Buachaille Etive Mor’s curved ridge

I’m sure I am not alone when I say that the tales about Buachaille Etive Mor’s curved ridge are enough to scare most hill walkers into opting for the more straight forward path. Now I am here to try and describe the route and reassure those of you reading this that it is not as bad as many tales would lead you to believe.   

Finding curved ridge is relatively easy if you take your time and keep an eye out for a few landmarks. The first landmark to look for is the Water Slab. Approaching from Rannoch Moor, there is a car-park immediately after the Glen Etive turnoff. Years gone by this was the preferred parking point for climbers doing the Rannoch Wall and other climbs in that region path goes out the back of this car-park and heads in a straight line across the River Coupall and directly to the Water Slab. Unfortunately this car park is far from ideal for those that do not wish to do Curved Ridge and descend the same way. The preferred car park is the one a little further up the road at Altnafeadh. From this car park there is a path which leads towards the little white cottage. Follow this path over a bridge, passed the cottage until you reach a fork. Turn left at the fork in the path this path rises gently as it contours around the bottom of Stob Dearg towards Glen Etive. You cross a couple of wet gullies these are not the water slab there is a fool proof way of finding the water slab from this path, remember at the start I mentioned the other car park which had a path leading straight to the water slab well simply keep following the main path until it meets the other one coming up from that car park. 

Path leading towards cottage from Altnafeadh Car park

The fork in the path past the cottage

Heading up the path towards Glen Etive and the water slab

Heading up the path towards Glen Etive and the water slab

The water slab!!

The path leading up from the old climbers car park

Next walk about 10m passed the water slab and head up a wide scree gulley of cream coloured stone. Avoid going left up this gully as this will take you away from where you want to be and make things harder. Keep going up the scree until you find any decent path which goes to the right and back over the top of the Water Slab which by this time is way below where you are keep following this route which should take you steadily up and to the right until you are at a point just below and to the right of the Rannoch Wall which is easily identified as a sheer wall of rock detached from the bulky North Buttress. Curved Ridge is to the immediate left of this. However, you have to bear in mind that you are looking at both the Rannoch Wall and Curved Ridge almost end on and this makes identification more difficult. Now make your way up towards the Rannoch Wall and the route ahead will be clear to see. The rest of the route is clearly marked by shiny rock and crampon scratch marks.

Here are some more photos that I took which should guide you up the ridge.

The route ahead onto the curved ridge

Did I mention follow the scratch marks!

Next stage

Looking down in the direction of where we have come from

Next stage

Once again looking down in the direction of where we have come from

The last wee bit you can actually see the path to the top from this point

My old trusty Blacks tent

Over the past months I have been looking to buy a new tent as the pressure to keep up with the Joneses has been getting to me slightly. For the last 15 years I have been camping in a bright red Blacks 2 man dome weighing in at just over 2KG. I kid you not this tent has been amazing it has been used in temperatures below -5^oC and in winds exceeding 60mph and has survived without so much as a loose thread. Now if my memory serves me right this tent cost around £20 as I said earlier 15 years ago so I’m guessing that equates to something like £30 in today’s money.   

So knowing that I currently have this tent that has served me very well all these years it is hard to decide what to replace it with when most of the reviews I have looked at all comment on the materials being thin and ripping/puncturing early on in their life. Ok I know an additional foot print can be used to protect the ground sheet but does this not raise the question why not make the ground sheet thick enough to start with? I know that the reason for the thin materials is all about saving weight but still does weight saving have to be so drastic that you end up with a tent that does not stand the test of time.

I truly intended to write this post talking about what new tents excite me but ended up rambling on about my old tent. Maybe that tells me something... perhaps I should hold on to my old friend for a little longer until she finally starts to leak or develops some other kind of fault. In the mean time I will continue to look at others with their expensive tents and watch them collapse in high winds or leak from the floor and think to myself that was a good £20 I spent 15 years ago!

Climbing in portugal

I have been lucky enough be have been rock climbing a few times in Portugal. To date the best crags I have been to have been from Lisbon southwards.  The crags in the north of Portugal seem to be climbed less often and so are very dirty and in some cases almost impossible to safely climb.

The best Topo Guide I have found for Portugal is Jingo Wobbly Topo-|Guides Portugal http://www.amazon.co.uk/PortugalTopo-Guide . Additionally I have found some other Topo's by searching the internet high and low such as this one

and this website www.topos.pt has some nice topos.

Now a quick list of the crags I have been to and what I thought of them:


Rocha da Pena - The best word to describe this crag is awesome. I love this crag as it has a good selection of climbing grades and lots of them to keep you busy all day.A minimum of a 60m rope should be taken to this crag.

