A final few days at the end of my Scottish winter season gave a mixed bag of conditions, weather and routes. After a year off the Irish crew arrived for a quick hit coming away with ascents of the Douglas Boulder SW Ridge (IV 5) and a very snowy swim up Western Rib (III) on the west face of Aonach Mor. With the turbo thaw back in action my final day on Curved Ridge was almost alpine with a leisurely picnic on Crowberry Tower and a cloud inversion on top.

A  harrowing film from Discovery Channel on the tragic events on Everest this spring. My Everest Sirdar and a good friend Dorje Khatri was one of those killed. This year he was the Sirdar for Joby Ogwen who was attempting to base jump from the summit for a live Discovery broadcast. Huge thanks to everyone who went and got him and returned him to his family. Honored to have provided some of the images of Dorje for this feature.

Plan A for today was the Aonach Eagach Ridge but the forecast 70mph winds put paid to that. Looking for another classic in Glencoe we headed to Curved Ridge on the Buachaille which usually provides a sheltered option in strong westerlies. The thaw has taken its toll and the route is now almost in summer condition with patches on soft snow which didn't require crampons today. We were able to look at a variety of alpine techniques of moving together on different terrain and even had a sit down lunch with a view in the sunshine!
We topped out into gale force winds which at times almost had us resorting to crawling to make progress. The head of Coire na Tulaich is still threatened by some significant sagging cornices behind which some obvious cracks are opening up. Below these is a large crown wall curving around the coire, the result of a significant avalanche but actually not the earlier huge slide which exited the coire base almost a kilometer away!

Today I was out with Mick and Paul who wanted to experience the classic Tower Ridge (IV 3). After the glorious weather earlier in the week the weather forecast was looking decidedly un-promising with the freezing level well above the summits and gusts of 80mph. We persevered telling ourselves we'd just have a look and it all came good for us with a very quick ascent in relatively benign conditions.
The walk in was enlivened by trying to persuade a group that No 4 Gully wasn't a good option for the day. They'd failed to look at a mountain weather and or avalanche forecast and were completely oblivious to the danger of the huge cornices / seracs that have been causing some huge avalanches in the recent warm conditions.
Tower Ridge is still well plastered in soft wet snow with helpful chewy ice on the various tricky steps. Against a constant barrage of noise from falling ice in Observatory Gully we soon arrived at Great Tower and the infamous Eastern Traverse. This is still pretty much banked out but today gave us the added bonus  of a good shower of icy water from above. I opted for the extension to the traverse which proved easier than the steep moves staright up. The narrow snow arete to Tower Gap was climbed a cheval and cruddy ice on the exit meant that today this was the crux. We topped out in 4 hours to be met by a constant stream of walkers, many in jeans and trainers, making their way to the summit seemingly oblivious to the cornices!