Q. What to do when the ski road is closed with forecast of 100mph winds? A: Stac na h-Iolaire from Ryvoan.

Another -20 day with wind chill.

Slabby even at 400m.

Eagle Ski Club party

Starting cairngorm car park taking lower path past Coire an t-Sneachda, coire an lochan and over to Ben Macdui summit. Snow on south facing slopes was thin to nonexistent making progress slow with skis on pack

Freezing level well above sumit. Patchy cloud with warm sunshine. Chilly breeze when sun went behind a cloud.

Snow on south facing slopes was thin to nonexistent making progress slow with skis on pack. North facing slopes had fresh on firm spring snow. the fresh could be sticky in places and even wind blown and slaby of the summit of macdui. Snow in Coire an Lochain was by far the best, fast spring snow, easy to ski. Tip is going to Macdui, leave the skis behind and enjoy the walk or stop at Coire an Lochain and enjoy the skiing.

Graeme + Les + John

ordersforgraeme at btinternet dot com

Cairngorm to Lurchers Gully

Blue skies, no wind, fantastic

Firm on the way up - sunbathed on Cairngorm summit for a while waiting for it to soften, but needn't have bothered - no snow off the back of Cairngorm. Walked to the top of Coire Raibert, skied the obvious runnel round and then up above Domhain. Walked down, great skin up onto Cairn Lochan ridge, and at last a ski descent on still firm snow. Walked over the meadow and then a fantastic run down Lurchers in perfect, unskied, sugary spring snow.
Cover looked great towards Macdui but if you only want to ski round the Corries, west to east will give you more downhill snow.

The Slant (Mess of Pottage)

Aladdin's Mirror Direct

N.B. Actual date of descents was 19 February 2014

sunny and beautiful in the morning - completely necessary for The Slant, which was the main event... Then clagged in terribly, but I know the Mirror well enough, and there was no ice-fall section, so 6-8m visibility was somehow enough...

strange mix of soft and hard, with some places just soft (such as on top of boulders / protruding rocks), others something like a crust on top of a firm wind-pack and still others scrapy and horrible. But the cover at the time was exceptional, and I believe it still is.

THE SLANT
Dropped in off a small but firm cornice, but I was probably glad of the firmness as a welcome alternative to being avalanchy... Picked my way down, across and through the Slant, and thoroughly enjoyed a rather exposed route but on decent snow. The chimney section was intimidating, as a fall would still have been costly at this stage, and the average steepness remained elevated throughout, but a couple of confident turns saw one through to a point where there was a clear line to the bottom.

ALADDIN'S MIRROR DIRECT
One of the "jewels in the crown" of Scottish extreme skiing, but I feel rather a counterfeit for my efforts that day. All previous attempts had involved a significant huck over the chunky ice-fall which normally sits in the direct route, hence giving the line its Grade IV winter climber's rating - on the day I came, saw and descended, there was almost no ice to speak of (I had to dig with my pole right at the crux to find some sitting just 2inches below the surface of snow-caked hoar-frost, which held my edges better than a traditional January Cairngorm piste...). It was a pretty awful, bridging side-slip to the crux, and then a brief point-and-shoot out the bottom, with a stoppage turn immediately after, as I really couldn't see anything once past the rocks... Not a pretty descent, but no rope was used, and a descent was achieved nonetheless.

Apologies for the delay in posting here, it was a busy time at work, and then I was straight off on holiday...

Peter MacKenzie (theph mack), Michael O'Donnell (photo credit for distance shots)

phmackenzie at gmail dot com

Ben Macdui and back

Sun and cloud

Icy on wind blown aspects, great soft snow on lee slopes.

www.alpineskiclub.org.uk