Sintra - A great place to climb with nice cool winds which stop this location from becoming too hot. a word of warning some of the routs are long and so a minimum of a 80m rope may be required so check which routs you might want to climb before heading out and go equipped with the right rope.

Serra Da Azola - An interesting crag (see attached Topo above) and one I intend to explore more. there are lots of good positive holds and nice technical moves on the routes. at the moment I can't say much more but I will write an update once I have explored this crag more. 

A Guide that I have met out in Portugal and that owns a company which offers a wide range of expeditions and climbing sessions can be found at  lifeoutside.pt. they are very helpful and willing to help so if you have any questions about anything give them a shout.

Could Beetroot turn you into a superhero?

First of all I would like to start this article by stating that I went into this experiment as an all out sceptic. I normally need extensive scientific evidence to back up any clam before I will give it a go. It all started about four months ago when I saw on a television program on which a researcher was calming that drinking Beetroot Juice can increases an athlete’s stamina. Shortly after this statement I lunged across the sofa reaching for my tablet to see if I could find any scientific evidence regarding this statement. The Name that seemed be associated with this research is a Dr Stephen Bailey from the university of Exeter. He claims by drinking 0.5 Litre of beetroot juice a day the high levels of nitrite found in beetroot juice reduces the cost of oxygen by up to 10% during exercise which means the energy demand at a particular work rate is lower. Further tests were taken where athletes were asked to exercise to exhaustion, on average the time to exhaustion is extended by between 15 to 20% by drinking 0.5Litre of beetroot juice.
A few days passed and I found myself doing the weekly shop at a well known supermarket where I spotted Beetroot juice on the shelf next to the fruit juices. I pondered over buying a carton for a moment before thinking “hey it’s worth a go just for a bit of fun”. On arriving home I filled up a glass and knocked it back, first impressions were that of confusion it seemed weird to have the taste of something that I associate with a solid food stuff normally found swimming around in a jar of pickle. Second impression was that this is defiantly something I has prepared to try. And so the personal test had started.
Day two I started the day as normal with breakfast with the addition of a glass of beetroot juice followed by my morning visit to the bathroom before heading off out to work. On using the facilities within the bathroom I became aware that my urine was not its normal colour instead it was a strong pink colour. This was aforementioned as a side effect on both the carton of beetroot juice and in some of the documentation that I had found online. After work I went for my usual one hour cycle, I returned home feeling a tired as I would normally feel after the same training exercise without being on beetroot juice but still willing to give this experiment a bit of time I re hydrated with another glass of beetroot juice. I was now hitting the magical 0.5liter daily allowance where I should start to see an effect.
Day three again the same ritual but this time while out for my training cycle I did feel different especially at the hill sections there was just a feeling that I still had a bit more fuel in my tank. But I still did not really acknowledge the effect as this could have simply been down to wind direction or generally having a better day.
Day four once again my normal morning ritual and again while I was out cycling I felt like I had more energy on the hill sections and on returning home I did not feel a tired as I would normally feel. This experiment was looking like it might actually be working.
Day five by this time I’m sure you have gathered I am a creature of habit and follow the same ritual every morning. But this time rather than doing my normal one hour training run I thought I would take my mountain bike for a long cycle 72miles to be exact. Once again while out I felt a noticeable feeling of more energy and by the time I had passed out the west side of Perth I noticed that I was a whole 15min faster than I would normally be. On returning back home my legs did not have that normal wobbly feeling as they would normally have after such a cycle instead they felt relatively normal. The time in which I had completed the cycle route I was a whole 25min faster than I had ever achieved before. It was at this point I was convinced that Beetroot juice does work as a means of improving stamina and I was satisfied that there was some truth in the statements made by Dr Stephen Bailey. I continued to drink beetroot juice for another week before I finally stopped drinking beetroot juice. The main reason that I have not continued for drink beetroot juice is mainly down to the taste, it was a taste that I personally could not get used to long term and latterly did not enjoy drinking. From my experience there is defiantly an effect and that it could be used as a training aid and perhaps as an aid in a competition to try and give you a competitive edge and I highly recommend others to try it but the taste simply was not something I could endure long term.
So coming back to the title of this article could Beetroot turn you into a superhero... well probably not literally unless you call having pink urine a super power but from my experience it does appear to give the feeling of having more energy. I recommend to anyone reading this article that is looking to boost their energy levels while training to give beetroot juice a go, if you can tolerate the taste you might be surprised by the effects.

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