Ken: Alex and I enjoyed a quiet day on Pinnacle Ridge on Sgurr Nan Gillean today, as a warm up for a full ridge traverse starting tomorrow.

An ascent of Pinnacle Ridge and descent of the West Ridge of Sgurr Nan Gillean lends itself well as a warm up, with a bit of everything en route, from sustained section of steep scrambling, scree and loose rocks, down-climbing and a couple of abseils, without being too long a day.

It was another glorious day, but this spell of excellent weather isn’t without its problems. There’s currently a fairly extensive hill fire on the hillside west of Sligachan which has spread alarmingly quickly throughout the day. Looked to be another hill fire on Applecross too.

Ken: A cloudy start soon gave way to a scorcher of a day on Skye, with wall to wall sunshine for day 3 of our Skye Munros Course, run in conjunction with Steven Fallon Mountain Guiding.

We kicked the day off with an ascent of the Am Stac screes and over onto Sgurr Mhic Choinnich, before retracing our steps and tackling the mighty In Pinn, which despite the weather, was relatively quiet.

For many Munroists, the In Pinn can pose their most significant technical challenge, but the team made little fuss with the ascent up the East Ridge.

From here it was a straightforward journey over to our third Munro of the day, Sgurr Na Banachdich.

Looks like more of the same weather tomorrow, summer has arrived!

Fancy tackling the Inaccessible Pinnacle?
For more info, visit: http://51.38.64.114/courses/guide-in-pinn/

Ken: Our hardy bunch of mountaineers braved the wind, rain and sleet to bag the Munros of
Steve and I are running a Skye Munros Course, in conjunction with Steven Fallon Mountain Guiding this week, and with the worst forecast for the week making its appearance today, we decided to go for a shortish day on the two central Munros on the main Cuillin Ridge. The team did well, and we were back down just before we developed webbed feet.

Visibility was fairly limited for much of the day, but it did clear on descending back into Coire a’ Ghreadaidh and the snow has completely gone from both An Dorus and Eag Dubh now. Things are looking up for the remainder of the week!

Ken: For Steve’s third and final day, we were back on Ben Nevis, this time we made an ascent of Castle Ridge. We couldn’t have asked for better conditions on the route, with dry rock throughout. We made good progress up the ridge, with Steve enjoying the steep, but positive crux.

We continued up to the summit of Carn Dearg, where we had to cross a large patch of surprisingly firm snow, for which an axe was useful. From the summit of Carn Dearg, we descended Ledge Route, which again, was bone dry and a joy to descend.

On reaching the large bowl part way up No. 5 Gully, we veered right, and traversed onto the top of Moonlight Gully, where we bumped into a couple of keen skiers, who had descended No.5 Gully until the snow ran out. We did have to traverse across a couple of large patches of snow here, but it was usefully soft, but again, having an axe was handy ,if not essential at this point.

And so ends three varied days of scrambling on the brilliant ridges to be found on the west coast of the Highlands. Long may the sunshine and dry conditions continue!

Ken: I’m back in Lochaber this week, and was out with Steve today. Back in October, Steve and I climbed Tower Ridge, but due to the weather, we weren’t treated to many views (or much dry rock), so we were back on Tower Ridge today, this time enjoying it in all its glory.

Due to an awkward looking large patch of snow, with a steep snout, sitting in the East Gully of the Douglas Gap, we traversed onto the ridge slightly higher up, and spent much of the rest of the route on dry rock. We crossed a couple of small patches of soft snow before the Eastern Traverse. The Eastern Traverse itself was snow free, but a sizeable patch of snow meant we climbed the Fallen Block Chimney on the outside.

Once above the chimney, it was dry rock almost all the way, with only a slight detour required on the exit gully to avoid some firm patches of ice. We didn’t need crampons at all, but used axes for about 5m or so.

The Red Burn still provided a quick descent, but the snow is getting quite thin lower down.

If you fancy a day of private guiding on Tower Ridge, visit: http://51.38.64.114/courses/tower-ridge-guide/