Great Inventions

What a great weekend we had. My introduction to winter mountaineering has been a fantastic one and I am ready for more. We had big plans for saturday, and after some serious consideration of weather conditions, snow fall and avalanch risk (all over some venison sticks, a bottle of beer or a glass of wine), we came up with a plan A, B and C, all involving the ascent of Bidean nam Bian and hopefully also Stob Coire Sgreamhach, two peaks behind and joined to the Three Sisters of Glen Coe.

We started our walk crossing the River Coe at the foot of Coire and Lochan and followed the path up the corrie to its head.



There were a few groups of hill walkers about, all taking different routs. We decided against following some of them up not very safe looking gullies and opted for a more benign looking one situated roughly south east of Stob Coire nan Lochan. Crampons were put on and with ice-axe in hand a quick presentation and exercise on how to use both in any situation followed and soon we were working our way up. It was exciting stuff and the calfs were particularly tested on the steep slopes where we scrambled up on hands and feet. Lacid acid gallore! We reached the ridge east of Stob Coire nan Lochan safely and scrambled up to the top of the hill. Visibility was excellent and the views amazing. We had lunch while deciding if we would risk climbing the steep and narrow ridge past the level at the top of the Diamond Buttres to reach the summit of Bidean nam Bian (Pinnacle of the hills).



As there was already a couple of people going up the ridge, and another couple descending it, we decided to go for it too. The snow was mainly firm, with some powder snow in places, and felt at all times safe. We got up in good time and less efford than expected. Time and conditions were against up so we decided against climbing Stob Coire Sgreamhach (Peak of the dreadful corrie) and instead headed north-west to Stob Coire nam Beigh and An t-sron, where we came down a gully and followed the river to Achnam beithach and back to the car.



Saturday was less adventurous but still did a nice 5 hours walk up to Aonach Mor and Aonach Beag. I'm not a Munro-bagger, but it's still nice to tick them off. We didn't fancy the slog up Aonach Mor so took the cable car up... some would call that cheating, however considerin the knee deep snow we were glad we did! Again fabulous views far and wide, with an especially good view of Ben Nevis.