25 March 2018

Winter is still there on the hills of Scotland so Iain and I decided to
head into Cairngorm’s Northern Corries to see what we could do. I
fancied something easy and Iain said there was a nice grade II called
Red Gully to try. It turns out ‘nice’ means ‘harder than grade II’ but
with a bit of fortitude and an astonishing amount of ice screws I
managed to get up the steep first ice pitch. Thereafter we swapped leads
and made it to the top without any real problems. Weather was fine if a
bit breezy with more snow showers than expected. With another cold snap
forecast this week it could be a while yet before the ice tools are put
away for the summer.

• David Matthews, Iain Gilbert

(More photos can be seen here on Yogile .)