Ben Nevis Ice

Saturday I was up in Lochaber and with a promising forecast from MWIS we decided on an early start and headed up to Ben Nevis from the Torlundy car park. For a while I've been wanting to knock off some of the grade V ice classics on Ben Nevis, having done most of the IVs but only one of the V's. Point Five seemed like a good option so once at the CIC hut we made a beeline for Observatory gully to check out conditions. Orion Direct looked thin at the bottom and we'd heard from others that it wasn't in nick, Hadrian's Wall looked better however lower down it was still a little thin. This left is with Zero gully and Point Five V, of which we chose the latter.


I was climbing in a three with Stu and Julie and unfortunately we got beaten to the first belay. This meant a lot of queuing behind two parties, who in turn were slowed by less then favourable conditions and spindrift for nearly an hour and a half. Eventually I left the belay, leading a nice long pitch over the first steeping, past the ledge and moving left up the initial vertical wall to the in-situ belay. In place the ice was good however in other is was poor and I was a little dubious of a few of the screws I'd placed should I of taken a whipper. The hardest part was passing the almost overhanging bulge near the top on the left as the ice the had lined the slabs that you can bridge on had all been hacked or kicked off which made it all a little spicy.

Above this I had to spend another half an hour or so waiting for the belay, constantly getting showered with spindrift and ice from above. I also got hot aches, which made the experience even more delightful. I say the pitch felt about WI4 in continental grading. Eventually I brought Julie and Stu up, who found it pretty hard, with Julie almost coming off the crux. We had a chat at the belay and I set off up the next chimney pitch, getting five meters up before Julie made her feeling clear that she didn't feel up to completing the route (she's been ill on the walk in). I contemplated just lowering Julie off so she could walk out and me and Stu could continue but with it being late in the day, and the time that that would take, poor conditions, deteriating weather, and being behind two other parties we made the call to all go down and save it for another day.


Once at the bottom we had a quick bite to eat and Julie composed herself and started the trudge down Observatory Gully. Stu and myself decided that with a few hours of daylight left we could still get something else in so we quickly headed round under Observatory buttress and ran up Tower Scoop III in two long pitches. It felt about right for the grade, apart from the top section where I led a steep pillar to the far left which felt more like IV. Once at the top we decided with half an hour left to head up and make the exposed traverse back right to below Tower Gap before climbing the mixed ground to the gap itself and finishing up the final section of Tower Ridge IV to top out on the Ben.


We didn't get our original objective done, but what we did climb of it was excellent and I'm very keen to get back and tick it off for real.

Ben Nevis: CIC Hut

Last weekend I spent an excellent 3 days up at the CIC at the base of Tower Ridge, below the north face of Ben Nevis, the only true alpine style hut in the UK.

The walk-in.

Day 1 - Friday

After a laborious walk in with big packs we reached the hut mid-morning and made ourselves at home before setting out to do a few routes. Tom, Mark, Chris, Julie and Martin headed up to do Tower Scoop while myself and Stubbs headed up to scope out conditions in Corrie na Ciste. We were a little skeptical of conditions with the warm temperatures (I'd been rock climbing with my shirt of all day a few days before) but once we were a few hundred meters above the hut the snow turned to neve and quite a few of the ice lines looked to be in good nick.

We decided on Green Gully IV 4 ****, a Cold Climbs classic. It was in excellent nick with the three steep ice pitches being fat and plastic and with styrofoam like neve in between. Conditions were so good infact that we never got the rope out and simul-soloed the whole route in just over 30 minutes! It felt excellent just to be moving really fast and un-encumbered up some reasonably technical terrain, Stubbs needed some encouraging words to do the crux but did an excellent job despite claiming to be slightly out of his comfort zone in retrospect.

Hut life - Jagermeister and curry.

After topping out we descended No 3 Gully I, with a small abseil over the slumping cornice. On the way down as it was still early we did the East-West Traverse I of the Douglas Boulder, and just about resited the urge to get on Tower Ridge!

Day 2 - Saturday

Up into the Ciste with Chris today, we went straight for Comb Gully IV 4 ***, another classic ice route. We soloed up the approach slopes and did the route in two main pitches, a shorter first one. Ice was nice and plastic again.

I was quite keen to get on something a bit harder so once we'd done the No3 Gully descent we headed back round and underneath our previous route and up towards the Cascade V 5. It looked a little thin, and very steep but there was what looked like a ramp of neve at just over half height which would give a rest before the top section. The route is about 40m in total. I started up the first section, which was initially a little hollow sounding but then got onto some great plastic steep ice, vertical in places. Four screws and about 25m later this changed as I hit the neve band, which unfortunately wasn't neve - it was unconsolidated ice, almost as if somebody had just poured crushed ice onto it. With poor pick and foot placements and no immediate screws, and even though it wasn't steep I was un-confident of my ability to climb it safely so decided retreat was perhaps a better option and started digging. I got through the layers of crud and found some better ice below and got a screw in to protect we while I built the abalkov. I built one, but wasn't confident in it strength so dug a little deeper and built another. I threaded this one, and put a mallion on it so I could lower off unclipping and unscrewing my runners I went, just to increase my safety margin if it did go. Before I took the screw out I tested and waited the thread and it didn't fail so cautiously committed to it. Chris lowered me and I got the first two screw out, as I was reaching the third though the thread blew and I fell 15m hitting the snow below, bouncing and sliding stopping as the load came onto the next runner. Thankfully I was ok, I checked myself and nothing felt broken. A small cut on my nose, stiff neck and 3 small punctures in the left thigh from my crampons (but no holes in my trousers!?) were the only injuries.

After having a moment I re-climbed the lower section of the route to get my screws back. Its been annoying me ever since as to why the thread failed. My first thought was that maybe the cord broke, or I just tied it incorrectly in haste but on inspection afterwards it was correct. I knew the ice was poor but I did test it and it didn't fail, and why didn't it fail when I first weighted it on the abseil and not halfway down? AT the point the thread failed the angle of pull on the tread changed slightely from being straight down to towards one side, perhaps this was the reason.

Anyhow the fact that it blew justifies in my mind the decision to back off rather than push on up the crap ice. It also makes we think I certainly did the right thing in leaving the runners clipped as apose to abseiling straight off the thread, in which case I very well may of slid off down the mountain when it had gone. Thanks to Chris for holding me, and staying calm. I did ask him if he wanted a go but he gracefully declined.

