Monthly Archives: June 2009

Les Ecrins

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Euan and I have travelled down to the Ecrins Massif to meet up with some friends and do some climbing and cycling. On sunday we climbed a twelve pitch route on Tete Le Maye above La Berarde called Le Maye Dulfer (TD 6B+). The rock was excellent and had some amazing hanging flakes which were a pawsome to climb.
On monday 29th we had a very early start and headed up to the Aiguille Dibona where we climbed the Voie Madier on the South Face (TD) and descnded the Voie Normale (PD). This was an excellent route which was not too technical or hard but still amazing glimbing on good granite. The Voie Normale (decent route) still has a lot of neve on it and therfore mountain boots would be useful for the descent.

Petite Fourche

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Top- Me Summit
2nd – Euan Summit
Lower 2- Me and Euan heading back down with more storms moving in.

Yesterdy Euan and I headed to the Albert Premier Hut, with the intention of climbing the Forbes Arete which has seen a few ascents over the last couple of weeks. Unfortunately, when we got up this morning lightning storms surrounded the Mont Blanc Massif. And as we walked out onto the glacier the skies erupted. We still managed to climb a smaller summit called the Petitie Fourche, 3520m, (Facile) during a clearing in the weather. This little peak saved the day.

Hopefully were now going to head to Les Ecrins to do some top class alpine rock routes on peaks in that area.

3rd Spur (Aiguille Du Midi)

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Top pic- Is a topo of the second half of the route in the setting sun

Yesterday Euan and I headed up on the 11:45 telepherique to the half way station on the Aiguille du Midi. We then walked for about 40mins, which took us to the bottom of our route which was the 3rd Spur (TD) 1300m. We started climbing around 1pm. The route consisted of some good technical rock and mixed climbing and some aiding to speed things along. We got to the top Midi station at 5am this morning after climbing through the night. It was a good route and the weather could not have been any better. It was my first route on this Mountain and after looking around at the numerous routes in the area while climbing last night, I can safly say it wont be my last.

Roti Flue (TD) Abeniflue

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On the 16th, Euan and I walked into the Rottal Hutte (hut) below the North face of the Abeniflue. Early the next morning (3am) we walked to the base of our intended route which is the ridge on the right hand side of the face (TD). We had to take a low detour to avoid some newly formed seracs that had been falling down the previous day. We followed the ridge in its entirety and then to the summit. It involved some fairly technical climbing on suspect rock at times. After summiting we made our way down the South face (F) to the Hollandia Hutte, we stayed there on the night of the 17th. The next morning, again nice and early, we made our way over the Mittaljoch, which is not the recomended way of decent from that Hut. After three fairly intense days in the Mountains we had done 4 routes and had an amazing time and experience.

We are now waiting for a bad weather band to pass over before we can head back up into the mountains and get a few more routes done.

Marlina

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After a few attempts at the redpoint today I got the 7c Marlina at upper cave, Dunkeld. Iv been trying the route for a few days now, and I’m happy to get it before I go to the Alps on the 14th. I was up there with Andrew Innes who was trying Hammish Teddys 7b+, he is making good progress on the route and with a bit more work he should do it soon. It was a good days sport climbing and I’m now feeling fit and psyched for my up and coming Alps trip.