I’ve been lucky enough to bag a good few days out recently with friends from Northern Ireland and the Lakes, every one of them in great weather. With Damian and Kookie, I visited Ben Vane, a Munro which packs a bigger punch than it’s status as the 283rd highest would suggest. Following that we climbed the schoolhouse arête on Sgorr Dhearg (on the Ballachulish horseshoe). Beinn Udlaidh provided some brilliant pure ice climbing the next day for Damian and myself, and on Wednesday Kookie and I climbed the  Steall Waterfall in Glen Nevis with our friends, (and many others!) alongside. Back in the Lakes a couple of days later, Ralph and I re-visited Hart Crag icefalls (III) and a few other quality, un-named smears, and a day later Jon and I climbed Steep Ghyll (V4) on Scafell. Impeccable weather throughout – if this is climate change, bring it on!

Just had a week working for an Outdoor education centre in Coniston. Fantastic weather and a great bunch of young people. Lovely weekend with the family and off to Scotland on Monday morning for a few days winter climbing.

I'll update the blog at the end of the week.

The March and April ML courses are now full. All courses are filling very quickly, best to book early to avoid disappointment!

Paul Platt and Dominic Hoare have just had another awesome trip to Scotland winter climbing. As a friend said when I called him 'Scotland is showing off'. Our intention was to go straight to Torridon in the NW but we got wind that Minus 2 on The Ben was in. We had a very cold night sleeping in my van in the North Face car park and walked into the corrie in perfect conditions. Minus 2 was fantastic, the first pitch is getting a little thin after a few ascents and care is needed but thereafter it's just brilliant.

We were having a meal with friends in Loch Carron in the early evening with plans for an early start to climb on the fantastic Triple Buttress of Ben Eighe. Once again perfect conditions after another cold night in the van. A three hour walk took us into the corrie and we decided to do East Buttress, a three star 400m grade 4,5. Well it was fantastic with cloudless views out to sea, brilliant climbing and good company what more could you ask for.

Our final day in the north took us to another Cold Climbs classic March Hare's Gully. I had to be back in the Lakes forthe early evening so we went light and climbed the 3* classic in a couple of hours and back at the van for 1pm. Another awesome route. The weather was changing and particularly grim when we drove through Glencoe.

Ralph & I visited Brown Cove Crags on Helvellyn today.  Top tip; the crags are not in Brown Cove ! The approach from Swirls car park is relatively painless and there were a good number of folk around, walking, learning winter skills, the odd skier and not too many climbers. We climbed Stepped Ridge (lll). It's in good condition, properly wintery with just a little soft snow over hard snow and turf. We reckon its at least twice the 100m the guidebook suggests and the photo-diagram hasn't got it quite right - where the red line goes straight up after half-height and then curves right, it should diagonal right and then curve left - easy to figure out in the good visibility we had because in this section you find the ‘window' in the picture. A top day out.

Ralph and I paid a visit to the Low Water area of The Old Man of Coniston yesterday. South Gully and it's neighbours aren't in condition but the icefalls of Percy's Passage ( lll / lV ) were well formed and provided great entertainment. Ralph made short work of leading the middle pitch after 10 years ‘in the wilderness'. We had a sunny ‘first lunch' on the summit, nipped back down to the tarn and soloed a gully which runs up the right (North) of the main buttress. Surprisingly not in the guide, this is a good line to the main ridge and as it's lean at the moment, had a couple of grade ll runnels on perfect water-ice. ‘Second lunch' followed, again on the summit in the sunshine.

On the 11th and 12th February Simon McCabe, Steve Hall and I had a fantastic couple of days in the Cairngorms. It was destined to be a hard getting there as I was meant to be working at a Lake District Outdoor Centre and needed to get the days off and arrange child care. Well the forecast was good and Sticil Face, our objective, had been on the list for 15 years, so it was worth the effort!

We arrived at midnight on Wednesday night and slept in my van. An early start enabled us to locate a snow hole in Corrie Domhain and leave some of our kit. We then headed off in poor weather, but light winds to Loch Avon. The slope felt insecure and after much delay and discussion we scooted across the slope linking islands of safety to Cascade (V1,6). This would have been my first lead on ice of this grade but it was not to be, 10 feet from the angle easing my arms gave out. A bit of frantic ice screw placing and I lowered off. Simon top roped to the screws and led through well to the top, good lad!

A very pleasant night in the snow hole and another early start found us standing outside in early light and more fresh snow. We decided to go over the top of Hell's Lum and drop into the corrie from there. At 9.50am we were climbing Sticil Face. Steve led the first proper pitch, Simon the much photographed ice pitch and I led the mixed pitches. It is a fantastic route, the weather was awesome and we summited at about 4.30pm. 

We picked up our sleeping bags from the snow hole and at 7pm we were back at my van driving back to the Lakes. A brilliant trip!

January seems like it will be hard to beat, lots of low level ice routes giving plenty of after-work exercise snatching rare gems like Cautley Spout, Low Water Beck and even a cross-border raid for Grey Mare's Tail in the Moffat hills as well as some local hidden gems that must remain a secret.

The high crags EVENTUALLY consolidated into good winter condition and the sun was out for long spells and seemed to shine most at the weekends, can february top all that? Last weekend was the highlight as Dom and I made use of limited time on the saturday to climb Bowfell Buttress (V, 6) in an afternoon - we were happy not to have to climb this classic testpiece with headtorches and thanks to the party who let us go on in front (I think they read Dom's body language exactly right!)

Next day was a much earlier start as we headed to Scafell where we found the Cold Climbs classics of Moss and Steep Ghyll weren't looking in the best nick so we jumped on another 3 star route called Pisgah Buttress Direct (V, 5) which is a memorable mixed outing involving an highly exposed traverse at mid-height and very thin climbing on the top pitch. Harder than BB we both agreed. We also agreed that we are old enough to know better than to race up to the crag at the speed we did. We were determined to get in front of everybody. Determined and very sweaty. Very sweaty and then very cold. One day we will be wise...come on february do your stuff!

Paul Rose & Scott and I went to Tarn and Falcon crags on Dollywaggon Pike on Sunday 31st January. After a relaxed start, they climbed & then descended Tarn Crag Gully 2 and then nipped up Dollywaggon Gully. This is a great soft touch grade III with the difficulties concentrated at the chockstone low down and in the icy top pitch. Great fun but the route is now suffering from the many ascents its obviously had recently. It’s well chopped up and there’s some loose rock around the chockstone.