Today John and I headed to Buachaille Etive Mor to see if we could escape the weather.  On arrival to John's favourite mountain the weather didn't look hopeful.  We wandered in with an open mind, a rack and a single rope.  On arrival to Great Gully it was raining so I decided we would head up North Buttress as John had already done Curved Ridge.  Whilst popping on waterproofs and gear it cleared up and blue sky appeared all around us.  A quick change of plan.  We traversed the mountain to get to the bottom of North Face Route (Severe).  I had never done this in summer but I did it 2 winters ago to give a sustained V,6 which was fantastic.  Climbing the route in summer brought back many great memories of the winter ascent, I bit my lip on some bits, asking myself how I climbed it with crampons and axes?!  We followed the exact winter line I took and it had some great pitches of rock in the upper sections.  After topping out we nipped over to Rannoch Wall psyched for another route.  With only one rope we were unable to abseil back down but fortunately Mike was just abseiling down after climbing Agag's Groove.  John had only climbed January Jigsaw on this face.  After a chat with Mike we all went to climb another route so we could team up on the abseil.  Mike went on January Jigsaw and we set off on Agag's Groove (VD).  We caught a team up on Agag's right where Jan Jig crosses, so we decided to shoot up in front of Mike.  As John had done these last two pitches we decided to have a go on a rather slippery and slimy Satans Slit (VS), a pitch I had never tried.  We topped out and abseiled down with Mike and His client.  Thanks Mike!  a great day finished by a wee descent down Curved Ridge.

Another great day out climbing on my favourite mountain in Glencoe.  This time I was joined by Kyle and Ben on Buachaille Etive Mor.  With only a little bit of sport climbing under their harnesses they wanted to climb a classic traditional route.  We headed up Curved Ridge to the base of the mighty Rannoch Wall.  The weather  wasn't great today but fortunately we were in the lee of it and sheltered from the wind and the rain.  The rock was pretty much dry all the way up.  We had company on the face, a team were on Agag's Groove so we climbed January Jigsaw (Severe) instead.  There were several teams on Curved Ridge too all making the most of the sheltered aspect.  From the top of our route we did two abseils back to our bags and descended curved ridge and wandered back to the car.

Today Kenny, Deziree and I took the drive back out to Dunkeld for try and finish Hamish Teddy's excellent Adventure (7b+).  I put the clips is and reminded myself of the moves.  Kenny and Deziree then had a play on it too as I got psyched up for my first red point attempt.  Up to the first rest went well where I was able to recover for the crux section, one little error saw me having to down climb but pressed on anyway and found the crux in my wake and shaking out at the heel hook rest.  I knew it was in the bag now, just wanted to make sure I didn't mess it up as there is one tricky section before the easy holds.  A good shake out and a visualisation of the moves set me up nicely to finish at the chains with a massive grin.  Well pleased to get it on my first red point.  I then had a look at Marlene (7c) which felt pretty hard....maybe my next project....

Another quick drive away from the rain saw Kenny and I standing below this fantastic conglomerate crag. I have been here on a previous visit and climbed the classic Stone of Destiny (6c+) and it was a great place for us to warm up on.  I led up placing the clips and remembered how much fun it was.  I then went onto lead up Inverarnie Schwarzenegger (7a) on-sight which I was super pleased to get up without falling off.  After that we went onto the classic Paralysis by Analysis (7a+) which I fancied on-sighting but unfortunately I popped off near the top with my arms throbbing with lactic acid.  Its a fantastic route which is sustained and constantly overhanging.  Unfortunately the rain set in, this didnt affect the routes but affected the belayers moral so we agreed that we would bail.  More unfinished business to come back for.

Today Kenny and I headed back to Dunkeld as we were both keen to climb Hamish Teddy's Excellent Adventure, a fantastic sustained 7b+ which moves up the steep and technical wall of Dunkelds Upper Cave Crag.  Kenny and I both made good progress, on my first red point attempt I got a sequence wrong and got too pumped trying to correct it and on my 2nd attempt my foot popped off a smear and saw me barn dooring into thin air, unable to vice my fingers tight enough to stay on. Airtime!  Feeling really close so hopefully on my next attempt I will get it!

Today was Fabian and Erik's last day and they wanted to see what all the fuss was about with the Black Cuillin.  Unfortunately they couldn't see what it was all about but we did get a good feel of it!  We headed up to the Inn Pinn but I decided they should come back and do it another time as it was very wet and greasy but more alarmingly it was very windy.  So we missed out the Inn Pinn and headed south onto Sgurr Mhic Choinnich, along Collies Ledge, and up and over onto Sgurr Alasdair.  After leaving the car, we hit the cloud level at 300m, we were in the cloud all day and didnt get out of it until we got down to 200m above sea level.  So we didnt see much but had a great scramble along a great section of ridge and had a good scree run down the Great Stone Shoot.  A good wet finish to my 3 days with Fabian and Erik.

Today was day two with Erik and Fabian.  The weather was clearing from the north-west so we opted for Neist Point, the most westerly point on Skye.  We arrived to blue skies and an empty crag.  Most of the routes were dry after yesterdays rain and we set up and abseil and went into the Financial Sector, quite fitting as Fabian works in this sector in Switzerland.  We started off on Shocks and Stares (HS 4b) which the guys learnt how to fist jam, something they have never had to do on bolted sport routes in their country.  Fortunately they were quick learners.  After topping out we all abseiled back in and I led them up Midas Touch (VS 4c) which goes up to a wee roof and follows a curving overhang to its end and then pulls through on good holds, a fantastic route.  We were all psyched for the route to the right which shared the same start but took another overhang and followed a groove come crack.  Hand-jamming-tastic!  The guys both did very well on this route too.

We then went down to Destitution Point which is directly above the water so we had to abseil into a belay and climb back out.  We firstly climbed Man of Straw (VS 4c) and then went back in and made a quick ascent of Come Around To My Way of Thinking (E1 5b).  A great place to spend a day, in fact a great place to spend lots of days, so much to climb!

Well day one with Erik and Fabian from Switzerland was almost put on hold due to the horrendous weather that was sitting on Skye.  After a delayed start (to allow the weather to pass, which it never really did), we headed up to Kilt Rock at 4pm to get a couple of routes done.  Unfortunately there was still a bit of drizzle and the routes were all still very wet but we managed to climb 2 routes.  We headed down North Gully but were met by a garrison of midgies so retreated to the top of the crag and I got the guys to lower each other into Stomper (Severe) and Pied Piper (E1 5b).  After both of these we looked at setting up for abseiling at sea cliffs and chatted through considerations the sea cliff climbers need to think about to make a safe and enjoyable day.