Progress In Mountaineering

by D. J. Farrant

I hope that Dr. Bell may forgive me for appropriating his title but I felt that no other phrase so succinctly conveyed the feelings of an English mountaineer who has eventually been introduced to the mountain world of Scotland. It was in April 1965 that I made my first visit to Scotland, for the Club’s Easter Meet in Glen Nevis. I was immediately struck by the vastness of this wild land and by its awesome beauty. Who could drive up from Tyndrum for the first time and not stop to gaze across the barren expanse of the Moor of Rannoch? Every time I pass this spot I have to put from my mind the thought of being lost out there in a winter blizzard.

That Good Friday I set out to climb my first Scottish mountain. As we made our way up the western slope of the Mamores I was instructed in the art of collecting Munros and was kindly but sensibly warned that the mere pursuit of these was an unworthy pastime if followed to the exclusion of genuine mountaineering. Thus, in contemplative mood, I climbed to the top of Mullach nan Coirean, technically rather an uninteresting peak but one for which, as my first Munro, I shall always have a tinge of affection.

There must be many people who climb Ben Nevis merely for its pre-eminence among British peaks and, although I did know a little more about the mountain than this, I must admit that it was high on my list of souvenirs from my first visit to Scotland. Thus, on a very dubious Easter Sunday morning, Kenneth Coote and I set off from Polldubh. Conditions were poor with a high wind and even at the col between Cam Mor Dearg and the Aonachs it was obvious that at 4,000 ft. life was going to have its problems. Donning every vestige of clothing we possessed, we set off into the cloud and snow of Cam Mor Dearg which in the very brief clearances looked more like Nanga Parbat than any British mountain. We were determinedly cutting steps for what seemed an age until, like two rather more famous mountaineers, we suddenly realised that the ground dropped away on every side and that we were on our summit.

Now a quick council of war—advance or retreat? The teeth of the Cam Mor Dearg Arete swirled out of the mist, jagged and threatening, but screwing our courage to the sticking place we decided to press on. I have little real memory of that traverse—it is a blurred reminiscence of whirling snow, ice-covered rocks and stumbling feet, but I do recall being thankful that the exposure of our route was veiled in cloud. Eventually we reached the top of Coire Leis and struck out in conditions of mounting severity for the summit of the Ben. At last we made it and congratulated each other as best we could. This was difficult for we could hardly see one another— great balls of ice had formed on our hoods and anorak strings, our hair was frozen to our scalps, our trousers were in flat, stiff folds. I pondered that our survival time up there would be about a couple of hours. Never had I known that such polar conditions could exist on British mountains.

Visibility was now almost non-existent and we tried in vain in the white-out to find the tourist route off the mountain. This was quite impracticable and after half an hour’s wandering on the summit we peered at each other—each knowing well what thoughts were in the other’s mind. We decided that some form of descent was imperative so we carefully retraced our steps to the abseil posts at the top of Coire Leis with the object of getting down into the Allt a’Mhuillin. This line of posts at fifty foot intervals proved a godsend; Ken belayed to the top one and signalled to me to launch myself into space. I sat for a moment on the cornice gazing into the icy void, bewildered by the spindrift and gripped with fear; Ken suddenly swore violently at me (a thing he never does) and his therapy had the desired effect.

I was away, slipping and clutching, biting with my axe, held firmly by the tight life line round my waist. I got to the first post and belayed; Ken descended rapidly and skilfully to join me. We continued this in sections until the last post (a significant term) and by now my teeth were chattering and my whole skin felt cold about me. My train of thought wandered on: “Must belay . . . Hard to get the axe in . . . knot won’t tie . . . can’t do it with gloves on . . . take gloves off get frostbite . . . half belay will do. Ken won’t fall …” I looked up; leaning out comfortably, cutting dexterous steps, Ken was descending like an expert. Suddenly I could not believe it—there was a swirl and a scuffle and he was shooting down past me on his back with his axe high in the air. My numbed mind churned over slowly as the rope snaked out. I had just realised that unless I drove my axe in with all my might and stood firm, I should be on my way also when, before realisation could be translated into action, I was plucked from my stance and spun down the mountainside. I rolled over and desperately tried to jam my axe in but I could not get a good grip, the wrist strap broke and my last aid was wrenched from my grasp. I looked up and watched my axe disappearing as I sped downwards. Bereft of hope, I now wondered rather calmly what was going to happen. Suddenly my stomach was constricted in a vice-like grip and I discovered to my amazement that I had stopped and that a grim-looking Ken was staring down at me from above with his axe magnificently scudded into the ice. We exchanged a few gasped words of enquiry and discovered that we were quite unharmed. We gradually pieced ourselves together and took stock of the situation—a lost ice-axe (which was soon retrieved) and three hundred feet of descent fortuitously but rapidly gained.

