Jura May Bank Holiday 2010

I signed up for this trip in November when Andy first posted on the forum. Having pretty much just joined the club I was super excited about a weekend of biking and hiking in Scotland. My excitement somewhat faded when Tenk suggested wild camping. Its not like I hadn’t camped before, but I wasn’

t really up for three days camping in the middle of nowhere, carrying ALL that stuff, drinking stream water and most importantly lacking some very essential facilities.

In the two months before the trip I remained very non-committal –

one minute really excited and definitely up for it and the next wondering how I would survive for 3 days in the wild, much to the irritation of certain club members (sorry!!).

On the Monday before the trip I finally decided I WOULD go (due mainly to being able to nick kit off people)! Woo Hoo and OH MY GOODNESS!

Friday came and on the third attempt I managed to get absolutely everything I needed in my bag, which surprisingly didn’t feel as heavy as I thought it would. I couldn’t stand up straight (for fear of falling over backwards!) but I could carry it – this was very good news –

I had not fallen at the first hurdle!!

Ready and eager Frank, Vidal, Helen and I set off in the rain. Traffic was good and for half the journey Frank and Vidal sat in the back of the car while Helen and I discussed school and politics and education and jobs and more school!

Having refreshed ourselves with food at the Truck stop and charged our camelbaks we set off for the second and last leg of Fridays journey – the Rest and Be Thankful – a car park…

on a main road.

We arrived about 10, pitched tents and crowded around Tenk’s camper for warmth. The last of the party turned in about 3…

and that was Friday!

On Saturday I woke to the sound of a car horn and some very loud German (I think) lads who said something I didn’t understand, laughed REALLY loudly, beeped their car horn and drove off – an incident that Vidal later had me believing I’d dreamt. I was so incredibly pleased that I’d survived my first night of wild camping – I was still alive and my little tent had not fallen down (though I did have help putting it up!). I wandered down to where the car was parked to be told we were heading into the town for bacon sandwiches and a cup of tea –

immediately I began to like wild camping A LOT!!

A large YMC party of some 23 assorted humans plus 2 dogs got the ferry from Kennacraig and landed on Jura at about 3.30.

Jura comes from the Norse words meaning Deer Island. Today over 6500 deer live on six estates on the island. In contrast, the human population is less than 200 so for 3 days YMC increased the population of the island by more than 10%!!

The island is 29 miles long and 7 miles wide in places. The west is wild and virtually uninhabited, occupied only by the three Paps of Jura which are known in Gaelic as The Mountain of the Sound, The Mountain of Gold and The Sacred Mountain.

We trekked for about 5miles as a whole group before splitting off at Cnocbreac–

half went for the long haul off track to the beach and the other half went for the shorter route to camp by Na Garbh-Lochanan. Needless to say I was in the second group and so excited was I to put my pack down that I pretty much ran the last leg of the journey!! We set up camp and that was Saturday.

Sunday brought rain in the morning. Fortunately as the group who took the shorter route we had the luxury of not having to set off so early in the morning so a lazy breakfast saw off the rain, we left bags at the bealach and we began our accent up the scree path of Beinn Chaolais. It was fairly cloudy when we got to the top, but cleared on our way down to reveal some spectacular views of Beinn an Oir and Beinn Shiantaidh which inspired the group to tackle the other two paps.

I managed one of the Paps, so not completely shameful. While the rest of the group tackled the other two, Frank, Tenk, Lewis and I headed for the pub (we had our priorities sorted!!). We took the longer slightly flatter route passing Loch an t-Síob, unfortunately (for me) this involved falling in two bogs! The first time I was fine, right leg in up to knee, the second time both legs went in –

having spent a horrendous 30 seconds fearing I may be stuck there forever I managed to pull myself out pleased that there had been no witnesses!

We met the road at a bridge about 3 miles from the hotel and from there we walked on tarmac for the rest of the way. The views across the coast were stunning.

We were the first people from the group to arrive at the pub and from our arrival there was a steady influx of campers ready for food and a pint. The rest of the evening was spent chilling out, some playing pool, eating and drinking in the pub.

You forget when you live in the city, that there are so many stars in the sky (well maybe you don’t forget –

but you know what I mean). The sky above Jura is AMAZING so being the science geek that I am I spent a good hour laid on the jetty staring at the stars trying to recognise constellations, with a can of gin and tonic to keep me warm!!!

Monday was welcomed with a fry up at the Jura Hotel. Its not like I hadn’t enjoyed my porridge with boiled stream water the day before, because I actually did –

but that fry up was GOOD! The bus that Tenk organised was picking us up at 2.00 so we enjoyed a relaxing day of just enjoying the gorgeous view.

We arrived back at the ferry port at about 5 and set off for the journey home.

It was an amazing trip and will be very hard to beat. Having been ever so slightly terrified about it I would have happily stayed for the week. Massive thanks to those who: organised the trip, believed I could do it (Lizzie), give me advice, a lift or bits of kit and to Helen for the photo’s.

Hannah

I was almost up to my knees in extremely cold water, and as I looked around I realised my bag and camera were floating down the not so frozen waterfall. The ice had crumbled beneath our feet. We, (Richard Harrison, Pete MacDonald and I) were at the base of Cautley Spout, a 250-meter, grade-3 ice climb in the Yorkshire Dales. I had changed my mind thinking my plastic boots with knee-high gaiters were a bit excessive. Pete was not so lucky. His soggy feet would plague him for the rest of the climb. The morning sun was quickly warming the hillside and it became apparent that this waterfall wasn’t going to be around much longer. Cautley Spout comes into condition once every 10 years, and we were the first of a string of teams about to climb.

