Honza and I made the long walk into Pillar, a little further than it had to be!! But its all training. After working far too many days in a row we headed out to Ennerdale Water, parked in the wrong car park, bedded down in the van, had a few ciders with burner going & got some shut eye for the following day. I woke early for morning needs & headed outside, to catch a glimpse of the Lunar Eclipse, then back to bed for more sleep for the on coming day. We woke around 9am, got the burner going, had coffee & breakfast, got the dogs sorted for a cold day in the van & then headed up the east side of Ennerdale water for our long walk in. The day was amazing, beautiful light & sky all the way. We cursed ourselves for parking in the wrong carpark, but you can't get everything right. I guess we got to Pillar around lunchtime, neither of us having a watch meant we were just there, no pressure, no problems. We had hoped to see the crag holding snow, but it was a bit hopefull & when we saw Pillar Rock in all her glory, we were slightly repelled by the dry rock we saw. Thankfully our back-up plan for climbing Waterfall Gully was a good option.

We geared up at the bottom and soloed up to the main icefall pitch. It looked in good conditions, but a little thin, so Honza tied on the sharp end & set off up the ice column of ice on the left of the gully. A few hollow sounding placements brought moans from Honza, but he sailed up it like all was ok.... I should learn.

As Honza made a belay at the top, I put my pack on containing a rope, all our rock gear (which had been brought in hope of a harder line on Pillar itself) & other stuff, weighing in at above 10kg. Of course I didn't think what effect this would have on my forearms as I started climbing, but with-in taking out the first 2 bits of gear, I was majorly pumped & srcabbling aorund too far left in the corner, back footing, not properly on the column itself. Now I understood the groans from Honza before. As I buried my right axe in the hollowest section & my left close by, I cut looose slightly to swing across. Of course the ice gave way & sheared into the waterfall behind, spitting me off & testing out honza's belay above. All was well, bar my over pumped hands from gripping my axes too hard. I pulled back on & shakely climbed the now thinner, hollow ice above, pulling out into the scoop at the top, breathing hard. The rest was following neve above in strips to the top out to an amzing backdrop over Fleetwith Pike, Dalehead & in the background was Blencathra with the moon rising to the right.

All in all a pretty good way to spend the winter solstice, with a Lunar Eclipse in the morning, a battle of a walk in with winter boots on, beautiful ice to climb to the top of Pillar & then walk back out by the light of the Full Moon. You can't really ask for more. Conditions on the fells right now are great for water ice climbing. Where-ever a water course runs down the fell, over rock,  or down a gully, then its a pretty certain bet that it is frozen & ready to climb. Reports of all ice in condition around Thirlmere, Blea Tarn is in excellent condition, Grasmoor & surrounding area's must have good condition & I have friends heading out to Cautley Spout tonight. Myself & Mike Elliot are heading to somewhere tonight, maybe Lower Gantry as we had a brief look when we drove over Honister on Monday night showing the ice there was also in great conditions & the drive down into Buttermere was interesting, snow tires were certainly a help, a little ice on the road adds to the adrenaline. If your into Ice Skating, then pretty much any small tarn you can think of will be good for skating. Ratherheath is always a certain, but I think it is take your pick until after boxing day.  For skiing there maybe area's which are holding old snow from a few weeks ago, but it will be a walk. The Helvellyn Ridge is maybe ski-able with care, but I haven't had reports back as of yet. Really, more snow is needed for good skiing conditions, but if you head east towards Cross Fell, then I am sure you will find something to mess around on. For runners, well the conditions are great, especially if you own a pair of Kahtoola Microspikes, which give great traction on icey/hardpack snowy conditions. I have heard of 2 attempts a a winter Bob Graham, but unfortunately both were unsucsessful. Steve Ashworth set of with a friend, un-supported, on Monday night, to get to the Dunmail Road cross & call it a day due to being behind schedule, his mate carried on, calling for a pickup in Langdale. The other I heard about was Jim Evans (?),  being supported by Ambleside AC, but this was cancelled before the set off. Hopefully someone out there managed it in the excellent weather condtions we have been blessed with. If your out winter walking then enjoy safely. Make sure you have full winter equipment, including axe & crampons (Kahtoola KTS Steels are a great option), capabilty to make hot food, have shelter, a sleeping bag & of course a map & compass. better safe than sorry!! ;-)

