Interpretation of Conditions

Firstly, may I say how useful I have found your information in the past. Thank you for your efforts! This week, however, I was surprised to see a comment by Duncan Francis where he quoted Deep Cut as in perfect condition. I have done the route before in excellent conditions and I also did the route the day after Duncan (this Wednesday). This week it provided a good day out and the ice was reasonable in the lower sections but the top was extremely thin. Whatever your tastes, in no way was the route anywhere near in perfect nick and a grade 3 leader wanting to test themselves on some perfect nick 4 would have found it very testing. Admittedly there is the chicken run out right below the top section (itself a very worthwhile variant). Keep up the good work, but I shall view some comments with caution from now on. P.S. Comb Gulley on The Ben yesterday gave a very enjoyable grade 4 in very good and quite easy conditions (honest!).

Gary Baum


Thanks Gary,

The vagaries of Scottish winter conditions! As I was not on the route I cannot say how good (thick) or bad (thin)it was. Last year some people were raving about climbing 'thin' ice routes on Psychedelic Wall, when in fact they were as thick as they had been for years. I put up a picture of Poacher's Gully last week and the author had it down as 'lean' conditions, but it looked very good ice to me with plenty of options, albeit once again all I had was a photo.

Personally I think 'thin' ice can still be very good to climb on so long as you are precise with your placements. It's when the ice gets 'thin' and 'cruddy' that I start to question good conditions.

Just goes to show how careful we should be when taking someone else's recommendations of conditions. You are correct to question it though and hopefully this blog will reflect the truth and not lead to accidents from suspect reporting.