Spending two nights in the Rossi and Volante Bivouac, we summited Castor and Pollox in a day via the normal routes as a part of our acclimatization. My head was feeling pretty rough after the first ascent to the hut, so we slept it out for a night and then beat the rush to top out on Castor before the queues arrived from the Italian hut below.
“Continuously excellent climbing, brilliant rock, exhilarating situations and a stunning location make this the very best VDiff in the West Country”. Sunset and low tide coincided, although this didn't stop Rob getting drenched on the approach to the first belay. Half way along the route, Rob pointed out that he hadn't bothered to bring a headtorch on this nighttime adventure, requiring an awkward abseil descent to the grassy banks below.
A major expedition for three weeks to the Djangart valley in Kyrgyzstan. With five other friends, we climbed seven new alpine routes on unclimbed peaks in the range. For further details, please see the Djangart expedition website.
With a relatively early 2:45am start, we made good time up the glaciers and rock finish to the summit of Dufourspitze (4634m) in around 7 hours. The descent route was much more exciting with some soloing of fixed ropes over the top of the Spanish and a few monster crevasses to contend with.
Is Google Earth ruining expedition planning? I thought no, and spent half an hour trying to convince the BMC AGM's Friday night audience to agree. Responses ranged from amazement, shock, cries of “but he's only 12”, and one particular individual was seen sobbing into his hands with horror at what the internet could achieve. Job done I think.
In support of a Cerebral Perfusion study for Dr. Chris Imray, I spent 22 hours in a hypoxic chamber breathing 12% oxygen to simulate ~4000m altitude. It was a night of strong headaches and restlessness, accompanied by a good dose of vomiting for my partner Jamie. I also spent around 4.5 hours in an MRI machine over the course of the study, which produced lots of great pictures of my brain and the blood vessels within.
