Stu McAleese at EMMF - Tonight

Edinburgh Mountain Film Festival kicks off tonight with Mountain Equipment Pro Partner and Plas y Brenin guide Stu McAleese giving a lecture on his recent successful Big Wall climbing expedition to Baffin Island, Where Stu, Twid Turner and Mark Thomas established their new route Arctic Monkeys (VI A4 V+ 1400m) on Sail Peaks, Stewart Valley, Baffin Island.

Stu on Artic Monkeys

The lecture starts at 8pm - Ratho's Murray Lecture Theatre more details here

Dave MacLeod at EMMF this weekend

One day to go before Edinburgh Mountain film festival starts

Dave MacLeod will be taking part in the Ethics of Adventure Debate at 2pm on Sunday 24th October at the George Square Theatre alongside Kayaker Patrick Winterton and Base jumper Kris Yule.

Dave Bouldering in Glencoe

The debate panel of experts come from a variety of backgrounds, which will prove fascinating. The Festival organisers will be actively encouraging audience participation and questions, which should result in a compelling finale to an intriguing Adventure Session.

More information and to buy tickets click here

Note: today is the last day you can buy tickets online otherwise its first come first serve at the festival its self which kicks off on Thursday night with ME pro partner Stu McAleese and his Baffin Big Walls lecture at Ratho.

Piolet d'Or 2010 Chang Himal slide show

I've being meaning to post this for a bit now and with a bit of time on my hands I've eventually got round to it.

Last year Nick and I were nominated for the Piolet d'Or 2010 for our first ascent of the north face of Chang Himal in Nepal. This is the film/slide show that the organisers put together for the event.




Looking semi hopeful for flying to Lukla tomorrow, now we just need a couple of weeks of weather like we had last year, fingers crossed!

Paul Diffley at EMMF this weekend

Edinburgh Mountain Film festival kicks off this Thursday night!

Saturday (23rd) afternoon at 2pm sees friend of the brand and professional film maker Paul Diffley of Hot aches hit the stage at the George Square Lecture theatre.

Paul Filming The Pinnacle last winter on the Ben

Paul was an avid climber himself when he first decided to point a video camera at another climber in 2003. Since then, he has formed Hot Aches Productions and filmed many of the world's best climbers, making several award-winning films in the process. With a blend of dialogue, photographs, film extracts and previously unseen footage, Paul will give a comic insight into some of the iconic athletes he has worked with, sharing stories behind films such as E11, Committed, Fools with Tools, Monkey See Monkey Do and his next film The Pinnacle which premieres next month.

More information and to buy tickets click here

Note: Wednesday is the last day you can buy tickets online otherwise its first come first serve at the festival its self which kicks off on Thursday night with ME pro partner Stu McAleese and his Baffin Big Walls lecture at Ratho.

5 Climbs, 5 Islands - BBC 2 Tonight

Dont forget... The 5 climbs, 5 islands film that was originally filmed as a back up for the BBC Great Climb programme in case of atrocious weather, injuries etc will air on BBC 2 Scotland tonight.


The 2 part film (second part will air on Tuesday 26th) features ME Pro partner Dave MacLeod and fellow climber Tim Emmett as the climb around the islands of the Hebrides.

For those outside Scotland - BBC2 Scotland is also available on Sky channel 990 and it will also be available to view on BBC i player

The waiting game...

This afternoon we should have being wandering into the village of Tangnag, sitting under the south face of Kyashar, our base camp for the expedition. Instead we find ourselves wandering down to Himalayan Java for our ritual coffee session and brief escape from the hustle and bustle of Kathmandu, the constant beeping of car and bike horns, the sound track of the city, reminding us where we are.

The first attempt at flying to Lukla, only 75kg of excess, let the bartering commence!

Lukla, the small mountain airport we fly to for the start our trek, is quite literally perched on the side of a mountain, 40 minutes of beautiful Himalayan panorama ending with a very ‘exciting’ landing on the short runway with a 12% gradient. With no radar they need very good weather to operate and the heavy rain and snow over the last few days means only a small handful of flights have left. Leaving a massive backlog of trekkers and climbers at both ends, frustration showing on everyone’s face.

We’ve packed and un-packed all our kit three times now for different scenarios trying to beat the system and jump the queue. The only option other than flying is a 9 hour bus ride to Jiri, the start of all expeditions before the airport was built and then an eight day trek to Tangnag. We chose Kyashar because of its ease of access from Kathmandu, three days should have seen us at base camp, the long approach trek isn’t too appealing and already three days behind schedule we’d arrive at Tangnag nearly two weeks later than planned but with all flights fully booked for the week options were running out.

Last night over a beer with Loben (www.lobenexpeditions.com) we came up with a plan, a bit of a gamble but hopefully it pays off. This morning Phalden our ‘guide’ got the early bus to Jiri with most of our kit and will start the trek to Tangnag tomorrow. We’ve kept one bag with us, just about enough kit to try and acclimatize on Mera Peak. The idea being we can get a flight in the next couple of days which will be much easier with just the two of us and only one bag, grab a porter in Lukla and arrive in base camp quite a bit in front of Phalden and start acclimatizing. It’s never a good idea going separating from your bags but knowing Phalden he’ll look after them like his own and won’t let them out of his sight, they’re in safe hands!

GORE-TEX® Campaign hits Manchester

The Mountain Equipment GORE-TEX® campaign has hit the streets of Manchester.

Street Team

This is the first part of a campaign which will run around key locations across the UK over the coming months to coincide with our new and updated Gore styles landing in store for Winter.
The Manchester Campaign which includes billboard advertising, in store point of sale and street PR is based around The Mountain Equipment Store on Deansgate - where you can check out the latest range, more info here

Window at The ME Store

Keep your eyes peeled around Covent Garden, London in the coming weeks.

View our Hardshell range here