Looking down the long gully of Beast From The East (II) on Am Bathach in Glen Shiel with perfect neve all the way to the valley. Mullach Fraoch-choire in the background. (Photo Andy Nisbet)
There’s a Beast from the East forecast. Hypothermia, death and destruction are imminent. So why am I climbing in blazing sunshine wearing only a vest, not a cloud in the sky, not a breath of wind, neve from the valley bottom (Cluanie to Affric valley) to the summit of Am Bathach? And still sweating. Who knows how many hundreds of feet of unclimbed gully, normally with a partly formed ice pitch but today banked out to steep snow and scraping into Grade II.
Some days in Scotland are just wonderful. What to call the gully – Beast From The East of course. But the only beast from the east was me, being an east coaster!
