Part I - Part II - Part III - Part IV - Part V

Starting the walk up to Ben Nevis. Photo by Dougald MacDonald

Part III

With a good forecast for Day Three of the International Winter Meet in Scotland, more than half of the climbers at the Glenmore Lodge laid plans to climb at Ben Nevis, the highest summit in the British Isles at 4,406 feet.

The Ben is hallowed ground for Scottish winter climbers, with a history of technical climbing that dates to the 19th century and new testpieces still established almost every season. The mountain lay about an hour and a half's drive from the lodge, and so, well before dawn, we filled two 15-seater vans and a small fleet of private cars and headed west.

Clouds covered the peak when we arrived at the parking lot, but we could see fresh snow not far above us, and streaks of white ice appeared to flow out of the clouds and down the black buttresses and gullies: a welcome sight after two days of rainy, warm climbing. Better still, the air was calm. A herd of amped-up climbers raced up the trail.

Des Rubens heads into Observatory Gully: Still about 1,000 vertical feet to the base of the Indicator Wall. Photo by Dougald MacDonald

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