Pete got the first pitch. It was about 40 meters. The climbing was delicate, on beautifully formed cauliflower shaped ice, though protection placed was more for psychological confidence than holding falls. The route was rapidly changing shape as Pete was climbing, and as water broke through the ice, was forced to re-think his direction. He moaned something about getting wet! Tenko and I found this quite amusing and laughed as we mentioned something about waterfalls being wet. It was a photogenic pitch with a heart pounding finish. The last few moves were performed on very steep, unconsolidated, crappy, deteriorating ice with an exposed step out onto a rather dodgy looking ice mushroom. It was only possible to finish by matching both hands on one axe in a thin runnel of ice. (And praying to God it held). The seriousness, of course didn’t compare for us seconding. What a gnarly lead for Pete!

Next was my turn to take the lead. I started up a short 15m section of ice, steep to start and then panned out half way to large steps. It looked like thick, hard ice from the bottom. It wasn’t. It turned out to be thin with a fully operative waterfall an inch beneath. My mind started to drift to a story that Tenko had told me. It was a similar situation where a piece of ice the size of a door had collapsed with him on it, due to the thin ice. I quickly dismissed this thought, reverted my mind to the job in hand and made my way up to a nice big tree.

Tenko took the lead, “when the rope pulls tight, you two climb”, he said and took off quickly. Soon the rope was tight. We shouted for him to stop, he didn’t hear. We dismantled the belay and were practically dragged up the waterfall by a very eager Tenko. We gathered at the bottom of a steep section. Same drill, “follow when tight”. Tenko was off, no time to smell the roses. Tenko wanted to get to the top! This time we were stopped by a more significant section of ice, a good 40m steep wall. STOP, BELAY, GO! He stopped to put in a warthog and a couple of screws and climbed the pitch in no time at all.

The waterfall continued to meander up a scar in the hills for another 150m with the odd steep section to provide interest. To our surprise it presented us with another 50m pitch. This time I got to lead a decent pitch. It started off on nice solid ice up to a ledge with some awkward moves that had me scrabbling around on my knees. Now I had to climb a wall that became a lot more imposing than it did from the ground. I quickly screwed in a hefty 20cm screw in a big chunk of ice and started to climb. I had made a few moves, when “aaarrghh, b@!locks!” the shoulder strap of my rucksack caught on my harness and SNAP! I tried to tie it up, but was irritated by fixing it, so I left it undone. I just wanted to climb! I climbed about 10m to where some beautiful hard ice awaited a screw. My dreams were cut short. The ice had deteriorated into utter crap under a sheet of shiny blue ice. I chopped around for an eternity trying to dig away enough to find a placement. I had to accept that I would not get the luxury of a good screw and headed to the top. The last move was nasty. I couldn’t trust the axe placements to pull me over the top no matter how many times I sent them in. My arms were weakening. I just had to suck it up and make the move. I decided to kick away a good step to transfer my weight onto my right foot and barely load my axes. With anticipation and adrenaline pumping I slowly moved across, a fall here would be… no, don’t think about it.

Relief! I did it! I’d done the hard bit. I should have stopped here where I could communicate with my team and belay from a sheltered alcove. But I didn’t. I looked up and saw another wall of ice. Hard, blue and shiny. It had been two years since I’d climbed on ice and these conditions are rare in this country. I couldn’t relinquish my tools just yet. I carried on to almost a rope length, flopped to the floor in a wasted heap, worn out by the flow of adrenaline and recovering from a dose of swine flu. I hammered in a couple of pitons and sat belaying on what was probably the windiest place on earth. I got hammered in the face by violent spindrift and couldn’t hear a thing from anyone.
Soon enough, my companions joined me. We shook hands and shared a great sense of happiness that anyone who’s had a good day out in the mountains can understand.

Richard Goodey

Isle of Skye

This year we decided to escape for the Christmas break, although as the weather worsened prior to Christmas we were regretting planning such a long drive! We woke on the 24th to blizzards in Yorkshire and a recommendation not to travel, so we set off anyway. Yorkshire had the worst of it and by the time we hit the M6 the weather and the roads were clear. We made the cottage by tea time and well ready for a trip to the local.

Christmas Day -  With blurry eyes we dragged ourselves out of bed and into the car, our goal was Blabheinn before Christmas dinner!
The car thermometer showed -7C and as the sun came up there was not a cloud in the sky. The going was slow and as we headed up to the first corrie, plenty of snow, big patches of ice on the path and loads of hoar frost. Hoar frost crystals are created by vapour rising up from layers of deposited snow and then freezing on the surface, quite rare and very beautiful, also a precursor to a high avalanche risk when more snow falls on top! We reached the summit at 2.30pm and were treated to some of the most stunning views I have ever seen in Scotland. We could see as far as Assynt in the North, Rum in the West and the Nevis range in the South East. One problem! It was too cold to loiter and now we were all thinking about Christmas dinner! So down we went, powder snow cushioning every step. Just time for a pint of Red Cuillin in the pub, dinner was cooked and eaten by 8pm, what a day!

A big thanks do Dolly and Frank for sorting the accommodation.

Looking forward to the next trip!

Simon