Day 3 - Sunday

Ice pitch at the start of Glovers Chimney.

Final day up in the Ciste, myself and Martin headed to do Glovers Chimney III 4 on the side of Tower Ridge. The first pitch gave an awesome 20m of steep ice, certainly at the top end of III. We then moved together for around 150m up the snow slope and small ice steps to the base of the crux mixed chimney. I led this and it was excellent technical mixed climbing, feeling tricky as it was quite thin but well protected. Theres three pegs, each by the hard moves, in addition to this I think I only placed a sling and nut. You top out right in the middle of Tower Gap which is awesome.

Final mixed pitch of Glovers.

We finished up the upper section of Tower Ridge to the summit plateau before descending and walking out. A session in th Clachiage followed.

Cairngorms: Ski Mountaineering & Winter Climbing

Saturday morning, after a relaxed drive up on the Friday afternoon I skinned into Coire an t'Sneachda along with Hannah, Joe, Jonny and Tom who were on foot. We split into two team with Hannah, Jonny and Tom heading to Fiaciall Couloir. Joe wanted to climb so steep ice so we went up to look at Mirror Direct IV 4 and I gave him some tips on tool and screw placements as well as foot work and then he did a superb job of leading the route which was his first proper ice route. At the moment its fairly banked out but still giving a good 6-8m just off vertical section. I followed and then we abseiled from the in-situ belay at the top.

Back at the rescue box we had a bite to eat and I stuck the skis back on and we headed over to Fiaciall Buttress, I managed to skin almost to the bottom only having to put my skis on my back for the final section, much to the pleasure of Joe who was wading through the snow behind me. We looked at Invernookie but decided the wind was a bit high but went for Fiaciall Couloir II/III. We roped together with about 30m of rope between us with myself leading and Joe following and climbed the route in about 20 minutes which was awesome. After topping out we headed round to 1141m where I left the other to walk down to the daylodge while I skied the Cas headwall and then blagged a few laps of the Corrie Cas T-bar.

Sunday we headed into the Corrie again and with the high winds and avalanche hazard decided to go for the sheltered option of Patey's Route IV 5. The first challenge of the day was constructing a harness for Hannah as she had failed to pack her's in the chaos of the morning. Joe led the pitch up to below the first bulge where I took over climbing this and then the crux pitch. The route was fairly thin in places, but still good, if a little tricky. Once at the top of the difficulties we soloed up Alladin's Mirror to the top.

Joe and Hannah filmed quite a bit of footage over the weekend and they've put it together in the video below:

Black Diamond Reactor - Review

After twelve months of use I think I've put my pair of Black Diamond Reactors sufficiently through their paces to warrant a long term review. They can be seen on Black Diamond's website and are advertised as:

'An excellent all-around leashless tool at a great price, the Reactor delivers precise placements and exceptional control.

• Dual-pommel TPU grip for ice/mixed use
• Aluminum shaft
• Shaft is CEN-T certified
• CEN-B Laser Pick included'

I purchased the tools in December 2009 while living in Canada. At the time I was after a pair of more technical tools for cascade icefall climbing in the Rockies, and perhaps the biggest factor in me deciding upon the Reactors was their price. I wanted a tool with a dual-pommel style grip and while Nomics would of been (and still are) my first choice they were out of my price range, the other contender was the Fusion 1 however this tool while excellent on the mixed did not perform well on ice, and at this point in time the Fusion 2 had not been released.

Since then I've used them for a whole season of cascade icefall climbing as well as some continental style mixed climbing. They've also done a season of alpine climbing in the European alps and most recently have been climbing ice and mixed routes in the UK. I'll look at the advantages to using the tools in each of the above activities sequentially below. After a general overview.

Reactor with micro hammer.

The reactors are the heaviest (marginally) of the Black Diamond's technical ice tools, weighing in when set up with micro hammers at 675g per piece. This makes it 3g heavier than the Fusion 2, 50g heavier than the Viper and 87g heavier than the Cobra. For Petzl fans its 70g heavier than the Nomic and 125g heavier than the new (10/11) Quark. The shaft is stainless steel with a dual pommel TPU grip. At the base of this is a clip-able spike. The head is Black Diamonds modular stainless steel head which is common across its range. I added grip tape to the shaft above the upper pommel for better grip when matching, and for when swinging the tool from this position.

For cascade ice climbing I have the tools set up with laser picks and two micro-hammers. I've had a few comments about how I go on without an adze, but for pure water ice I don't miss it. The main use for an adze in cascade ice climbing is clearing rotten ice from the surface to get good screws and in my experience I can perform this task fine, if not easier with the pick. Two hammers mean both my tools are equally balanced, and given the choice, although neither is a appealing prospect I'd rather hit myself in the face with a hammer than a adze!

Climbing WI4+ with the Reactors in the Upper Evan Thomas, Canadian Rockies.

I enjoyed climbing on the tools, finding them similar to a pair of Vipers but with the advantages of the dual grip. They worked well from the easiest angle ice (where sometimes I found it easier to swing from the upper grip position) up to WI4/5. At this point I begin to feel the limitations of the tool, particularly on featured, vertical ice as due to the relatively shallow pick angle (when compared to tools such as the Cobra, Fusion or Nomic) meant the shaft would often impact the bulges as I tried to hook them or make placements on top of them. If your not constantly knocking out routes in excess of WI4/5 this won't really be an issue for you.

I packed the tools when I headed out to Chamonix for the sumer alpine climbing season, at first feeling they were perhaps a little overkill. They were however fantastic, and worked really well for me in the alpine realm. I used them on several routes, snow-ice faces to mixed ridges. Examples being the North Face of the Tour Ronde, routes on the Tacul Triangle through to the Kuffner Ridge on Mont Maudit. For predominantly snow/ice routes I rolled with the lazer picks but for routes with more of a mixed nature I swapped the lazers out for fusion picks. These are BD's aggressive T-rated picks, for general use Titan picks would be more appropriate - but here is a limit to the number of picks one can have! I also replaced one of the hammers with the standard adze. I could of used a micro adze, but if your going to buy an adze for the axes then your obviously planning on using it - so just buy the big one. When you add the adze though, there is a noticable difference in the swing as despite the head getting heavier the weight is now further back then forward. This is minor, but is noticable on ice, on mixed it isn't really an issue.

On the Kuffner Ridge of Mont Maudit, with Reactors and tethers.

