Myself, Pete, Michael, Harry, Jim and Dan headed up the Cobbler on Sun for the hope of grabbing a route on the north peak whilst conditions allowed.
Myself and Pete headed up North Rib, Mick and Harry on Maclays,plus Jim and Dan on Soul Groove.
A fantastic day out, with cracking weather and company, topped off with everyone finishing their route of choice.
Looking forward to the Etive meet already.

With the bad forecast there was only 4 of us who attended this meet. Myself, Martin, Niall and old hut custodian Gary Wroe. Martin was first to arrive, and found that the hut was without electricity !! he had a healthy fire going when we pitched up about an hour later. Breakfast was cooked on the wood burning stove and a plan for the day agreed. the corbett of Carn an Fhreiceadain north of Kingussie was our target.There is a land rover track that basically takes you from the golf coarse right over the summit and back down in a nice horseshoe.

headed up late to dalwhinnie on boxing day with Lisa, short afternoon corbett walk up the fara from dalwhinnie train station. nice little walk up easy ground in soft snow, lovely views from the summit. bought some coal and walked into ryvoan bothy from glenmore lodge. a pleasant evening with Canadian peter in his oh so wild western long johns, Italian Michael ( very quiet ) and 100mph Matt from Manchester. roaring fire good chat and whisky. forecast was for a stormy morning brightening up in the afternoon. left the bothy around 10am and drove up to the car park at Cairngorm.

Last Saturday saw me pick Florian up at 5am in the Saltmarket. He was hoping to get a route done before he heading back to Berlin for a 6 month sabbatical. We were lucky to get a space in the Altnafeadh car park as ther was a jmc meet on in the Lagangarbh hut. we set off in darkness, the first team breaking the trail in soft snow, when we got to a point in the path to strike up towards the buttress we were joined by Oli and his mate from the jmc. We all took turns to break a trail up thigh deep snow to the base of the climb.

Not a hill, but a Loch... for something completely different, Karin G and I decided to brave a swim in Loch Venacher on Sunday. Looking like a pair of cat burglers - from head to toe in neoprene - and trying not to upset the fishermen we managed about a kilometer. Some very interesting physiological effects - although it didnt actually feel all that cold in the water, neither of us had any strength in our hands or feeling in our feet after we got out, making it very hard to get out of the wetsuits! Weird stuff but it's supposed to be good for you.

It being November I fully expected a sociable weekend with a beer or two in front of the coal fire in Inver, with rain a good excuse not to do anything to demanding. However, that cunning plan was thwarted by two days of gorgeous autumn weather. So, on Saturday seven of us set off to Moruisg and Sgurr nan Ceannaichean. Getting up Moruisg was hard work with no path to speak of and boggy ground. The top briefly disappeared into the cloud but once we were up the ridge the sky was clear and the views amazing. Congratulations to Lucy on her first Munro!

Day#0: 20 September depart

Bristol - London - Paris – Lourdes: Train – Walk – Train – Tube – Train (I knew the script from last year). Rained on getting off the train in Lourdes… the only time that I felt the rain all week.

Day#1: Cauterets to Refuge Wallon

Sunday as per last year: take the bus to Cauterets with it’s terrific stock up market. This year though I head out and west through the alpine Marcadau valley. On to the Wallon refuge, with a real end of season feel about the place (like all the places I stayed at subsequently).

Day#2: Pic de Cambales

last saturday myself, billy, jim and lisa left glasgow at 9pm and took the long and winding road over glenshee to the car park at the spittal of glen muick. arriving just after midnight, as seemingly chips from the chippie in blairgowrie helps travel sickness ???? set up camp in a shower and it was early to bed. billy was first up in the morning,( think he stood on a duck ) , as were a billion midges, and we left early for the long hoof up to the corrie. with none of the predicted wind the midges feasted on us as we stopped at the base of the ridge to gear up.

First week in August our group of five LMC members and three others met in Chamonix. Our Members were, Michael, Peter, Billy, Fraser & me. We were joined by Gav,Dave and Andy.

This was a first Alpine experience for me, Fraser and Billy and for Micheal, Peter and the others a chance to add to previous experience.

The group was diverse with different interests,abilities, skills and timeframes to work to, but this only added to the buzz around our group as we all mucked in to make sure that personal objectives were met.