crux pitch of Trail of Tears knowing we were going to get up the route was a close second though..... I think I put it on my UKC wishlist in about 2008 and spent years either not being able to sort a partner, understanding the conditions or just being too intimidated.

Amazing, yeah everything coming together for the cardinal is as good as it gets!

Pulling the last hard bit and coming into balance on Blood, Sweat and FT for sure. Wasn’t sure I was going to be up to it at all and felt a heavy pressure (self inflicted) setting off on the last pitch after Milo and Rob had done their bit already.

I spent about 20 minutes of precious daylight trying to figure that last bit out, and eventually managed it by the help of a steinpull (which makes any route more memorable). Pulling onto that ledge and then knowing a grade V corner was all that was left, a huge wave of relief and joy overtook me and I could finally enjoy myself. The boys followed on in increasingly stormy weather but managed to beat the darkness by minutes, big embraces afterwards. Despite trying hard, Rob still hasn’t managed to benight me! 

The Guillotine on Carn Etchachan was also a big highlight, so much good climbing and my first trip to the crag. Some introduction! 

Rope soloing is winter is something I've not heard of for ages, maybe since reading about Alan Mullin in Crazy Sorrow! I'm interested to hear how your system works? Do you have to wind-proof it a bit more to avoid tangles with any rope loops?

My friends Will, Iain and Rob finally climbed the Fiddler's Nose after eyeing it up for the last 5 years so there must have been a couple of good moments at least! Thanks for helping to minimise my FOMO though.

Yes, there were a few good spells but mostly mid week or other times I couldn't get out.

Haha good effort on BSFT! If you're reading this Rob then enjoy climbing routes by daylight while you still can, I'll be back soon to drag you into the darkness..

I love Etchachan upper tier, it's in condition pretty much as often as the norries but you get the crag to yourself more often than not. There are some niche VIs there which are right up your street. I was just about to say you should take a look at Pythagoras but it's already on your wishlist! I thought it looked incredibly unlikely for that grade when I was scoping it out from half way up nathrach dubh.

Yup Alan’s efforts on Centurion (some story, that is epic!) and Rolling Thunder (I do wonder if some aid were used…) were mega impressive.

Think your probably aware of what we were up to Murray, but here's a couple highlights:

Think I lucked out this winter really. Unemployed for the first half which I thought wasn't too bad weather wise, then starting work seemed to coincide with a couple of the only good weather weekends it seemed we had!

- The Citadel was a real highlight, just don't think single day adventures come much better than that anywhere in the world! And going from a couple seasons ago it seeming totally unachievable to it now being the right side of enjoyable was very satisfying!

- Our trip to coigach to climb The Nose . We did it in a total storm, what will stick with me was actually having an easy day next day on stac pollaidh and seeing the whole landscape for a breif minute in a break in the weather.

- BS&FT, as much for the route but also the stars aligned to climbe it with Milo who was visiting from America for less than a week!

- Feeling like we pulled a blinder by going to Skye and finding great weather and conditions (a lot of luck involved!) while many inland crags were reported as not great. A winter route on Skye always feels special!

I've kind of avoided the days that were really windy or went the opposite side from strong gusts. Down side of that is obviously soft snow accumulations on the other side.

I keep two cache loops on 3 to 5m loops. Adjusted when reaching below a difficult section and adjusted above when comfortable to do so. I've been using cord slings occasionally attached to runners to prevent rope back feed and keep the line tight against the face. No slack in the system. I will be ditching this for plastic clips holding the rope as the former is a pain to do gloved. When the line is set up correctly tight against the face with no slack in the system it feels quite reassuring.

Topping out central buttress on Beinn Eighe at 8:30pm on NYE and making back down to the Ling hut for the bells was pretty cool. Proper long route in great condition. 
 

Watching Huw pull a pretty crazy lead out of the bag on the crux of Trapeze will also live very long in the memory. 
 

Blue Rinse in amazing condition back in December probably will go down as the best single pitch I’ve done. 

Came back to do some winter climbing this year, after quite a long break. I managed to finally complete Tower Ridge in pretty reasonable, if slightly lean, conditions. 

I'm in the US for about another year and half, so I'm banking a lot of psyche for the winter of 2025!

In reply to entire thread:

Thanks for the stories, I loved to hear them all. I totally agree Rob, winter climbing in scotland is the best climbing adventure experience in the world in the single day / 0-4000ft / traditionally protected / reasonable avalanche risk / easy walk-off category.

Yeah that does sound nuts, keen to hear the full move by move story of trapeze some time! I also was blown away by how fun blue rinse was, that enormous turf bulge low down is like something from a dry tooling comp, let alone the roof.

Added it to the wishlist after reading your blog post about Nathrach Dubh, both looked good from Guillotine and will be back there next season hopefully!

Hope the States is treating you well.

Had a belting week in the NW in January. Good routes on An Teallach and Liathach in good company and stellar weather (Thanks to UKC user AlexTheAlex for the mint photo).

My one climbing trip was dominated by a week of wet windy and warm weather with absolutely no snow for nearly the whole trip however I had some amazing backpacking trips early in the season with an extended Locharber traverse at the end of November and a beautiful if somewhat eventful trip to the Crianlarich Munros . 

Was snowshoeing in the alps at xmas and got overtaken on ascent by 3 'lycra hikers' - Salomon trainers, tights, technical baselayer, down gilet, headband, 10 litre camelbak pack - you know the sort. An hour later on the side of the ski piste I heard a shout and looked up to see one of them come flying down it on their arse, followed seconds later by another, then the third. The first one went a good 200m before disappearing from view around a corner, the other two went about 150m.  We picked up the poles they'd lost and returned them to them. That was the most interesting thing, managed to have type 1 fun on the two other occasions I went up mountains - blue skies, no crowds .