They coped well with both moderate terrain and technical climbing. On easy angled slopes I tended to clip my tethers to the head to allow me to plunge the shaft. This nonsense about not being able to plunge tools like this is rubbish in my opinion, In soft snow they still plunge fine. In harder snow, or when I've got the tethers climbed to the spike I often simply invert the tools and plunge the heads. If the snow gets any harder than this I'm into daggering terrain - or swinging from the upper grip (a lot of critics cited this reason for not using such tools in Scotland - its Scottish Winter CLIMBING for got sake, not Scottish Winter Plunging...).

Next up was the UK winter season, which started for me with some early season mixed in the Lake District followed by several trips to Scotland. I had the tools set up in their alpine configuration, with fusion picks for this and found them to be fantastic. At first I had concerns about the teeth on the top of the fusion pick making removal from placements difficult but I haven't really found it an issue. For Scottish ice they've been great, having had them out at Beinn Udlaidth, the issues I had with them on really steep featured ice in North America haven't manifested yet over hear due to the comparatively lower grades and thinner ice. They've also done really well on the mixed having climbed consistently up to tech 5 in them. If your knocking out real hard mixed test pieces, VIII & IXs, then you'll probably be better off with something like a Fusion, as there is some pick shift when matching with these tools.

End of a day's early season climbing on Great End, the Lake District.

So in conclusion, the Reactors are an awesome all-round tool, especially for the UK based climber that perhaps dabbles in ice-climbing, mixed and alpine. If you want a tool specifically for hard water ice on the continent then there are tools out there that will do job better (Petzl Nomic).

Coire an t'Scneachda: Aladdin's Mirror Direct, The Runnel & Fingers Ridge

After my stint on the West Coast I had a quick turn around and headed back up to the East with LUMC on Monday for some climbing and skiing. The first day myself, Struggles, Joe and Toby headed into Scneachda for some climbing. Conditions under foot were very icy with some parties putting crampons on at the ski car park for the entirety of the walk in.

Struggles climbing his first IV.

We got to the rescue box in good time and geared up, before splitting into two pairs with Joe and Toby heading up towards trident gullies area and myself and Struggles heading up to Aladdin's Mirror Direct IV 4 ***. The route was in good conditions, giving a good 20m pitch of ice, of which about 12m was probably vertical, the rest being just off. I lead it and then Struggles followed and did really well for somebody whose only done a few easy gullys before, and he was climbing with two walking axes! Once at the top we chose to abseil back down as a pose to walking round on the Mirror as their is a good in-situ belay (3 pegs and block with a sling around it) in place at the top.

Struggles abseiling down from Mirror Direct.

Next up, we traverse across to the trident gullies area and chased Joe and Toby up The Runnel II ***. I think we did 5 pitches but we climbed quickly as conditions we nice firm neve with me leading and Struggles following. The narrow chimney at the top was good fun, we took the lefthand exit. Once on the top we made our way across to and then down the Goat Track before tucking ourselves behind a boulder for some lunch.

Struggles coming through the cornice on the Runnel.

We then headed over to Finger's Ridge IV 4 *** hoping for a quick ascent before we lost the light, Joe and Toby were on Broken Gully next too us. The first pitch was fantastic with great mixed climbing that was continually interesting, the rock was hoared and all the crack were filled with hard ice which made gear sparse in places but the climbing easier. Joe was having some difficultly below me having got off route so once at the belay I dropped him a loop and brought both him and Struggles up, and then Toby. The next pitch up to the Fingers looked awesome and I was keen for it but the other were pretty cold and the light was failing so made the decision to bail. We abbed off the the spike that can be threaded at the belay and got to the bottom (just!) in one 50m rappel. Certainly will be going back for another go as it was awesome.

Stob Corrie nan Lochan & Beinn Udlaidh

Andy, Mark and I headed up to Stob Coire nan Lochan in Glencoe to get a quick route in before that evening's celebrations (New Years Eve). We did the standard approach very quickly not stopping once between the car and corrie base taking around 1:10hrs. Conditions were poor with warm temperatures, the snow was fairly wet and most of the rock was black, ice was still clinging to lots of places though.

Leaving the car in drizzle on the A82.

We headed up for Twisting Gully III 4 *** which is a Cold Climbs Classic. The pitch was a simple steep snow/neve slope which leads you to below the tech 4 crux. From photos I've seen this usually is covered in ice or consolidated snow but for us there was only a thin layer and some old snow ice which made it quite sporting for 4, although still well protected. Above this another snow slope leads to a peg belay. The next pitch is the final hard one with a move through over a chockstone, this again was good fun, and thin, but easier than the previous. Two more pitches of around grade II lead up the finishing section of the gully before going through the cornice. I'd like to go back and do the route in fatter conditions I think as it would probably be more enjoyable.

A damp belay on Twisting Gully.

I pulled through the cornice at 2:10pm and then started bringing Mark and Andy up, we then legged it round and down Broad Gully I before de-gearing and heading back down the valley. We all pretty shocked when we were driving across the bridge in Glencoe at 4:10pm! Poor conditions but a good day, moving very fast.

We began the journey home on Sunday 2nd after a rest day on New Years day. I'd always wanted to climb on Beinn Udlaidh which is small hill near the Bridge of Orchy, but which offer some of Scotlands best pure ice climbing so we went for a look. Due to the recent thaw a lot of the lines weren't in and some had only jsut started re-forming with the last 24 hours of cold temperatures. We went for Quartzvein Scoop IV 4 *** which gave us 3 pitches of climbing, with the middle being the steep and sustained crux. The quality of the ice varies with it being plastic in some places and brittle in other, good screws could be found where needed though. We climbed fairly slowly as I led all the pitches and brought Andy, Mark and Martin up in a continuous line. We topped out just as the sun was dipping below the hills, de-geared and headed down to meet Lewis at the cars.

Myself leading the crux pitch on Quartzvein Scoop.

So in summary of the last two posts an excellent week spent climbing in Scotland in good company. I think we achieved a good balance of climbing and having a bit of holiday. For me the thing that made the trip was the chalet we rented at the Inchree Center - far superior to camping!

Cautley Spout

Cautley Spout is allegedly England's highest waterfall according to Wikipedia, and is located in the Howgill Fells. Its a bit of a winter classic, forming after a good period of cold temperatures what is a pretty good ice route. I've been up to it a few times before when walking in the Howgills, most recently two weeks ago - at that point I definitely did not think I was going to be getting on it this early in the season!

