Vade Mecum and Abacus, Ben Nevis.
Last day of our little weekend on the Ben, and Donald joined us for some more classic ice. With a simple rule of not doing anything that any of us had done before and avoiding the crowds we opted to try some of the lines left of Hadrian’s Wall. First off was Vade Mecum which lived up to its 3 stars and packed a stiff punch for its grade on the steep icefall crux.
A couple of abseils off v threads had us pondering what next. We opted for an old route called Abacus which is the furthest left ice line on the wall. Pure class, helped by the thin ice to make it spicy. A great lead by Donald.
Met Dan Arkle, a photographer from Sheffield, who’d been making a great stitched panoramic of the Ben’s north face. His camera was perched somewhere below and taking time lapse shots of him as he soloed Point 5 at the end of the day. It looked magic!
