The weather gods had been kind and conditions were coming very good all across the highlands. Craig and I had wanted to climb in Creag Meagaidh for some time but it’s surprisingly fickle and given the relatively long walk in, long routes and long walk offs, not as often visited as a lot of the other crags around. We decided that today was the day to go and explore so took enough kit to scale el cap in winter and set off on the approach. We had no real amibitions but had seen the not so often climbed, 1959 Face Route had been ascended a couple of times recently so had that as a marker. We were also keen to look at the ice routes on the post face.
Unfortunately my phone decided to die on the walk in and Craig didn’t take that many photos so there are hardly any photos of the day, but even if we had had working cameras, I’m not sure we would have been taking too many, we had a long day!
We knew the approach was going to be a bit of a slog as there had been a lot of snow right down to car park level, but had hoped that there had been enough traffic through that we wouldn’t have another repeat of Fingers ridge.
We were thankfully right, although we were passed by Ken and Al on skis looking rather smug! As mentioned, we didn’t have a plan as such, and had chatted about a couple of routes that we’d like to have a go at, and as we got closer to the lochan and could see the prevailing conditons we decided 1959 face route would definitely be a goer. Ken had recommended it on his way past, and we knew a couple of people had been on it over the last couple of days meaning the infamous route finding shouldn’t be too much bother.
We climbed it in 8 pitches altogether, the first pitch was a nice ice pitch, leading to a belay on a small ledge before a larger gully. We tried to run our pitches out to full rope lengths as we knew it was a long route. The 2nd pitch took the gully and a short step up to a corner. This lead to the long traverse which we managed in 2 long pitches, placing Craig in a belay in a cool ice cave. The next pitch was the crux, up a steeper ice section and a belay in the base of another ice fall. This lead to the final long gully to the top of the harder sections and then the last slopes to the top.
We topped out in the gathering dark and decided we would descend off towards Puist Coire Ardair and down its eastern ridge, hoping it would be slightly more scoured than other areas. We were unfortunately wrong and were met with ankle to knee deep snow right until we got down to the burn by the farm. Getting back down to the cars in 3 hours, another long day but definitely worth it!
If you liked this report check out our others here. If this has inspired you to have your own adventure contact us or have a look at all of the adventures we offer click here.