Is that it?.....

20th April - forgot my camera yesterday!

All good things must come to an end – Sunday marked the end of my 2008 ski season.

Aonach Mor on Sunday had considerably less snow in evidence than last week, but offered classic Scottish spring snow conditions – granular, loose and fast. The back Corries were open again, and although I bottled out of the cornice drop from Chancer, Alex (back from a season in France and enjoying a day on Scottish snow) managed a couple of vertical face-first drop ins.

Descending the traverse from Corrie Dubh back to the Gondala Top Station, the snow became patchy and necessitated some grass shredding, before finally running out near the Rob Roy T-Bar.

A trip to the Lakes is on the cards next weekend, and by mid-May I reckon lift served skiing will be over in Scotland. So, if this is it, what are the grand totals for 2008 skiing?

1 day at The Lecht
1 day touring in Corrie Fionn
1 evening tour of Lowther Hill!
2 days touring on the Cairngorm Plateau
3 days at Glenshee
4 days at Cairngorm
4 days at Aonach Mor
5 days at Glencoe
6 days in Slovakia
7 days in Alps
=34 days!

Probably (unquestionably, in fact) my most productive ski season ever. Also the most expensive – if an average lift pass (or the cost of hiring touring gear) is £23, I’ve spent nearly £800 on uplift this season! Bugger. If I’m still in Scotland next year, an all area pass will be a serious consideration – or maybe I’ll volunteer as ski patrol somewhere.

There is a lot of snow in sheltered areas on the hills still, so I reckon a ceremonial hike up and BBQ could be on the cards, weather permitting of course, for Midsummer's Day!

Corrie Dubh Virgin

Me airborne - Shoulder of Ben Nevis in the background

Don Juan on the Climbers' Col

Me again!

Don Juan asks himself "how did I get here?"

The Back Corries at Aonach Mor are one of those places that you hear mentioned in reverential tones by Scottish Skiers. There are other runs that offer a huge adrenalin rush – the Flypaper at Glencoe and the Tiger at Glenshee spring to mind – but nowhere offers such extensive lift-served off-piste skiing as the Back Corries.

Until this weekend, I had never skied the back Corries. I’ve been up Aonach Mor quite a few times but because this is Scotland, it has usually been in whiteout conditions and 90mph winds. To get into the back corries you have to pass over an impressive snow cornice which forms on the ridge between Aonach Mor and Aonach Beag, and there is no way I’m going over an edge like that unless I can see what’s below!

My good friend, the unlikely lothario Don Juan, has been well and truly bitten by the Scottish skiing bug this season and had managed to persuade some of his chums from back home to try their hand at it. This was a brave move; most had never skied before and all of them lived in Northampton.

Another key rule about Scottish skiing: - “Never plan a trip in advance if you’re coming a long distance; wait until a few days before and assess the snow conditions then.”

Unbelievably, the Northamptoners arrived to a blue-sky Scotland with snow-clad peaks and little wind. Driving up the A82 felt like being in a Visitscotland commercial. I’d had to work on Friday while the Northamptoners tackled Glencoe, and when I arrived at Corran Bunkhouse on Friday evening I was relieved to discover they’d thoroughly enjoyed themselves and managed the blue runs from the Cliffhanger Chair back onto the Meall a’Bhuiridh Plateau. That’s impressive stuff for someone who’s never been on skis before.

So, on Saturday morning after a pleasant Friday night watching the students of Northumbria University Kayak Club go skinny dipping in Loch Linnhe at midnight, we piled into the Bongo and set off for Aonach Mor.

The Northamptoners struggled a bit with Aonach Mor in the morning. I think the spring snow they’d experienced at Glencoe yesterday afternoon was more forgiving, and the poma lift which accesses mid-mountain at Aonach Mor starts on snowflex , then passes over a couple of slush patches, dodges round a bewildered ptarmigan or two, and then snakes on up the hill at an increasingly steep incline. This is not an ideal scenario for a new skier, and teddies began be ejected from prams – not thrown from prams, but certainly pushed over the edge of them with a slight hint of resentment.

Don Juan and I went off to ski Warren’s, a rather steep red run with beautifully groomed snow. Given the donkey-like skiing of Don Juan at Cairngorm last week, I was confused to see him disappear down the slope carving perfect parallels, gracefully stopping only to seduce hot snowboarding chicks every few hundred yards.

We then headed for the main purpose of the day – the Back Corries. Don Juan’s mastering of Warren’s had convinced me that he could manage Coire Dubh, but the entry would be a worry. We skied off the top of Warren’s T-Bar and traversed onto the Lemming Ridge, where we luckily found the easiest entry into the Back Corries, the unfairly-named Yellow Belly. This was only Don Juan’s seventh or eighth day on skis, and blood visibly drained from his face as he contemplated the drop in.

Despite its name, Yellow Belly still involves a drop through the cornices onto a steep headwall, followed by a long descent to the Braveheart chairlift. Don Juan went first, and despite a sideways fall (followed by 50m head first plunge) he made a thoroughly decent job of the decent.
The Braveheart chairlift only runs a few days a year, so we were very lucky to ride it. Only one person is allowed per chair despite it being a two-seater, in order to reduce the load on the aging engine. The Braveheart/Mel Gibson connection reminded me of something Tam Cowan said after the actor had been arrested in LA and had an anti-semetic drunken rant at police: “When Mel Gibson did Braveheart no-one thought he’d be able to pull off playing a Scotsman. But look at him now. An alcoholic and a racist. He’s done us proud!”