With university commitments during the days all this week I was getting a little frustrated, so on Tuesday evening I suggested to Ben that perhaps we should go and get on it one night, which is what we did last night. I was a little skeptical about conditions, so earlier in the week, daringly started a thread on UKC to see if anybody had been up there, hoping it wouldn't spur on loads of overly keen people to go and get on before us and knock all the ice off! The route is in Brian Davison's Lake District Winter Climbs book in the outlying areas section. Its given III and 250m, and has a short approach of probably only 1.5km and a small amount of ascent.

Myself, almost feeling like I was on fat Canadian water-ice.

When we left the car at Cross Keys it was getting on towards 7pm, and was about -4C which boded well, another good sign was that the river that flows parallel to the road had a reasonable layer of ice on it. After about 25 minutes we were at the base of the ghyll. Its obviously been well visited over the last few days as there was a defined track that wove its way up the lower stages to the large enclosed amphitheater below the first proper and crux pitch - there are a few small ice steps before this so geared up, apart from ropes about halfway up.

Ben below the 2nd pitch we roped up for, with quite a cold plunge pool below him.

We'd seen some headtorches on the the walk in and met this pair just as they were backing off the first pitch, having taken a line on skier's left of the ghyll. We decided to go and have a look anyway. We set up an intermediate stance probably 25m off the deck and then I lead off up the crux. At first the ice was good, but the higher I got the more detached and hollow it became, mostly sugary spray ice as appose to water ice that my tools were just pulling through. It wouldn't take screws and a bit of dig for some rock gear below was fruitless so I decided to bail, only about 6m from the top of the 30m pitch, and started the careful downclimb. A few more days of cold weather, or perhaps even first thing int he morning and perhaps this pitch would be ok, I guess it would probably go at around WI3, Scottish tech 4 in good conditions. I got to the belay and lowered Ben to the ground before downclimbing again, we took a look at skier's right as well but that looked as it probably wouldn't go either, and we would of has to get seriously wet.

Ice-climbing by headtorch - awesome!

Undeterred we escaped the ghyll up a small turf/scree gully on skiers left just below the amphitheater and walked up and traverse in to just above the crux pitch that had just thwarted us. Here we soloed for a while up small ice steps following the ghyll before roping up where it steepens again for 4 pitches, the best certainly being the penultimate full 50m pitch of good ice, probably going at WI3-, so nowhere near hard but fantastic for UK Ice. All night we had fantastic weather, perfectly clear skies with bright stars, perhaps the only thing that could of made it better would of a full moon. Climbing winter routes at night is cool, go do it.

Lake District Ice - Blea Water

Sunday entailed another 'Griffiths-early-start' with me and Martin leaving Tarleton around 5:30am. The drive up was fairly slow as anything other than the motorway was covered in ice. We came off at Shap, noticing on the way that the Teabay road cutting icefalls seems to be coming into condition quickly, I don't know if they are quite climbable yet though so don't take my word. From Shap we followed some icier roads, eventually arriving at the head of Haweswater just as it was getting properly light.

I've never climbed on Blea Water Crag before, I was initially attracted to it in the guidebook by the short walk in and the promise of some of the fastest forming water ice in the Lakes, which considering its been cold for a while I reckoned on being quite fat by now. The walk in went quickly and we were soon at Blea Water where we chose the Lakeland classic of Blea Water Gill Direct III 4. This route starts at the base of the face, only about 15m above the water level and follows a steep gill, first through a series of narrow chimneys filled with ice before it opens up allowing several variations on what was superb water-ice. We did 5 reasonably full pitches before soloing the last section where it eases.If you take the easiest line and avoid the difficulties it probably deserves and straight III 3 however if you take them direct its at least tech 4. The route is easily escapable at most point, which also allows to come back down and do variations you missed.



After topping out onto High Street we dropped down the ridge heading back to Haweswater for a few hundred meters before coming off partway down to the south to check out some steeper looking ice lines that we'd seen from the Gill earlier. I lead a nice route of about 20-25m which started with vertical ice for about 6-8m before the angle eased a little as you go over a few bulges. I'd say it felt about WI3, which roughly equates to IV 4, although it was single pitch Ice cragging so probably just the tech 4 is more applicable.

So, conditions are great at the moment, and if its ice your after certainly go and take a look at Blea Water Crag in the next few days.

Sunny South-face Rockclimbing & Cold Icy North Faces

So another update on alpine happening out here in Chamonix, I'll start with a bit of an update of conditions.

With the end of the hot period a few weeks ago a lot of snow then fell around 1-2 weeks ago which put all the snow, ice an mixed routes into good, or at least better condition then they were, we took advantage of this in a few weather windows over the last few days. The weather has now taken a turn for the worse now, with the forecast being fairly unsettled for the next few days. It feels a bit as if we've been juxtaposing types of routes over the last few days, being on warm sunny south faces oen day, in t-shirts and rock shoes and then on cold, icy north face routes the next!

Stubbs arrived just over a week ago, so the day he got here we just headed up for a quick lap on the Cosmiques arete in the afternoon to get our heads in the game for climbing together. We did it in 1 hour 40 mins which wasen't as quick as me an Chris did it a few weeks before that but was still fairly rapid considering we had a bit more queuing to do. You can tell its the high season here as there was a line of about 20 people at the crux slab! Thankfully we maanged to bypass most of these.

Stubb's seconding one of the easier pitches on Indianna Jaune!

Last Saturday, we headed out with a local; Brian Birtle, to a big limestone sport cliff down towards Sallanches. I'm not really a sport, well not really an udnerstatement, I'm not a sport climber! But Brian had the day off an was looking for people to climb with so we thought we'd go along an have a go. We went and did 'Indianna Jaune' on Maladiere, its 300m in 9 pitches and goes at 6c+. Its fairly sustained with about 5 of the pitches being in the 6b range, and the rest not being much easier. Its also fairly commiting, not in a dangerous sense, just due to the fact to get to it you walk up to the top of the cliff and then embark on 5 abseils to get to the bottom, leaving your shoes an stuff at the top! The cliff is huge, and very very steep, as a lot of abseils leave you haning in space away from the wall. The route doesn't waste anytime either with the second pitch being the 6b+ crux, now I've led 6b sport before but this felt a lot harder than that - I have to confess I pulled on a lot of quickdraws and ropes to get through it. The exposure on the wall is fantastic, Indianna Jaune takes the easiest line on the face, the rest of the routes are a lot harder so your alwasy climbing in between very very steep, and very very blank rock. We averaged around 40 minutes a pitch and got to the top at around 7pm, before a hurried descent and drive to the kebab house in Cleuse. Big respect to Brian for dragging us up all the hard bits, and the the route in general! Absolutely superb.

