Helvellyn - V-Corner Variation

Sunday (28th) myself and Tom got up at a un-earthly hour and headed north in search of some early season winter climbing. After a little sliding on Kirkstone Pass, and some snow chain related remediation we pulled into Glenridding before heading up the road to the youth hostel being the first people there. The walk in was a little tedious, with the ground being completely frozen from the start, but eventually we got to red tarn, finding several people encamped trying to get a early start.


We chose V-Corner III, and ended up doing a slightly harder variation of it, up a ice runnel and then mixed corner before the v-corner itself, to the right of the actual line of v-corner. Conditions were fantastic, with the turf being completely frozen for the most part, the rock was rimed up and there was quite a bit of water ice around. The snow that has been left over from the dump a few weeks ago is now bomber neve in the gullys however some of the mixed line could still do with a few more inches. We topped out in wall to wall blue skys and almost alpine conditions, had some lunch and then descended striding edge, excellent day.