Sunday 24 March 2013

A very windy weekend for Am Binian Club, Atlas Mountains Expedition team.


Cutting winds and cutting steps.


Lagangarbh, our residence and the Buachaille behind early Sunday morning.


Good old fashioned techniques on ice bulges!


Heading down late afternoon on Saturday under the Dragon's Tooth.


Wind slab formation at 600 m  on a NW aspect slope.

Six members of the Am Binian Club from Kilmarnock are joining a HPL trekking holiday in the Atlas mountains in October and this weekend was a gathering of the team to get out on the hills and plan for their adventures in Morocco. It was a true adventure in Glencoe this weekend and hopefully out of character for Morocco in October. Storm force winds thundered down the glen shifting the lying and freshly falling snow into lee slopes, gullies and stream beds, making walking difficult off the obvious paths and higher wind scoured ground. On Saturday, Stuart, Eva, Heather, Helen, Bobby and I headed up to the really the picturesque path to the sheltered NE Coire of Beinn a Bheithir. We had a good refresher of using ice axes and essential foot work in case we need to cross old snow whilst out in the Atlas. This may be useful high up on Toubkal and other 4000 m peaks. Sunday, started early but wild and improved slowly. A shorter day up on Stob Coire Raineach. Although the salvos of wind and snow still created difficulty in seeing and walking at some stages! The obviously seen ice falls in Glencoe are building nicely but be very careful there is a huge amount of slab building at the tops of gullies and on the lee sides of ridges. Winter is firmly in control in Scotland bring on the sunshine in Morocco!