Back to the main restaurant to meet the others via an entertaining traverse on the steep scarp slopes above the Great Glen. Alex and Jen had serious sense of humour failure – Jen having mistakenly ended up on the Goose red run, and Alex having knackered himself on the poma lifts. I adopted the old trick of being annoyingly upbeat and pretending not to notice their discomfort. This had the sole effect of making me look like a prick, which to be fair is not an unreasonable analysis.

Making the difficult decision to help the Northamptoners instead of going in search of Back Corrie Glory, we headed to the Quad Chair to avoid the poma lifts. Alex made a superb recovery and made it all the way down Easy Rider blue run, including the narrow section at the bottom, with only a couple of falls.

I decided that if the Northamptoners were happy on this run, it gave me the opportunity to revisit the back. I caught a variety of lifts to the summit, and headed on my own to the top of Chancer. Chancer is a proper cornice drop, and a group of snowboarders were kind enough to keep a close eye on me as I plummeted into the bowl. Outstandingly, I managed to stay in control – just – and skied down a bit to catch my breath and stop shaking! The lifts had stopped working now, so I traversed out again and made my way to the top of the Gondola to meet the others.

Funny, skiing, isn’t it? I had one of my days of the season, but the group from Northampton had really struggled until the snow softened considerably in the afternoon. In a way, it was a shame the conditions were so good – I quite like hanging round with new skiers, laughing with them at falls and bumps and dispensing (normally very bad) advice. It's not easy to hang round on blue runs when an off-piste paradise is open on the back of the mountain though – hopefully Alex, Jen, Henson, Jonno and Kirsty enjoyed their experiences and will soon be back to the wonder that is Scottish skiing!

It’s not over yet either…………..

The Church of Cairngorm

Eglise

Disciple Haber and I

Nearly Evensong

Prologue

Two facts worth mentioning about Skiing in Scotland:

• I may have mentioned this before, but the golden rule of Scottish Skiing is “Expect the worst and you’ll never be disappointed”.


• During Mid-April, skiing normally consists of trudging up remote peaks to search for a 20 metre snow patch, get one turn in and walk back down.

Therefore heart rates have been increasing, jaws dropping, and more time spent looking at webcams in the office than actually working this week. It is mid-April and the snow is still falling!

Cloudy Cairngorm

Jon has posted Isabel back to Poland, and Don Juan has promised a visit. I skive off work early on Friday and pick them up in Edinburgh. Jon assured me on the phone the night before that he would have all his stuff ready in his car, ready to transfer into my van for the trip North. This was sort of true, as Jon’s Shogun contains more tat than a street full of pound shops.

We transferred nine sacks of assorted oddments, fifty maps, seven skis, and £2.18 worth of change (mostly Polish Zlotys) which would be Jon’s spending money for the weekend. We set off North.

It is fair to say I had a reasonable level of expectation of the snow conditions, and it was a bit of a disappointment that the day dawned overcast on Saturday. Never mind, the snow line extended down to Loch Morlich and the full area was open at Cairngorm.

Avoiding the train we headed up the Fiacaill Ridge Poma, and turned right onto the red run. The light was very flat, and Jon instantly hit an unscheduled mogul/rock/bewildered ptarmigan and fell on his bad shoulder. Not an auspicious start. Don Juan – to his great credit- made it all the way down with a limited number of falls. The snow was like concrete, and we needed to get higher.

The rest of the day was spent tazzing round the creaking Cairngorm lift system in near whiteout conditions, struggling to avoid disused uplift pylons and tardy snowholers. The last run of the day was excellent, however. Jon and I headed to the top station, avoided the gun-wielding piste patrollers and skied down the officially-closed West Wall gulley. It was closed to the visibility, basically we had to feel our way down the top section until clear of the cloud. Once clear, however, there was a lovely run down through untracked snow to the disused chairlift station at the Ciste Car park. Don Juan drove the van down to pick us up.

Church for the day.

The next morning was the start of a scheduled red letter day; the arrival of the Church. We gave thanks that the church had been unburdened from holy babysitting, and reverentially followed him up the side of the Fiaciall Ridge on lovely mountaineering skis donated to the mission for the day by Mountain Spirit (in the sky) of Aviemore.

The Church was a hard taskmaster and made swift progress towards the heavens. Us lardy disciples followed in his footsteps, pausing only to make holy gasps for air.

On the plateau, the Church had arranged for the clouds to part and we were able to survey a fine panorama across to Ben Macdui. Emboldened, we ascended Cairn Lochan and settled for lunch. There were no fish, so we had loaves and snow hare instead.

A whiteout decended upon us sinners as we ate; this may or may not be due to farting (me) and bad thoughts about Bonnie Langford (Haber). Luckily the Church and discipline Haber were able to use a holy compass to guide us to the light at Lurcher’s Gulley.

The snow gods were obviously pleased with our pilgrimage, and had provided us with an enormous bowl of untracked powder to follow all the way back. We gave our praise to the Church, and were saddened that holy mortgages prevented him from leading us on glorious pilgrimages more often.