Snow Gods Shining on Touring Intro Weekend, 10-12 January 2025, Glen Feshie Youth Hostel

When Al Todd said that this had been by far the best Intro week-end he’d seen in many years, we glowed with pride, naturally thinking it was due to our good vibes and stunning beginners’ skills in the hills. He meant the generous amount of snow cover! but politely left the benefit of the doubt.

What a splendid Intro week-end spent in Glenfeshie. The excitement had been building up all week with longing sights of snowfall over Raigmore carpark. The chat started bubbling up with some basic questions which the instructing team patiently answered: t minus 1 week “Can I check that ski crampons and boot crampons are the same thing?”. NO. Panicked t minus 2h – do we need a survival blanket and headtorch? YES.
Newbies Chris, Doug, Mark, Mhairi, Alice, Tabitha, Laura, Cerys, Fiina, India, Lina and Julie all trickled in excitedly on Friday night, to a stunning crisp -8 deg clear sky. Outside weather inversely proportional to the warm welcome by a fantastic group of instructors Ross, Lisa, Al Todd, Donnie, Brendan and Kevin.

Lovely hostel with a woodburner lit on Saturday evening and plenty of space to accommodate all. Slight heartsink moment when we realised the hob was not compatible with a Moka pot. But the various coffee presses saved the day and we were all kept well caffeinated throughout our stay.

After unpacking our million items of kit and finding a bunk we set off to Brendan’s tips and tricks to packing essential-plus items Mary-Poppins-style in a tiny bag, as well as what clothing to wear. Warm pink puffer jacket and splint pad usable for insulating one’s buttocks when sitting on snow stand out in common memory. I’m sure a few of us were mortified at realising we had packed just about the opposite of what was suggested! But we all survived to tell the tale with no frostbite. We got excited about the avalanche bag and swiftly went to check it out on Youtube.

This was followed by a full kit check in great clatter of skis clicking in and out of bindings- thankfully no crampon marks were left on the lovely flooring and we all seemed to have a complete touring set. Brendan probably lent all his kit that week-end, selflessly not skiing himself.

Early 8:10 start Saturday, with an impressive departure just 10 min later than planned. Objective: Cairngorms, for some basic skills training and getting familiar on our skis. We set off to a daunting -12deg, in “unseen before Arctic conditions” as per Al Todd, which was NOT reassuring in light of his experience. But our enthusiasm prevailed and we all enjoyed a great first day out in sunny conditions.

Split into two groups we went through some basic important skills. Al Todd and Ross’ group focused on using ski and boot crampons whilst in the vicinity of a big protective rock. We set up the group shelter for a wee lunch break and listened to Al Todd’s many tales in the mountains. Mhairi nearly lost her lunch which ended up buried deep under our feet as we excitedly set up the shelter. She took it with a smile, dug deep and crunched on her rescued icy sandwich. Meanwhile, Ross was burning calories taking us out one-by-one to practice our transceiver skills. No wonder he needs so many sweets on the hills! In parallel Lisa and Dougie’s group practiced rescue skills and desperately looked for a steep slope to test ice axe self stopping [ed: ‘ice axe self-arrest’] technique. The more motivated ones threw themselves to the ground and wiggled themselves into a 360 turn with their feet to simulate rotation. It worked.

We all nearly mastered the kick turns by the end of the week-end (reminiscent of the bend and snap for those familiar with Legally Blonde). We all eventually headed down-hill Bambie style, falling with loud curses and painstakingly elevating ourselves back to our feet with a smile. Fantastic first day out on the hills. We could all feel our leg muscles aching.

Back at the hostel we all managed a hot shower. Brendan made the statistical mistake to kindly offer to shop for essential items in Aviemore. 10 requests later he made it back with – amongst other items- the much-awaited earplugs for Alice and sweets to keep Ross happy on the hills. Thanks, that was brilliant.

We all shared a common feast that night thanks to everyone’s over-enthusiastic cooking. We had a near team meltdown when miscommunication ended up with a cheesecake heating in the oven! Thankfully it remained delicious. Meat eaters got outvoted but enjoyed the meal just as much.

Digestion was accompanied by an avalanche awareness presentation from Brendan. The 15min margin available to save a buddy from the snow got us all paying attention to essential transceiver skills. We all enjoyed his DIY weak-layer-in-snowpack-leading-to-slab -avalanche demo with plasterboard sliding over plywood thanks to Tesco’s finest double cream (or was it shaving foam?) [it was shaving foam -ed]. Lots of useful info about trip planning and weather forecast decryption from Dougie and Al Todd.

No time for boardgames we all crashed to sleep, our dreams full of wonderful recollections of the day.

Sunday was a gentler start, needing to clear up the hostel before taking off. Mission accomplished, we set off a few hundred metres down the road to explore Glen Feshie towards Sgor Gaoith. We swapped instructor teams and set off in the middle of a stunning forest trail in milder temperatures. We only had to remove our skis on a few bits, otherwise skinned our way up a splendid hill flank. We explored the rest of the skills and improved on our kick turns. We actually had a decent descent through powder and despite the short downhill we felt more confident on our skis! A lovely second day of touring.

We reluctantly said goodbye to one another in that parking lot, all wanting the week-end to extend into the week. We all got the bug for ski touring.. How lucky were we with the snow! Really great to see such experienced members take the time to lead newbies up the hill when they could be out and about enjoying the hills at their level. Despite torn ACLs they showed up to just teach and welcome us to the sport. Reflective of a great club spirit. Thanks all. Let’s do it again soon!

?? Where has the snow gone ??