At the bivi for the Rochefort Arete.

Early last week we headed up with a friend of Chris's, Remi whos been living in the UK for a while. We took an afternoon lift up the midi and traversed the Vallee Blanche in fiarly bad conditions to get to a bivy spot above the Torino hut for an attempt on the Rochefort arete the day after. We went fairly lighweight for the bivy, and were a little cold after the clouds dissapeared, and quite relieived to get moving at 4am. The route starts with a slog the glacier, over the bergschrund and then a small, but shallow mixed coulir lead to the col. Here we ditched crampons for the scramble up to the Salle e Manger below the Dent du Geant. The scramble cover around 300m of height and some fairly loose chossy ground, so it was nice to be on it when it was all fairly frozen together. We reached the start of the Rochefort Arete at around 8am. Remi wasen't feeling too good due to the altitude and to add to this Stubbsy had lost his glacier glasses on the ascent so was struggling to see as the sun began to break over the horizon. So a little frustrated we turned around, it was a shame, as I could see the whole arete stretching out in front and it looked ace, and so close! We were glad to be descending the chossy ground while it was still frozen though, there were a few parties on their way up as we were descending and they were starting to knock a lot of stuff down. Two short abseils and a bimble down the glacier and we were back at the bivi spot, before making out way back to the Midi.

Friday/Saturday we decided to take advantage of a good weather window and head off to try an do a route first on the Tacul Traingle, then cross the Vallee Blache, sleep at the Torino hut and knock out the North Face of the Tour Rone the next day before heading back. For some reason the first Midi lift was delayed and it was after 8am when we were leaving the station. There were 3 teams (of which 5 of the 6 people, ourselves included were sporting our new minimalist alpine rucksacks! - I'll be reviewing it soon on here as its ace) heading for the Chere Couloir, our chosen route. The routes given D, which is really soft for the standard of climbing but due to its accesibility of being an hour from the lift station is fair. Its about 250m of ice climbing, with the crux pitches being 85 degrees, so about WI4. We moved together up the first pitch and then did 5 fairly full pitches before abseiling back down. The route was in good condition, with good ice on the steeper bits and bomber neve on the more easy angles slopes. We chose to abseil back down the route in 5 abseils to below the bergschrund rather then continue up to Tacul and secend the normal route through the seracs which with all the new snow would of been pretty dodgy.

Myself leading one of the easier upper pitches on the Chere, lots of spindrift!

After we were down we roped up and began the crossing to the Torino hut, getting there a few hours before dinner, and then having a fairly early night.

The North Face of the Tour Ronde, our route took the lower and upper icefields linked by the snow gully in the middle.

We left the hut at 5:30am, which was probably a little late as depsite being a north face, the route on the tour ronde gets the sun fairly early. The North Face route is 350-400m, moving first up a icefield directly above the bergscrund and then through a snow gully which leads to the upper icefield and the summit. The climbing is much easier than the Chere, being at the steepest maybe 55/60 degrees - the crus pitches are in the gully. We moved together up the first icefield for around 100m with myself leading, and then pitched it through the gully and up the summit icefield getting to the top by about 2pm. We moved fairly slowly but this was due to the fact we were fairly tired from the previous day. The descent was tedious as we first followed the PD rock ridge before dropping off at the shoulder on the the Tour Ronde Normal Route, which is AD and follows a broad, and very loose couloirs. 3 Abseils got us to the bottom of this, and then a sprint back to the lift station.

We fancied a bit of warm rock climbing for change after our cold north face endeavours so headed up the Flegere lift and then the index chair to climb on the index, a huge fin of rock standing clean away from the mountain. The classic route takes the ridge up this, at about 4c but we opted for a link of two routes on the face, going at about 5c/6a over 7 pitches. The climbing was nice, and most of the pitches were pretty well equipped. We abseiled off the summit, back down tot he chair and were back in Chamonix for late afternoon.

Stubbs atop the Aiguillete de Argentierre.

Continuing the theme of sunny rock climbing, after a fiarly heavy night with Chris, John a Scott we got up late so drove up towards Argentierre and walked up to the Aiguillete de'Argentierre, a small pinnacle about an hour from the road road. This was pretty easy, if a little dissapointing with two pitches of maybe 4c getting us to the top. Nice views from the top of the pinncale though. After this we did a route on the cliff opposite, which was 4 pitches of 5c, excellent slabby climbing on warm Schist.

Yesterday we headed back up into the big mountains to have a look at the Rebuffet Route on the Eperon des Cosmiques. Me an Chris went and had a look at this a few weeks but decided the start was out of condition and dangerous due to the snowmelt. We'd heard about a direct start though, that missed this though so decided to go an have a look. The catch was that apparently it went at about E1. The crux of any alpine rock route was as always getting out of crampons and boots, getting these into your rucksack and then getting your rock shoes on! I led off up the first pitch we'd been informed about and immeidietely found it quite hard so left my sack on a runner for Stubbs to deal with later. The climbing was awkward but got easier and eventually I made the belay an then brought Stubbs up, who was complaing about having to come up it with two sacks. I'm not sure it was E1, maybe hard HVS, but still fairly hard on a mountain. I then led out the rest of the rightwards trending ledge system, belaying below overhang pitch. Stubbs came up and I set off up the overhang pitch, this starts with some lovely crack climbing with good gear before you reach a big roof which sticks out about 2m. You can free this, but it goes at about VI so I just pulled on the gear an got through it quickly. 3 More pitches on lovely orange granite cracks led us to the top of the buttress at about VS, and then we zoomed along the Cosmiques Arete, getting to the station for 2pm. Superb route.

Me, leading on the Cosmiques crux slab.

We've had a rest day today, as the weather is bad, its actually looking quite unsettled for the rest of the week so we'll what we get done. I'd like to do the Frendo or Kuffner, and Chris is talking about the Brenva but there all fairly serous routes, so we'll be needing a spell of settled weather to get on any of them.

In addition to the above we've also beein hitting the valley crags like les Gaillards quite a but in between things.

Junkyards & Norquay

Just a quick note here.


