The thaw has set in and Andreas and I had a very wet day on D Gully Buttress. It was good training though and a good test of the waterproofs. Nobody had put in a boot trail beyond Great Gully so we waded through thigh deep saturated snow past The Waterslide and up to the buttresses. I can't say I enjoyed this very much but once on the climb we got on fine. Andreas and I swapped leads all the way up and moved together Alpine style from the top of the climb, across to Curved Ridge and all the way up this to the summit.
There were 80mph gusts on the summit and steady rain. We walked down the west ridge of Coire na Tulloch and we were very careful to stay away from avalanche paths down in the foot of the coire - any avalanches will travel a long way down the slope in the current wet conditions. Back at the van I was amazed to find my Jottnar Bergelmir jacket had kept me completely dry underneath - I did not expect anything would keep me dry enough let alone keep me completely dry in the conditions today!
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