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ADVANCED CAMP 2004 Winter Sports Scotland April 2004 Troop B took its twelve patrol leaders for winter mountain fun in the Scottish Highlands, over the Easter period. It was hard work, exhausting, but above all brilliant fun and very exciting. More than that, it was a good bonding experience between the PLs and leaders and showed just what a good team they make. This was our fifth advanced camp to Scotland, and it fully lived up to expectations. Here's what happened... Sleeper We nabbed some seats on the Scotrail sleeper service from London to Glasgow overnight, arriving at Glasgow Central very early on Good Friday. Nice service really, though not massively easy to get sleep if you're leader-sized, and the hot dogs are ropey. Fun though. G13 What can we say about G13 Community Transport? - you're heroes. Brand new amazingly swanky bus for a week, met us where we asked and really helpful when things didn't go to plan (read on). Robert and John, we salute you! Calluna Our accommodation in Fort William was Calluna, run by local mountain guide Alan Kimber. We rented two plush apartments - easily the nicest place we have ever stayed on camp. The most important thing was the blast-furnace powered drying room! Weathermungous We had every type of weather you can imagine - sun, rain, snow, overcast - four seasons in a week! 72nd Glasgow Thanks to Jim and the people at 72nd Glasgow who leant us their skis for the week. Glen Nevis As we always do, we headed up Glen Nevis to do the most beautiful short walk in Scotland and cross the three-wire bridge. Also checked out Stealle Falls from the bottom before heading back just as it was getting dark. Cairngorm Mountain Our first full day in Scotland involved heading East to the Cairngorms (near Aviemore) and enjoying a great day's skiing at Cairngorm Mountain ski centre. The snow was good and the runs in great nick. Beginners spent some time on the Ptarmigan Bowl and Cas Bowl, going from snowplough turns, to nice linked traverses. Those that could ski a bit already were hooning down the blues and reds of the Gunbarrel and Traverse by the end of the day. A fine days work and it was even a bit sunny towards the end of the day. Nevis Range The following day we headed to Scotland's other main ski area: Nevis Range. We've been here before and it was better than we remembered. Fun was had on the Summit runs, as scouts enjoyed near perfect snow and perfected their techniques. Some were trying the jumps in the terrain park and everybody ended the day skiing reds such as The Goose and Sidewinder. Again, we saw some sun and we were really enjoying Scottish skiing now. Ice Factor Straight after kitting up with our boots and crampons, we headed to The Ice Factor in Kinlochleven for a three our ice climbing session. Donning the latest winter climbing garb, the scouts blasted up some indoor climbs in "the ice chamber". It's a great facility and folk their were really helpful. It was good training for the next fews days on the mountains. Winter Skills We got the gondola up to the snowline on Aonoch Mor for our winter skills session. A morning was spent sliding down the slopes perfecting ice axe arrests and what to do when you're tumbling without and axe! And of course there was the ubiquitous snow ball fight. Following that we clambered our way to the top of the mountain in our newly tamed crampons. The the best bit: a glissade (controlled bum-slide) all the way down! Scrambling Glen Coe On a day when everybody thought better than to go out on the wet hills, we headed for Glen Coe. We had a scramble on Gearr Aonach in mind, via the zig zags. Picking an entirely new route we did some high grade scrambling and climbing to the top, which involved some very hair-raising moves (roped of course!). The scouts did incredibly well as this was very daunting and energetic stuff. We reached the summit and headed down to the valley floor. Clachaig Burgers Our reward for a hard days work on the hill were the fantastic burgers and chips at the Clachaig Inn - easily the best hill pub in the country. They even gave us loads more free chips, though I don't think anyone cleared their plate! The Ben A trip to the top of Ben Nevis is never an easy undertaking, particularly when there is loads of snow and the winds are strong. This didn't stop us reaching the highest point in the UK (again), picking our way through a white out to have the summit to ourselves. We will bring a pen to do some graffitti in the summit refuge next time. Blasting the Bauchaille Our final activity was a scramble on Curved Ridge on Bauchaille Etive Mor - a favourite mountain. This is scrambling at its best and we did well to make it to the top of the ridge before being forced to head down due to the snow and the need to make our plane. By the time we got down it was blue skies, though a bit too late in the day to make our plane! Food The scouts catered themselves whilst we were away and achieved a high level of cuisine. They did well and can cook for us anytime! Missing planes Due to a delay getting away on Thursday, a freak blizzard on the mountain and a procession of slow drivers on the A82 - we missed the plane home! Ryanair to their credit held check-in open way past their normal time but, alas, even this wasn't enough. Fortunately our crisis-management proved its worth as we used our contingency plans and got the sleeper train home from Glasgow, arriving at Walton station at 8.12am the following morning. We even saved parents a long drive to Stansted Airport late the night before! All in all it was an incredible experience and made a few things clear: we should go skiing again, we should climb lots of Scottish mountains more often, they should put airports nearer to Glencoe (or perhaps not...) Check us on Scottish mountains again in 2005.