The last two weeks we have had the best weather I have experienced in a Scottish winter. I am an avid reader of the blogs of the local climbing guides, and it seems pretty unanimous, that they have all been saying that these have been the best Alpine like conditions for a quater of a century.
It's not always possible to get out when the conditions are favourable, and work has been taking up a rather large part of daylight hours for the whole of this year to be truthful, but on Monday I had agreed to head up to the North Face of Ben Nevis with a mate Jordan and do a route.
We decided on Ledge Route - a straightforward winter grade II - but it's location, length and the panorama from the whole of the ridge, make it one of the best routes of its grade in Scotland.
My old Scarpa boots had served me well for a number of years, but have never been perfect, and a few weeks ago, I had bought a pair of superb La Sportiva Baturas. Bright yellow, built in gaitors - they really are the mutts nuts. This was my first outing in them.
Jordan pulled the old 'my rucksack isn't big enough' card, so I ended up carrying the rope as well as a rack of gear, and off we set from the North face carpark. The trudge up from the carpark to the CIC hut is seriously tedious - steeply uphill on a trail for 600 m, and in that short time I ended up with a monster blister on each heel. All that walking around the house in the new boots did nothing in letting me work out if I was going to blister up in them - note to self - start taping those heels again.
So for the rest of the day I had rather painful feet, but that in no way diminished the beauty of the day. We headed up the ridge, perfect neve, some areas of solid ice, cracking views, a picnic half way enjoying the views, topping out , and heading down No. 4 gully, Little more to say other than check out these photos........
