Aonach Mor again..

Well we had an impromptue day off. Stewie and Ian got up early for a day on the Ben but turned back due to bad weather. We had decided on another day to Aonach Moor, but again it was raining which dampened everyones enthusiasm (apart from mine, I was grumpy so I filed stuff). We filled our day with Lazing around, a trip to Fort William and some more spa treatment. Both of us planned to try again the next day.

Stewie and Ian did get up early again and head off before we'd even got up. Me, Toaf and Andy where planning to catch the 8 o'clock climbers cable car up. We almost didn't make it and had to run across the car park. I think we were the last ones they let up. As we walked off towards the charlift this time, all the other teams seemed to head for the west face od Aonoch Moor. This had the most favourable avalanche forcast (ie low). We'd planned to head up to Aonoch Moor north face again and do Typhoon and maybe Left twin. The cable car wasn't actaully open when we got to it but Andy had a polite word with the guy running it and he started it up and cleared the ice off the machinery. When he checked our tickets it turned out that we'd only brought cable car and not chairlift tickets. Bummer! He offered us a £1.50 each for the chairlift and we gladly accepted.

Our getting on and off the cable car went fine as we'd practised the day before, however Andy dropped his gloves off just as we left...and I got the blame!

The weather was awesome on the walk up to the gearing up point. We had excellent views of the Ben and almost alpine clear skies (there was some cloud on the move in). The walk really didn't tate that long, but it seemed so much long than the day before when we didn't have a whiteout to deal with. We took our time gearing up being the first to arrive and headed off to easy gully. Now we'd abseiled off a snow bollard last time, which wasn't there. I asked them both if they'd ever dug one before and no-one had. I opted to rappell in first because one I'm the heaviest, but two because I was making the snow bollard so if It didn't work then it would be my own fault. I played it conservative making it 4 metres wide and about just over a foot deep. Then clipped in and abseiled off.

The cornice broke as I stepped on it. Thankfully it wasn't to big and I only fell a little, but I wish I'd done up my jacket and put my hood up. I got fiulled up with spindrift and yelled a warning of my mistake up to Toaf and Andy. They heeded this warning as they came down. We podded off in deeper snow that the day before. We found the base of Typhoon (grade IV,5) easy enough. The amount of snow that was at the base (waist deep) prompted me to write off Left Twin as I figured it would be under snow. I'm not psyched by podding up snow. I took the first pitch. Today we had 60m ropes and better weather for the moment. I ran up pretty easy snow and ice placing a few pieces of gear but mainly running it out in a effort to save time, then I was confronted with the crux.

The crux was a chinmey/squeeze/groove. It was wide enough to get my axes in and my arms, but my body was forced out. Had it been solid ice all the way up the back it would have been easier, but there was alot of exposed rock and thin icey cracks. In went a torque nut at the base and up I climbed. I could see a great place to belay just above me, when I would have topped out the groove. tenuous placements above gear lead up the a slight rest where I bashed in my mixed hook and clipped a screamer to hit. I remember thinking "well you better not fall off, don't want to use up a screamer". By now I had my axes in good ice covered turf above me, but my feet didn't seem to want to go anywhere? I tried lots f placements, usually ending in a scraping of metal on rock until I got a monopoint on a tiny crack on the right wall, opposed against my back on left wall. This was enough and I hauled up on my axes shifting my hands up the shafts to get higher. I managed to get a frontpoint into the frozen turf and I knew I'd done it.

"On belay", then and Toaf was climbing. Toaf climbed well up the easy snow and ice to below the chimney/groove crux. Here he just stopped. I could see it in his face that he's already resided to the fact that he wasn't going to climb it. I gave him as much encouragment as I could, but Toaf hates mixed climbing. I found out later that he preferes climbing snow. He yelled for a lower off and said he'd walk round. He wanted us to carry on with the climb and he said he's meet us at the top. I think I told he I expect a cup of tea ready for when we topped out. Andy then came up. He had a little difficulty with the groove and topping out of it (something along the line of me grabbing his harness to give him a hand. I remember his yelled "stick god dammit it stick" as his knee refused to get purchase on the ice. We figured after that there might be a market for knee crampons.

We swapped the gear and Andy took the next pitch. It was now we realised that Toad had walked round with a couple of runners and bit of gear. By now our alpine clear skies had gone and the weather had moved in, Yay for whiteout conditions! Andy started up the pitch but his front points didn't want to bit into the ice. It was covered in a rime of cruddy neve and his boots just kept scrabbling off. He got about 20ft up before his first piece of gear and he lower off it leaving me to take the pitch. I watched Andy snuggle back into his pre-warmed (by me) belay jacket.

The snow was actually quite hard to get purchase on, but I found some good ice further up and got stuck into that. The next section was alright, steep but the foot placements were good so I could keep the weight off my arms. I got another good nut in half way up int he rock wall and carried up. The route spilt here and as I didn't have the description or the guidebook (another thing Toaf had with him) I just chose the easiest looking line. It took a hanging groove with ice in a single crack on the left hand side. Here the ability to swap my hands on my axes really paid off. I scraped up this and floundered into the snow above. Here I podded on upward running it out and hoping to reach the top. Obviously I didn't! And annoyingly I could see the top (only metres away when this happened). I had to backtrack and excavate a something in the nearest rock to belay off. I got a goodish peg, and hammered in axe and a good rock to brace off. I think there is alot to be said for a good braced stance.

I couldn't hear Andy at this point, so I had to rely on the fact we'd climb together for the last 6 months and that the good old 3 tugs system would work. I gave it three, got three in return and then started taking in for what seemed like forever. It always does thought when you can't see the progession your second is making. Eventually I could hear grunting and panting and Andy popped up covered in snow. "good lead" was all he said as he took off up the final snow slope to deal with the diddy little cornice. The ropes went tight and I took out my peg and axe and plodded off aftr him.

I was greeted not with tea as I'd hoped but a smiling Toaf exclaiming "where the bloody hell have you been?!". Least he'd made it round back to the bag and recouted his mini-epic of dealing with little cornices and front pointing across exposed neve. We enjoyed some tea at the gear up hut as the weather had cleared up. There was no rush to get back to the cable car so we took a lesuirely walk down, picking up Andy's dropped gloves on the way.

Another good day.










(Yes, that is toaf asleep in the cable car curled around his pack)