Manimahesh Kailash - Paragliding Expedition

I've just had an email in from John Silvester aka The Birdman of Karakorum. John headed out to the Himalaya early last month on his latest Paragliding expedition and made a new circumnavigation of Manimahesh Kailash.

Fitzroy Mitt being put to the test with Manimahesh Kailash in the distance

John sporting his new Citadel Jacket

John and fellow paraglider testing new equipment at lower altitudes

There more info/pics over at John's Blog here

North Wales winter kicks off with a bang

With good winter conditions building quickly in North Wales and Scotland snowed out, this weekend was the perfect time to kick off the Welsh winter season.

On Sunday, Chris Parkin, Mark 'Baggy' Richards (of blog fame) and Tim Neil, both of whom are supported my Mountain Equipment visited the Mecca of Welsh winter climbing, the Black Ladders. Here they climbed a new route
The Gerlan Heights VI-5.

Chris on the first pitch Gerlan Heights

Baggy tells us the story...

“Starting just to the left of Scimitar Hill, Chris amazed Tim and I with his coolness has he battled with thin turf and little gear on start of the first pitch. A fall from half height would have seen Chris deck out!! However Chris dispatched this with ease to add another fine pitch. Following this were two more amenable pitches at IV and III

Chris is a local legend and has claimed 15 new routes on the Black Ladders, many climbed in the mid 90’s with grades up to VII-7, some still unrepeated. The crag has over 40 routes, many up to 350ms and is a Welsh Jewel. Many of the routes are turf based routes which often give a serious feel due to lack of gear, especially early in the season before never has built.

Dave Garry and his partner Neil bagged the first winter ascent of Devils Dive a summer VS 4b, very green, wet and grassy route found on the right hand side of the Devils Kitchen. This came in at VI-6

I am sure this is just the start of the new routes in Wales this winter, so watch this space."

you can keep up to date with all the latest from North Wales over the winter at Baggy's Blog here

Winter Weekend

Winter is officially in this weekend..... so here's a little 6 minute clip taken from "Committed II" featuring Dave MacLeod on The Hurting (XI,11) Coire an t-Sneachda, Cairngorms, Scotland - to wet your winter appetites



The Committed II DVD is available at Hot Aches here

Doug Scott Lecture

Mountain Equipment are proud to support "The Rucksack Club Winter lecture series"

Click on the image for further information

Wednesday 15th December'10 sees Mountaineering legend Doug Scott take to the stage at the Heaton Sports Club, Greater Manchester.

Tickets cost £3.00 for members and £8.00 for none members on the door.

Kendal Mountain Film Festival - round up

Were just back in the office after a great film and lecture packed weekend up at the Kendal Mountain Film Festival. The weekend turned out to be a successful one as ever for all our Pro partners who were involved.

Andy Turner, Andy Parkin and Dave MacLeod have a catch up in the bar

Friday night kicked off with the World Premiere of "The Pinnacle" a film by Paul Diffley featuring Dave MacLeod and Andy Turner. The film went down a storm with the sell out audience at the Brewery Arts Centre - Main theatre.

Paul Diffley introducing The Pinnacle

Saturday night saw yet another sell out for "The Usual Suspects - The Great Climb Lecture" featuring Dave MacLeod, Brian Hall, Cameron McNeish and Richard Else as they took us through the live BBC televised climb on Sron Ulladale, from behind the scenes to the climb itself.

Then on Sunday Stu McAleese and Twid Turner took to the stage to present a lecture about their recent successful Baffin Big Walls expedition to a packed Parish Hall venue.

Andy, Dave, and Diff during the Q & A after the Premiere

Then to finish the weekend off "The Pinnacle" won Peoples Choice Award for best film so congratulations to all involved especially Paul Diffley.

The awards that were sculptured by Andy Parkin for this years festival

To celebrate win and the launch of "The Pinnacle" on DVD today (which you can purchase at www.hotaches.com) were giving away 3 signed copies of the DVD over on our Facebook page click here for your chance to win - competition ends Friday 26th November at 12pm

Kendal Mountain Film Festival - This weekend

If your heading up to Kendal this weekend then make sure you check out our Pro Partners who are lecturing at this years festival

Tonight

The World Premiere of "The Pinnacle" presented by Mountain Equipment

5pm at the Brewery Arts Centre

a film by Paul Diffley of Hotaches Productions which follows Dave MacLeod and Andy Turner as they repeat the infamous Smith/Marshall week on the Ben 50 years to the day. The footage I've seen so far has been amazing so make sure you get down to this one.

Saturday

The Usual Suspects -The Great Climb night presented by Mountain Equipment and Scarpa

6.30pm at the Brewery Arts Centre

featuring Pro Partners Dave MacLeod and Brian Hall along with writer Cameron Mcneish and producer Richard Else. The lecture looks at the filming of the recent "Great Climb" which went out live for 9 hours!! on the BBC.