Last weekend (Sunday 28th) I headed out to the Junkyards with Dena & Ian for a fairly chilled afternoon, we threw a top rope up and climbed some of the steeper lines on the curtain before doing Scottish Gully, all fairly standard stuff. With regards to conditions theres are some big shear cracks forming in the ice on the main falls, I counted 4/5 with about 6ft in between them, I don't think theres any immediate danger but its certainly showing that its late in the season. The curtain is also thinning, and theres a big hole at the bottom. The itself isn't too bad to climb on, theres a granular layer thats sitting on top of the proper stuff thats formed as a result of the freeze cycles, this in combination with the ice below actually gives quite easy placements, it goes without saying that the steeper (WI4) lines are all really hooked out. If your after leading stuff I'd be wearing as due to the quality of the ice I was wearing about placing screws, and if you do place some, especially for top-roping make sure you bury them with some snow/ice. It was over 10 degrees when we were out there in bright sunshine and screws were certainly falling victim to melting out.

On a side note we hired some gear from a place in Canmore as we were a bit short, including a pair of Black Diamond Cobras - absolutely amazing tools, probably the best I've climbed on (yes, better than the Nomics I think!).


Yesterday (Sunday 4th) I was out skiing, as the other resorts were going to be busy due tot he easter weekend we decided to check out Norquay. Its a small resort, only 5 chairs all with a mixture of runs coming off them but it was satisfying for the day, if I spent several days there in a row I would certainly get bored, its no Sunshine or Louise but considering there were probably only 50 other people there all day (Sunshine would of been in the 1000s) it made some pleasant skiing, being able to just burn down runs with nobody else on them.

When i get chance I'll try and ass some photos to this. I reckon I maybe have next weekend left for winter stuff if the weather keeps going the way it is and then I'll be packing the skis and axes up until next season.

Scottish Winter Climbing

Climbing in Scotland, and in the other parts of the UK in winter has to be pretty unique. Having spent my formative years climbing in wet, cold wind blasted corries in the Cairngorms or the faces of Ben Nevis spending the year here climbing beautiful fat water ice in lovely cold dry conditions has been quite the contrast, a good one though. The routes are still challenging here, but theres not quite as much suffering involved which allows you to concentrate more on the climbing, perhaps allowing you to push yourself a little harder.

Anyhow trying to explain this contrast to locals has proven challenging, many have the view that the UK mountains, well our mere hills, are tame compared to the rest of the world and in some respects they probably are, but in others they are most certainly not. I found this video below and I think it gives a good picture of what the British winter climbing scene is like, and its not like its bias either - coming from a group of continentals! Make sure to watch it on full screen.



Obviously the grades these guys are knocking out are far harder than the average British climber, myself included climb and they do make some of them look pretty easy! But I'm a firm believer (perhaps because I don't in the grand scheme of things climb that hard) that climbing isn't about the grade, its about the process.

Upper Evan Thomas Creek - Slurpee

Friday (19th March) I headed out with Joe and Frank to Evan Thomas Creek in Kananakis country, about 45mins from Calgary. I've climbed in the lower Evan Thomas Creek before which is home to some classic and popular routes but I'd never ventured any deeper.

We walked up in the morning, passing a swiss guide and his client who made some remarks at the car park about the size of our sacks and obviously coulden't live up to them! After about 45 minutes you pass Chantilly Falls on the left which I did earlier in the year, and then after another 15 the Moonlight/Snowline area which is looking pretty thin at the moment. 400m or so past this we came across Combo Falls which had been on our list of potential objectives, but at WI2 and relatively short it looked a little bit easy. This is the last route in the most recent guide.

Unpacking gear in the upper creek, Rehab Wall behind.

To get to the upper creek from combo you can follow the creek base as the creek bends to the left and approaches a waterfall, bounded by two impassable cliffs on either side, the falls itself were frozen and looked climbable being a short pitch of WI2/3 however the plunge pool below was not and none of us fancied going for a swim - this might be possible in the depths of a cold winter. We scouted for a way up the rock ledges to the left of the falls but to no avail, the rock is also very loose and fissile her. The best option we found was to back track about 100m from the falls before climbing a shallow gully on skiers left, and then bushwacking through forest for around 150m of heigh until you gain the ridge crest, then carry on traversing above cliffs on the other side of the waterfall until the gradient lessens and you can get down to the creek, now above the falls. From the falls this takes around 45minutes - so all in all to get in your looking at around 2 hours, but I imagine under fresh snow this could take a hell of a lot longer.

We wondered around the creek for a while to scope out some of the routes, we had a little bit of beta but not much so decided to go for what looked like a nice WI3 pillar style route just to the right of Rehab Wall, the mixed climbing area. It consisted of an approach pitch of no more than WI2- which we soloed, followed by the crux of the climbing, a 20m freestanding vertical pillar with some very chandeliery ice. Above this was was another pitch of around WI3 which lead to the top.

Me leading the WI4+ crux pitch of Slurpee.

I lead the steep pillar with Frank holding my ropes and Joe taking photos. Good screws were a rarity, especially in the bottom half, the fact that I managed to thread a collection of columns about half a meter deep into the pillar highlights this I think. All was going well until about a third of the way up I pulled up on a poor hook, the axe pulled through the ice as I made the move, both my feet blew and the next thing I new I was hanging a few meters further down the route looking up at my other tool still planted up on the route. Frank checked I was ok, and I did likewise as I brought down quite a bit of ice. The screw that held me had a screamer on it and I ripped about a 1/3 of it, I do wonder if I'd had a static sling on it instead if it would of pulled. Anyhow I lowered down and retrieved one of Frank's tools and then carried on back up, climbing a little more carefully until I got to the better ice above, finally pulling myself over the top quite relieved. I brought Frank an Joe up who both agreed it was a pretty scary pitch before Frank led up the final easier pitch, we both followed and then got off in two abseils.

A little research after showed the route to be Slurpee WI4+, albeit in pretty tricky conditions because of the ice, one of the hardest things I've led here.

Slick Ice - Summary

Just read through what I wrote last night and realized that I actually wrote quite a lot! I'll offer a quick summary in the form of 5 key tips below in case you don't fancy the marathon read.

1. Use a longer rope, 60m or 70m and always make the effort to run the full length out.
   
2. Use an autoblock belay device, allowing multitasking at the belay.
3. Climb confidently, moving for reasonable distances above your gear.
4. Have a system that works in place for changeovers so there as quick as possible.
5. Lead in blocks rather than swinging the lead.
   

