M.E Winter Skills Training Course - Day 2/3

Days 2 and 3:

Two more days good weather have allowed the climbers, mountaineers and hillwalkers from Cotswold to have great days out at a variety of classic Scottish venues. A team of us made a very efficient ascent of number 4 gully on Ben Nevis yesterday before continuing to the summit to take advantage of the occasional gaps in the cloud. On the way up we passed Jason and Adam who were climbing good ice on Wendigo with Tim Neill of PYB. The hillwalkers learned more essential skills and dug some excellent snow shelters while they were out. Today has seen climbing on Aonach Mor, a traverse of the Lochain and Phil's team made good use of the ski lifts to save some weary legs!

This evening we've finished the course with a brilliant lecture from ME Pro Partner Dave McLeod.Everyone has headed off to bed raving about an inspiring and informative few days. Thanks to all the Cotswold staff who've got fully involved and the PYB staff who made it so successful. The next bunch arrive tomorrow so there's a lot of kit to wash in a very short time! We look forward to another good few days on the hill.

M.E Winter Skills Training Course

Day One:

Our winter skills training courses are run by Plas Y Brenin, at their winter base in Glen Coe. The course is run for Cotswold retail.

So the weather forecast didn't live up to the promise of sunglasses in Scotland but didn't detract from a superb day on the hill.

We had three courses out today one dedicated to climbers, another which was more mountaineering orientated, the third was winter hill walking.


Chris and I were out with the winter hill walkers while Andy Turner and Rich Bailey went up Buachaille Etive Beag, Practicing essential winter skills.

Everyone has just finished for the evening looking pretty tried while relaxing in the bar.

COMING SOON - LLAMFF 2011

A date for your diaries, more exiciting information to follow!!

click to view

Latest Product Reviews

I've just picked up the latest issues of Trail and Country Walking magazine for February 2011.

First off Trail where the Morpheus Jacket came out "Best in Test" scoring 4.7 out of 5 in the Waterproof group test.

click to view

The test features 5 of the best general waterproof jackets on the market; all constructed from various waterproof fabrics and all put to the test by Trail writer/reviewer Graham Thompson. Graham scored us highly on the design and features of the Morpheus Jacket coupled with superb breathabilty, waterproofness and weight of GORE-TEX Pro Shell fabric.

click to view

The Ibex/Chamois Pant got through to the final 10 in the Mountain Trouser review scoring an impressive 4/5

click to view

There is also a Used and Abused write up for the Diablo Jacket by Trail resident geologist Guy Prince.

click to view

Its also worth grabbing a copy of Trail as theres a very rare interview with friend of the brand and mountaineering legend Reinhold Messner.

Then over to Country Walking where the Arete Jacket came out Best in Test in the Mens insulated jacket review scoring 20/20 overall.

click to view

Both magazines are in store now

Martin Moran: 2010 round up

2010 round up from Mountain Equipment Pro Partner and British Mountain Guide Martin Moran

Martin..... "2010 was an excellent year particularly for winter and ice climbing. I made several new routes in Scotland, including Pale Rider (VIII,9) and Feast of the East (VIII,9) on Beinn Eighe, The Wailing Wall (IX,9) on An Teallach plus some notable repeats The God Delusion (IX,9) (2nd ascent) on Beinn Bhan Sundance (VIII,8) (2nd ascent) on Beinn Eighe and The Secret (VIII,8)(5th ascent) on Ben Nevis.

In Norway the cold winter produced stunning ice climbing conditions and with Martin Welch I made the 1st British ascent (and 13th or 14th overall) of the 275m Vettisfossen (Norwegian VI, WI6), one of the world’s most impressive and famous waterfalls.


In our 18 hour Vettisfossen day I wore the same pair of ME Randonnee gloves throughout – testimony to their superb warmth water resistance and technical performance. We also discovered and climbed a new 300m line up an astounding pair of ice pencils above Ardal – ‘Double Whammy’ (Norwegian V, WI6).

Spring and Summer were mainly spent guiding. We had a total of 200 clients in the year and notable highlights were weeks in the Lyngen Alps and Lofoten Islands of Northern Norway, where I guided the magnificent 11-pitch Presten West Pillar (E2) – one of the best rock climbs I’ve done. In the Alps I made guiding ascents of the Kuffner Route on Mont Maudit, Vaucher Route on the Aiguille du Peigne and a traverse of the Schreckhorn .

Our post-monsoon expedition to peak Satopanth (7075m) was beset by bad weather. A single blizzard put down 4 feet of snow at base camp. Having already reached and dumped kit at camp 2 (6000m) we were unable to retrieve the kit and were lucky to extricate ourselves safely under threat of avalanches."
more information available at Martin's website here

Climb Magazine - February 2011

We've just had the latest issue of Climb magazine appear out of the post bag. This months issue features our very own pro partners Andy Turner, Andy Parkin and Dave MacLeod.

Andy Turner features making the second ascent of Dave MacLeod's Catherdral (X,11) on the Cobbler in Mid December kicking off whats so far been a great season. photo by Lukasz Warzecha


Andy Parkin features in Adam Wainwrights article "The Wizards apprentice - adventures with an Alpine magician". photo by Ray Wood

Theres also a great article by Dave MacLeod - "Staying Strong" where Dave explains how to prevent and beat common climbing injuries.

We also have write ups by reviewer Tom Richardson on the Tupilak II and Ogre Jackets in the "Gearing up" section

Get down to your local stockist and grab a copy - well worth a read

DAV Expedition team 2012 - Videos

2 videos for your Friday afternoon viewing pleasure to get you psyched now the snows back (well kind of)

(Left to right) Members of the DAV 2012 expedition team on their recent visit to select kit for this winter season, with Anke Schneider Marketing Manager and Thomas Strobl Director of Invia - the distributor for Mountain Equipment in Germany, Austria and Italy.

You can check out 2 videos from the DAV 2012 Expedition team on there earlier training expeditions to Chamonix here at 4seasons tv - Video 1 and Video 2

Have a great weekend!