{"id":7037,"date":"2019-04-18T21:19:41","date_gmt":"2019-04-18T20:19:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.scottishwinter.com\/?p=7037"},"modified":"2019-04-23T20:17:58","modified_gmt":"2019-04-23T19:17:58","slug":"seasons-end","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.scottishwinter.com\/?p=7037","title":{"rendered":"Season’s End"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The last Grade V ice climb of the winter? Crag Jones and Andy Bunnage made an ascent of a very thin looking Smith\u2019s Route high on Ben Nevis on April 12. (Photo Crag Jones)<\/p><\/div>\n

Hopes for good late season conditions were thwarted by another major thaw in March. By way of compensation, a heavy snowfall in the Cairngorms followed by a helpful thaw-freeze cycle brought the easier north-facing gullies into condition and several teams enjoyed romping up the easier classics in the Northern Corries.<\/p>\n

Across on the West conditions were leaner. The most popular technical route on the Ben was Gardyloo Gully, which provided a sporting Grade III. In many ways, extremely lean conditions are the best time to climb this classic route as it is often blocked by a monstrous cornice. Ascents were also made of Glover\u2019s Chimney, Central Gully Right-Hand and Tower Scoop. A strong French team backed off the third pitch of Point Five Gully.<\/p>\n

The most eye-catching climb was a very thin looking Smith\u2019s Route by Crag Jones on April 12. \u201cThe brave second was Andy Bunnage,\u201d Crag explained. \u201cHe was lashed under the roof, in case the whole caboodle came down. It was that thin \u2013 the icicle was very hollow!\u201d<\/p>\n

To maintain the winter psyche until next season (just six months away), Robert Taylor has put together a set of podcasts interviewing current activists about their Scottish winter and mountaineering exploits. So far Robert has interviewed Simon Yearsley, Helen Rennard, Robbie Phillips and myself. Paul Diffley of Hot Aches Productions has also very kindly made available the full audio of his interview with Jimmy Marshall.<\/p>\n

Robert has a good flowing style and the topics range from Robbie talking about seconding Greg Boswell on Anubis to Helen revealing Andy Nisbet\u2019s caramel shortbread habit. Robert has plans for many more interviews, so listen in to Vertical Voice \u2013 Stories from the Steep<\/strong> at:<\/p>\n

< https:\/\/verticalvoicepodcast.wordpress.com<\/a>><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hopes for good late season conditions were thwarted by another major thaw in March. By way of compensation, a heavy snowfall in the Cairngorms followed by a helpful thaw-freeze cycle brought the easier north-facing gullies into condition and several teams … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[186,96],"tags":[718,8,400,25,719,720],"class_list":["post-7037","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-comment","category-winter-conditions","tag-andy-bunnage","tag-ben-nevis","tag-crag-jones","tag-northern-corries","tag-robert-taylor","tag-vertical-voice-podcast"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.scottishwinter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7037","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.scottishwinter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.scottishwinter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.scottishwinter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.scottishwinter.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7037"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/www.scottishwinter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7037\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7044,"href":"http:\/\/www.scottishwinter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7037\/revisions\/7044"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.scottishwinter.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7037"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.scottishwinter.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7037"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.scottishwinter.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7037"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}