Lakes Weekend Conditions 29-01-12

The last 2 days have been great in  the Lakes.  Whilst the climbing conditions have been marginal due to the turf being only partially frozen, the general winter walking conditions have been fantastic, Saturday in particular was perfect with sun, fresh snow and blue skies….

I’ve been running a winter mountaineering course over the weekend, on Saturday we did the Helvellyn edges followed by some snow skills on the headwall area.  The headwall had some areas of unstable powder and windslab about which is probably still much the same due to no real thaw-freeze up high to stabilise it.  There was lots of people out and a few looking at the climbs.  Looking across the Lakes a lot of the major crags looked white, however turf will be the deciding factor over the coming days.  Bowfell Buttress, North Buttress Bowfell, Rampsgill Head to name a few looked well snowed up.

Today we did Pinnacle Ridge on St.Sunday Crag which was great.  The turf was fairly good really and the route was holding plenty of snow.

Haven’t heard any reports of winter climbing over the last few days at other venues, think the skiing at Raise has been good though, touring should be ok too with some selective route choice as the tops are scoured.

Great 2 days, thanks to Bob and Glen.

Mountain Circles has also had a 2 day mountain skills course running in the Cairngorms over the weekend.  Alex called in to report what sounds like some great weather up north as well and that the course went well.  It sounds like conditions in the Northern Corries have been fairly settled with not too much fresh snow.