This week has been brilliantly hot and sunny. The rock has been dry in the glens and the air warm with a gentle breeze, great rock climbing weather. I have been helping Al Halewood deliver two SPA Training Courses for West Highland College UHI degree students and it has been very good fun.
On Wednesday we went to Kingussie Crag which has a clutch of fine single pitch climbs at easier grades to look at personal climbing skills and abseiling. Yesterday we covered group management on a few crags at Poldubh in Glen Nevis and today we finished with a short session at The Ice Factor climbing wall. We then met the group on the second course and tried to make the most of the dry weather by staying out later this evening going over group work stuff at Poldubh again.
It has been really nice to see so many friends out climbing on the crags over the last few days. After a good winter of ice climbing, getting on to the rock in the glen with the sun on your back feels like a very nice gentle way to go climbing.
Up in the mountains there is of course a very good cover of snow still and the ice is still there on many climbs. Steve and Andy climbed Tower Ridge on Monday and Ken took Stewart and his 12 year old son Matty up Ledge Route on Wednesday. Matty did fantastically well and went up to the summit of Ben Nevis as well. We have a colder weekend forecast with snow down to 600m in heavy showers so it will all feel very different again tomorrow. There is lots of fat ice to go and enjoy still with long days and few other climbers around so make the most of it.
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