Have a Happy Snow Christmas,

The Outdoor Warehouse Team

I've been pretty busy for the last week, since the snow fell & it has meant I have neglected getting a fell top report loaded for the end of the week. Sorry... So here we go then, I have skied to work 3 times last week and this morning as well (testing out my new Silvereta 505 bindings on my older Volkl Tele Toruing skis, I think I have mounted them too far back), taken Nicola out on Friday night for her first time on XC Touring skis, been out for a failed mission with Honza two nights ago & tried to ski round the Fairfiled Horseshoe on Thursday morning before starting work.

Conditions are excellent in the fells at the moment, there was about 5" of even snow cover put down on Friday with little wind blowing so this will have covered the whole of the Lakes very nicely. Saturday saw a thaw coming in, as an Atlantic low pressure pushed its way onto the shores of the UK & the Lake District in general. This has allowed alot of the snow, which was largely unconsolidated, to settle down. So we have the start of a good base for skiers & more stable snow on & around the crags for climbing. Last night another 3/4 inches of snow in Windermere has meant a fresh covering over harder packed snow. Care should now be taken to approaches to crags that are/maybe loaded. I have heard reports of all the low level ice coming in, ascents of Low Water Beck-Coniston, Launchy Gill-Thirlmere, Brown Cove Crag has seen lots of action, Gable has had several teams making ascents of Jaberwock, Engineers Chimney, Engineers Slabs & Snickersnap. Honister Icefalls have come into good condition, although there is apparently a diversion in the waterflow & so the routes have formed in a different manner, there may well be access issues now as well. Steve Ashford has repeated Dave Birketts 'The Crack' on Gimmer Crag - Langdale, climbed Asterisk with Woody. Martin from Marmot has been out with Paul Casey of Zero G Climbing equipment over the weekend climbing some water ice in Langdale on the left as you go up Oxendale & I am sure Helvellyn has seen many people climbing all the routes. Blea Water Tarn is in good condition.. need I go on. Basically, this artic airflow has brought the Lakes in to a winter climbers heaven... now its the skiers turn

David has been XC Skiing from his front door, enjoying setting himself a Loiper (ski tracks) around the fields outside his house & langlaufing every morning.

I made a bundelled attempt at getting round Fairfield Horseshoe on Thursday morning before work on very limited snow cover. I aborted my mission just underneath Great Rigg when I had a call from David letting me know he would be late for work, I realised I was also late for work & descended straight down into Rydal valley on very limited snow cover, along the valley floor & back to Rydal Hall.

Honza was climbing with Frazer on Dollywagonon the Tursday, I'm not quite sure what route they were on, but it was somewhere around Dollywagon Gully, but a deviation of some sort.

Fred made a Quinzhee shelter with his flat mate Sonny, first you pile lots of snow into a .... pile, pat it down & then leave it for a couple of hours to settle, after this you start to dig into it, making first a snow tunnel, being careful to always lie face down (if you lie face up and it colapses then you could be 'brown bread' through suffication), make sure you have a friend there in case it colapses, to pull you out. After you have made the tunnel, you continue inside the shelter to dig out a chamber. When ready, you have your Quinzhee shelter ready for sleeping etc.

So you can see we have all been very busy in the outdoors this week, and we are hoping you have been enjoying this amazing weather as much as we have. Weather conditions for tomorrow look fantastic, hoping to get out on Telemarks in the afternoon. The back of Helvelyn looks excellent.

Keep on enjoying ;-)