Adventures in Scotland: Day 3 - Curved Ridge (again)

Another day, another mountain. The previously planned day off after our attempt on Ben Nevis went by the wayside thanks to a friendly little weather forecast; having popped into the pub for a meal and talking to the barmaid, we checked out an accurate forecast which told us Wednesday would be awful, but Tuesday would be clear and dry. So the decision was made for us.

As we'd been held up by my slowness on Sunday, we decided to have another crack at Curved Ridge on Buachaille Etive Mor and actually summit this time. We set out far earlier, catching breakfast at our B&B and getting onto the walk-in for 9am just as the sun came up, in near-whiteout conditions with low lying fog blocking out the mountains, but undaunted we set off.








Eventually we reached the start of the route, after some fun but sometimes sketchy crampon-less front pointing and losing sight of Charlie (and the ascent route) several times. At about the same height (but further across) as we finished on Sunday, we started actually climbing the route, with Charlie leading the first pitch up and over the ridge. After he got safe I followed. The route was really good fun; not overly technical but challenging for someone new to mixed climbing. There was very little ice or decent snow, so most of the time my ice axe picks and crampon points were teetering on very thin rock seams or torqued into little cracks. I did have one fall, though - a bit of a swinger as I finished removing gear from the wall. My precariously positioned crampon points slipped off their hold and my only placed axe blew under the pressure. It was a bit of a tumble, and I ended up horizontal, facing the wrong way but it wasn't all bad; the line it put me on was a far easier climb, and after burying my axes in some frozen turf I hauled myself up to Charlie's belay position.

We quickly changed over gear and I belayed him on the next pitch. However, as he went up, he realised that the rest of the ridge was poor quality snow and difficult climbing - even the gully that followed next to the ridgeline was full of slushy, partially melted snow and as such was a no-go. After a bit of a discussion we decided it was best if we just cut our losses and descended. Charlie directed that instead of down-climbing the pitch we'd just ascended, we'd traverse around to the snow field we'd played on during Sunday's practice.

Despite being disappointed that we didn't complete the route, we were pleased with our maturity in making the decision to descend (the right one apparently - as we drove away an hour later the entire north face was blanketed in thick cloud) at the right time and the competence we'd both shown in both ascent, traverse and descent was a solid achievement.

Now Wednesday will definitely be a day off. We're going to go into Fort William and spend money on things we don't need. That's the best fun you can have on holiday, isn't it?





(The Adventures in Scotland series is a collection of all my posts from my first foray into winter mountaineering. Find all the others here)