Slick Ice - Moving Fast On Big Ice Routes

I've been having a fairly chilled out 10 days since coming back from the Icefields, I took the weekend just gone off from anything mountain related to give my knee a rest and catch up with some housekeeping, studying and paperwork, and putting this new site together. Weather is also a little funky here at the moment, it feels like spring, I've been walking around the city with just a cardigan on in +10 a far cry from multiple layers of down when it was 30 below in December. From what I hear a lot of the ice in the front ranges is suffering, and the pistes are looking very thin at the resorts, still lots of snow in the backcountry though and relatively low avalanche danger apart from some solar triggered stuff on southern aspects. March is usually a big snow month so we'll see, I wouldn't be surprised if we get the mother of all dumps in the next few weeks but due to how the Arctic Oscillation feedback is working this year I think we may of seen the last of the really cold weather.

So in this aforementioned down time I came across a really interesting article on Will Gadd's site giving tips for speed and moving efficiently on multi-pitch ice, theres a lot of good stuff in there although there are a few things that I don't quite agree with or would do differently, I'll delve into a few of these below. When I first came out here and started the whole pure ice thing, which we don't really get in the UK, and I'd only had limited experience of in Europe I figured I'd best do a little reading to get up to speed so I picked up a copy of 'Ice & Mixed Climbing: Modern Technique' which is written by Gadd - if your getting into this sort of thing this is certainly the book to have and from what I can tell is as current as you can get for the basic techniques.

Will Gadd's Blog article can be read here.

Rope Choice
In Gadd's article he recommends using a single rope for leading on, and from what I've seen this seems to be commonplace for most climbers out here. Using one rope makes things simple, you don't end up with tangles, you don't have to think which rope to clip etc. With the impact forces of single ropes getting lower and lower using a twin rope (both strands clipped into each runner) system on ice is loosing popularity, it will however still always have advantage off if you cut your rope your still left with one strand! Half/double rope technique, what is commonly seen on trad climbs, biggest advantage is that on winding routes it reduce the rope drag on the leader. On ice this isn't so much of a problem as in general you can put gear where you want, obviously bearing in the the quality of the ice etc. On some ice routes, and those with mixed pitches double ropes may have the advantage. I'm specifically speaking with regard to cascade ice here, or continental/north American style mixed - for Scottish winter the double system for most routes is in my opinion the way to go.

Using a double rope system on a wandering route.

So assuming we go with a single rope lets talk about length, I think we're a bit behind the times in the UK with the standard rope length still being 50m, probably still stuck in the mentality that size doesn't matter, when clearly it does. Things are changing though and 60m ropes are becoming more popular, people over here are a step ahead though, 60m would be the standard length of rope, infact a lot of routes that need to be abseiled require 60m ropes but even this length isn't hugely popular with a large proportion of people have 70s. The only people I know with 70m ropes in UK are filthy sport climbers who heady off to Kalymnos or El Chorro for the endless lines of bolts. My conclusion of this is simple: longer rope = less pitches = faster. No two ways about it.

I'm not going to talk about how to speed up descent here, as if I did th article would be a lot longer than it is already going to be but it is important to remember that whatever rope system gets you up need to get you down. So if we look at my suggestion above, of say using a single 70m rope that means with that alone you can only rappel 35m. On a 300m route thats 8-9 raps, which is a lot. The solution to this would be carry a second rope or rap-line in a pack carried by the second, allowing you to rap the full extent of your rope.

Carl Stubbs seconding on a single serenity on a small WI3route.

The ropes I bought just before leaving the UK was a set of Mammut's new Serenity ropes, these are 8.9mm 60m ropes that are rated as single, half and twin. There not the first rope to get the rating as the Beal Joker has been around for 1-2 years before, they are marginally lighter than the Jokers though making them the lightest single rope in the world. I bought them because I was doing a lot of climbing in a three and I was concerned about the seconds when climbing in parallel only being on a single strand of double rope In a personal climbing situation I wouldn't have a problem seconding a route on one of these ropes as the chances of the second falling and generating enough force so that if the rope was over an edge are very very slim, I've even lead loads of pitches with just a single half rope below me but have obviously made an assessment off and am aware of the risk beforehand. In a lot of these situations though I was having to behave in a professional manor, for the most part leading on scouting events, and legally its not considered professional to have your clients on a rope that could be looked upon as being only half as strong as it should be, I imagine you'd be pretty screwed if this ever went to court! Its the same thing with guides in alpine regions, for pure glacier travel carrying a single rope is overkill, a half is fine in my opinion but in a legal sense the guides should have their clients on a single, not that anywhere near all of them do this!

I've got sidetracked a little there, back to the topic. If the routes short I'll just take one 60m and deal with more rappels, if I'm looking at a longer route I'll definitely take both, the main reason being the rappels, whether I climb on one and keep one in the pack or use them in a double rope system will depend on the route. High on my list of things to purchase though is a dedicated rap line, this could be a really thin (7-8mm) rope to pair with one of the serenitys for the descent or what I'm leaning towards more at the moment is a 60m length of 5-6mm cord to simply be used as a retrieval cord for the rap rope. Obviously using all of the above pieces in 70m lengths rather than 60m would also increase speed.

The Autoblock
These are still considered a little bit of a black art in the UK, with many people giving you funny looks when you rig one making you feel a little like the dark horse of the crag. The Europe and Canada they are one of the most popular ways of bringing up a second, the States is a bit like the UK but is slowly catching up from what I read. These devices really do speed things up, allowing the typically male climber to take on female characteristics for a period and multi-task! Belaying is dead time, if your using a placquette (atc) device off your harness you can't let go of the dead rope, meaning you can't do anything else. Using a autoblock device allows you to take layers on or off, mess with the rigging, change gloves, sort the rack ready for the changeover, eat & drink and a multitude of other things while still belaying your second, or even both of them.