Sunday

Big Wall Baffin Island presented by Mountain Equipment

2pm The Parish Hall

Pro Partners Twid Turner and Stu McAleese along with Mark Thomas present a lecture on their successful epic first ascent off Arctic Monkeys, Stewart Valley, Baffin Island.

Andy Parkin will have his artwork on display

there will be a few of the ME team at the Festival over the weekend (most likely around the bar area ) so come and say hello.

It wasn't to be

Amazing views from the south summit of Mera Peak, 5 of the 14 8000m peaks visible

You win some and you loose some, and unfortunately we were definitely beaten by the mountain this time, but we’re both back safe and sound which at the end of the day is a good result for any trip. The disappointment as you’ve might have guess is that we didn’t get to stand on the top of Kyashar, for me its not just because we didn't get up the route and stand on the summit but more that we didn’t get to give it a good go, no one’s fault, just the way it works out sometimes.

The local youths!

Sorting kit and food at base camp below Kyashar

After savouring the views on the south summit of Mera peak, sorting the gear in base camp and a brief winter snow storm we set off up the face on the 3rd November. Steep grassy slopes and broken slabs led to our high point of a recce a few days ago and at 4890m we changed into rock boots for the first actual climbing.

The start of the climbing at 4890m, soloing up the initial slabs (photo - Tony Stone)

Dirty lichen covered slabs lead for 50m to more broken ground leading us higher into the complex rock buttress. Easy scrambling interspersed with the odd tricky step accessed a ramp feature we’d spotted when scoping the face. It was very Eiger reminiscent, loose scree covered terraces surrounded on all sides by steep, clean granite walls. More through good luck than anything else we were getting high on the buttress without any technical difficulties, the ropes still coiled round us. Higher the ramp turned into a steeper gully and we got the ropes out for three long pitches of Cilan style loose rock, the final one feeling quite ‘exciting’ but giving way to easy ground and the top of the buttress.

One of the many loose terraces between the steeper steps

Finding a way through the choss on the final pitch of the initial buttress (photo - Tony Stone)

On the rock wall leading to the glacier (photo - Tony Stone)

Where next? This is one of the things I love about trying new routes, the unknowns. We could see where we wanted to get to, the small glacier glinting in the evening sun, tempting us up to catch the final rays, but a steep wall looked to block easy access. Coming round into a massive boulder strewn bay we’d expected to be cramming our toes back into rock boots but were happy to find a fault line leading easily up through the rock wall that brought us to a five star bivi at the base of the glacier. The following morning after a leisurely start savouring the warming rays of the sun (the joys of a south face) we were breaking trail up the glacier to reach the snow crest that lead to the base of the upper pillar.

Savouring the morning sun

Heading up towards the main face

How your body will adapt, no matter how fit you are, to altitude is anyone’s guess and there’s only one way to find out – by getting on with it. This was Tony’s first trip to altitude and he’d been struggling with it since the start, having to descend from the high camp on Mera Peak with signs of server AMS (acute mountain sickness). But still with having spent a night at 5500m on Mera it wasn’t too bad. Unfortunately the altitude was still playing havoc with Tony and we made the safe call to bail before getting committed any higher on the pillar where altitude illness would have led to a serious situation.

Retracing our steps

Descending the big bay below the glacier, the fault line we'd followed through he rock wall isn't visible but starts just behind Tony's back and went diagonally up right to the glacier just visible

There are still lots of unknowns on this route, but it gave me a sneak preview and a few of the answers, but more importantly temptation and psyche to be back. And anyway the failures keep you on your toes make those successes all the more special.

The boys that help make it all possible

Many thanks to Mountain Equipment, Black Diamond, Scarpa, Tendon Ropes, Lorpen Socks, SIS and Adidas Eyewear for their continued support and our agent Loben Expeditions for another first class service. The expedition was funded with help from The BMC and the Alpine Club Climbing Fund.

South Georgia 2010

We’ve just had this link in from Kris at XC sports the distributor for Mountain Equipment over in Norway.

The Team

XC sports are sponsoring a Norwegian team of Kayakers with Mountain Equipment clothing and sleeping bags.

The team of 4 made up of Sigrid Henjum, Tormod Austring, Dag Marius Ammerud and Simen Havig-Gjelseth have just set out from Port Stanley at 1.30pm today with the aim of becoming the first Norwegian team to circumnavigating South Georgia by Kayak.

Tormod with a small part of the luggage for the Exped

The team will be updating there blog daily in both English and Norwegian check out the latest here

there are also further details of the trip and video at the South Georgia 2010 site here