As we worked our way down to the Allt a’Mhuillin and thankfully unroped, the Olympian anger dissipated, the cloud caps blew away and the whole glory of the north face of the mountain was miraculously flecked with evening sunlight. The ridges stood out like spears against the white threads of the gullies. We moved thoughtfully down into Glen Nevis and made a quiet way back to the camp. It was Oscar Wilde who said: “Experience is the name everybody gives to his mistakes”. Thus was my first experience on Scottish hills a very chastening one.

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It was 4.30 a.m. on a June morning when my companion rolled over in his sleeping bag, dug me in the ribs from the depths of untroubled sleep and said “What about it?” What other answer could I give? The Etive chuckled past over the stones, the pink fingers of the early light were flickering over the huge buttresses of the Buchaille, the sparkling dew rain-bowed at our feet. Having driven to the Meeting of Three Waters we set off up the track into the Lost Valley to do the Bidean Horseshoe. I had been told of this lovely spot before, I had looked down into it from the Aonach Eagach, but never had I actually set foot in it. We worked our way through the tangled mass of tree roots and huge boulders and suddenly emerged from the rocky defile on to the broad grassy plateau. Here Scotland is beautiful beyond all the laws of beauty: the perfect symmetry of the valley with its huge fairway rising up in front of us into the steep gorge; the towering cliffs of Beinn Fhada and Gearr Aonach on either side; in the centre the mighty peak of Bidean with its clefts and gullies still deeply sown with snow.

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In the Lakes or North Wales it is possible to go out in the hills for an afternoon and do quite a lot. Once in Cumberland I remember not getting away until 6.00 p.m., but half an hour later we were climbing on the crags of Bowness Knott in Ennerdale. Two and a half hours for the eight pitches of Black Crack and still time to get to the Fox and Hounds—a fair day’s work. But in Scotland one needs rather longer; never is this more apparent than in the Cairngorms. Here one soon realises that enormous distances have to be covered if anything is to be accomplished. Roads are few and those that do appear on the map are often unnavigable; one must start at the end of the road and walk miles to the mountain and even more miles over it. One glorious April morning a group of us set out from the northern end of the Lairig Ghru to climb Braeriach. This was in the middle of a marvellous spell of sunny weather that had enabled us to walk on summit ridges without shirts on, had forced us to wear goggles incessantly because of the intense dazzle off the snow and had given us suntans that the uninitiated ascribed to the Mediterranean.

What a beautiful path the Lairig is! It winds gently up through the pine trees, the scent of which is almost Grecian in its intensity, imperceptibly gaining height all the way and giving glimpses through the trees of the tumbling cataracts of the burn far below. Eventually we arrived at the Sinclair Bothy and paused to watch a temerarious snow bunting pecking whatever crumbs we cared to throw. Then came the long trek up on to Sron na Lairig and the final ascent of the Braeriach plateau. Here we saw the famous circle of crags sweeping round in a corniced amphitheatre to the pyramid of the Angels’ Peak and the table of Cairn Toul. Could we possibly walk round to Cairn Toul as well? Two of us were prepared to try so we bade farewell to our companions and trudged off across the wastes.

As we passed across the Wells of Dee we suddenly found the tiny fluttered body of a goldcrest; it was a vivid flash of scarlet and gold against the snow, but even in death this poor victim of the storm looked strangely peaceful. The ascents and descents were becoming very tiring now, as was the soft snow, but at last we found ourselves beneath our objective. My companion, who had climbed Cairn Toul before, reckoned that this was the ideal place to build a snow hole, so I left him to his construction and set out up the last slopes of the mountain. I made the summit’s cairn without too much difficulty and was rewarded with a superb panorama of Deeside and the eastern Cairngorms.

When I descended to the col I managed to persuade ‘Nansen’ from his task—he had already produced a shelter of which any Eskimo would have been proud—and we began the long return journey. The slopes up to the Braeriach plateau were not as arduous as we had feared and we were soon plunging down to Glen Einich. We were lucky enough to find a long snow shoot which enabled us to make rapid, effortless and, this time, safe downward progress. We lay down and abandoned ourselves to the slope, capturing all the joys of motion until we emerged in a damp, tangled and laughing heap in Glen Einich. There now remained six long miles to be walked, which took almost two hours. When at last the car really was round the next bend our day had taken nearly ten hours and we had walked some twenty-two miles. We were both very tired, but a tiredness invested with a glow of happiness and achievement.

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If it is necessary to go to the Cairngorms to learn the lateral magnitude of Scotland, surely it must be to Glencoe that one goes to appreciate the vertical dimension. One of the most exciting things I have ever done is to climb the Crowberry Ridge on the Buchaille; not that the route is all that difficult, but the sense of height and depth is thrilling. The culmination of the climb is an unforgettable experience; you climb up the last few rocks on large and comforting holds and arrive on the exposed pinnacle of the Crowberry Tower. The white ribbon of the Glencoe road lies far below, in front of you everything drops completely away and again you can see the forbidding stretch of Rannoch Moor with the distant sentinel of Shie-hallion rising darkly into the distance. A progress in mountaineering indeed. Much may have been done in the past three years, but this has only revealed how much more remains. “Some work of noble note may yet be done . . . “.