Today i was on Ben Nevis looking at mountaineering skills with other instructor Dave. But the most important lesson was to have robust plan A, B and C.
Plan C was deployed today, after walking in and not willing to cross the river around the CIC hut we decided to keep on heading into Corie Leis where we could achieve the aims of the day.
There is a lot of snow still in the corie and ice still hanging in on the Little Brenva face for when it freezes again. We geared up at the base of the steep snow and took an exploring line through the snow and small crags to top out at the end of the CMD arete. We then made the final, steep ascent up to the summit of Ben Nevis. We didn’t come across a freezing level today with drizzle still falling at the summit.
For the descent we walked down the Red Burn which is tricky in places with old footprints, slushy snow and hard old snow, all designed to trip you up.