The original autoblocks that were around were known as 'guide plates' collectively with modes such as the magic plate, and Kong's plate. These could only effectively be used for bringing up the second though. From my research the first major hybrid device to come onto the market, one that could be used in an autoblock/guide mode and also as a normal belay plate for belaying the leader was Petzl's first Reverso. I owned one of these and it was a great device, being nice and light and slick. Petzl followed this withe Reverso mk2 which didn't really change much apart from adding some grooves which reduced the slickness a little, to the like or dislike of different people. The big failing of these devices, and why a lot of users of the original magic plate shunned them was that they coulden't be released under load. If your second fell and ended up hanging in free space unable to to get back on the rope and take their weight off the rope, or even on a very steep face with little holds your unable to lower them to the ground easily. There is a method for doing this which everybody who uses such a device should know like the back of their hand, it involves attaching a sling or cord to the karabiner which the rope runs on the device (not the one attaching it to the belay) and then running this cord up above the device, through a point on the anchor and then back down and clipping it to your harness. The dead rope coming out of the device is then attached to you via an Italian hitch and the slack between you and the device taken in, the 'dead' rope coming out of the Italian hitch is then held and you sit back and put you weight on the cord. It may take a bit of bouncing but the carabiner being held by the rope int he device should release allowing you to lower the climber off the hitch. SO not the the easiest thing in the world to do. The old plate designs used to have a hole in the bottom that could be used to simply lever the device in this situation and lower the second. Black Diamond obviously picked up on this and released their ATC Guide which solved this problem by adding a loop to the front of a devide enabling this levering to take place, Petzl soon followed with their Reverso 3 which effectively copies the Guide. I currently use a Reverso 3, a big advantage is that it works across a large range of rope diameters, gone are the days of having to own a Reverso and Reversino! Go buy one.

Swinging Leads
On Ice swinging the leads on anything but short routes when your trying to climb efficiently doesn't in my experience tend to work too well. Even on big rock routes I think its far more efficient to lead it blocks rather than switch for every pitch. This is for a few reasons:

• You get into that lead mode, where your head is screwed on to what your doing, you go your eye trained for gear an you physced for it. Spend half an hour at a belay and you'll soon loose this.
• Ideally the second should fly up the route, getting from top to bottom in about 1/4 of the time it took the leader to climb (this is assuming climbing as equals) so they should be pretty dam warm when they arrive at the belay, and also pretty tired. It makes more sense for them to sling a belay jacket on to conserve this heat and for them to have a rest while the leader whose probably starting to get a little chilly after bringing the second up starts up the next pitch, warming up again.
• Changing over the rack is quicker, this is more true on rock then on ice but some things still hold true. Its much easier to replace gear into a depleted racked harness then it is to move the entire rack to a new harness.

So on longer routes, lead it blocks, its faster, and warmer.

A little bit of a side note is that if your climbing in a three, if your going to stand any chance as climbing as fast of a pair (and it IS possible, sometimes a three if everybody is slick and has assigned roles can climb faster than a pair!) you need to be climbing with seconds in parrallel so one person needs to lead substantial blocks, changing the leader in this situation is a real faff and wastes time.

Changeovers
As of noticed i've supported and agreed with a lot of what Gadd wrote in his article with what I've said above, not surprising, the guy is a better and far more experienced climber then I'll ever be but when reading the section he wrote on changeovers, particularly the set up of the belay for bringing up the second I thought it was a bit strange. The way he doesn't equalize the screws properly and essentially brings his second up off a single screw. I'm not saying this is wrong or unsafe but I don't think its what I'd do, below is the steps I would take upon reaching a belay on a big multi-pitch route.

1. Upon reaching where I'm going to belay one, as long as possible bomber screw in, daisy chain clipped to the top hole on the screw (a simply clovehitch with the rope would also work here but I like the daisy, it does however have its whole own world of controversy which I'm not going to get into now).
2. I shout "SAFE", upon hearing this the second takes me off belay, shouting "OFF BELAY", and begins to disassemble the anchor leaving in one bomber piece which they are attached to.
3. I put in a second bomber screw, usually higher but this depends on the ice and equalize it with a sling clipping my Reverso in guide mode to the powerpoint (equalizing this with the rope, while making the system more dynamic makes it more complicated and more difficult for the leader to move off once the second arrives).
4. I take in the slack, coiling it over one foot, there shouldn't be much as you should making an effort to run the rope out. When I hear "THATS ME" from the second its in the plate and I start taking in tight and shout "ON BELAY". The second should no this is coming and be ready to take the last screw out and be on the move in mere seconds.

While the second is climbing I can be eating, looking at the next pitch, changing gloves or anything else. One thing I think is quite easy and useful to do it to put in your first runner for the nest pitch as it should be immediately after the belay and stick a screamer on it so its ready to clip as soon as move off later Gadd suggests drilling a v-thread ready for the descent, and for the second to belay off, I've never done this but I could see how it would certainly speed up the descent. So the sequence when the second arrives:

1. Second arrives, clips into powerpoint of equalized slings, leader takes them off belay.
2. Flip over lapped rope onto the top of the equalized sling so its ready for the second to pay out.
3. Swap gear over, this should be occurring from moment they reach the ledge. The second should make sure them clean all the screws on route so this doesn't have to be done at the changeover.
4. Second puts leader on belay, leader un-clips daisy chain and starts climbing, clipping pre-placed first runner.

Julie Paton - lapping the ropes over the equalized sling, ready to pay out to the leader. Cascade, WI3+, 300m.

So nice and slick if it all goes to plan.

Confidence
Something not mentioned at all it Gadd's article as he concentrates on process and technique is the psychological side of climbing fast. If you go down to your local wall/gym the quick-draws on the lead wall are probably about 2m apart, we've already discussed that longer pitches make things faster, but think if you place a screw every 2m on a 60m pitch thats 30 screws. Never mind the weight of carrying 30 screws, but if it takes say 20 seconds to place a screw that 10 minutes you'll spend on the pitch simply putting screws in. Firstly this is a hell of a lot of time and will obviously slow you down but perhaps more importantly, hanging on one axe for 10 mintues (cumulatively) while you do this would be bloody knackering, energy you'd much rather spend getting further up the route. So you need to learn to climb confidently, for several meters above your gear.

On most routes for a pair I think 16 screws is a good number. If we loose 2 at each belay thats 12, and if each climber has one in reserve for those 'just-in-case moments' that leaves working screws for the pitch, which on a 60m pitch would be one every 6m. I think this is reasonable.

Conclusions
For anybody looking to climb bigger stuff faster I hope this offers a little advice, in addition to Will Gadd's fantastic effort. Its mostly all applicable to water ice however some of the techniques could be carried over in the rock, alpine or Scottish mixed arenas. I've really only scratched the surface of stuff here, and writing the article I got sidetracked a few times down different avenues which at some point in the future I'll return and expand on.