Mountain Leader Assessment Success!!!

Monday 24 to Friday 28 October - what a week! Had my Summer ML with MLTS thro Abacus Mountaineering and Kenny Grant MIC (Point Five Mountaineering) around the Fort William area, and what a week. Day one had us doing 1.50 nav on Meall Bhanabhie, and what a task - featureless horrid terrain which does not hep confidence. A bit of emergency carry and stream crossing saw day 1 close with a dip in confidence after a poor days nav :(

The next day saw us on Meall Cumhainn for steep ground and emergency rope work which went well after good prep work with Mark, helping with confidence for the approaching 3 day Expedition. Home for food and a shower at Kimber's place and packing the sack for the exped saw me take over the kitchen, but got everything in to my excellent Osprey 45l bag ready for the days ahead looking positively iffy (not like the coffee!)

We headed for Garven to the south of Loch Shiel and headed into the hills. To be honest, I was nervous and wondered if I had the skills but some early successes proved I had the skills and gave renewed confidence to make the right choices. Things remained good throughout the day with one or two moments of 'OMG' but generally things were solid and my legs were sound. The crux for me was an excellent night nav session with Kenny finding all the points on the way and having confidence to say we were definitely at various points despite others apprehensions - this session really clinched things for me and the following day with Mike was good with some sound nav and minor mistakes (made by all tbh) were within scope of award, although the penultimate leg left me wondering if I'd blown it as I missed the fact we didn't hit the top on Ewan's leg...although I think we all missed it. We strode down the path back to the car having a good chat and got back to base for the big decision. Sadly, one of the guys deferred on nav but the other 5 got the tick, much to my relief and immense personal satisfaction :) After a bit of chat with Mike and Kenny, I headed off elated to Ellis Brigham for a reward of some window shopping, although it was hard not to buy some Haglofs or ArcTeryx gear..... Low points of the week were the first day's nav and my compass reversing polarity on the morning of the exped...high points were the night nav, security on steep ground and getting the pass. I can safely say it is a hard earned and much respected award - by me now anyway, and others I have spoken to - requiring a great deal of prep work and damn good nav skills. I was fair chuffed to get the award and sang merrily to myself on the way down in the car, to my dear wife's open arms for a well earned well done. Now that's out he way, seems winter ML is next on the agenda...aaargh?!?!? Big thanks to Mike and Kenny and Mike @ Abacus Mountain Guiding for the pics...hope you don't mind Mike??

Tomato soup in the conservatory?

Good days nav and rope work in the hills in Glen Kinglas, past the Rest and Be Thankful. Very wet, but good practice then some nice soup in an open cave, come conservatory

Eventually cleared to a view of sorts but burns raging all over the place. Coffee in Arrochar and home for a hot bath and a kip :)

MoD Plod to the Rescue

Out on the hill in, initially, poor weather but cleared into a quite lovely starry night for a bit of night navigation with Markus Baghdatus, aka Dan Draper! Anyway, nice plod up the hill, apart from 'Day of the Ferns' again and found a nice spot out the wind for the perfunctory Tomato soup. Good contour interp' saw us pick up the burn down hill, traverse across to the next and follow it down hill picking up some good features. I'd forgotten my Ay-Up lights, world's best head torch and biking lights, so borrowed Mark's pesky Petzl thingy...how on earth can you nav with that...I could hardly read the map with it!! Anyways, 200m up, Mark's Ay Up picked out the MoDs checking my car (?), so a sprint down to the car saw us gassing with him for 5, and him wondering what the heck he was seeing out the mist; thankfully he kept Fang and Tyson in the back of his car, so we scooted back to Glw in warp time and in bed for midnight. Good night, with conours showing nice, tho used 1.25k as visibility poor without uber Ay Up :) No pics but Sunday on the hills for more fun and games...patience my son! This will keep you going...

Oh yes...it's coming soon :)

Suunto - cheapo - busto - buyo...and more soupo too

Another good day in the hills with Markus, who still has his grandfather's Suunto watch still going, tho dying a death when it hits 2 rain drops a year...buyo newzo :)

Good handrailing and burn climbing (canyoning in reverse) to the summit for statutory soup and sarnie. Amazing rock formation on the way down, then car for a quick change and home. Good nav day with poor vis and much rough terrain...never lost