The very white peak: North Ridge of Stob Ban

The final day of working for Hughes Mountaineering saw me heading into The Mamores, with Declan, Tom and Miriam to have a last mountaineering adventure with one real criteria for the day: to get back for the Ireland/Wales Six Nations rugby fixture at 5pm!  With snow forecasted and a shift in the wind direction, it made sense to stick to ridges, and with that in mind, opted to head up the North Ridge of Stob Ban.  Stob Ban translates as the white peak, and although the term refers to it's quartzite composition, it was certainly very white with the freshly deposited snow.

A snow covered North Ridge

The ridge has great character, rising at first quite sharply out of Glen Nevis, then easing off before tackling what at first seems to be an improbable buttress.  Once up close, the true nature of the difficulties become much clearer and easier than initial impressions might suggest.  A couple of rocky steps and some meandering lead to a spectacular snowy arete, leading the way towards the various false summits and finally the shattered quartzite peak of Stob Ban.  Windslab, which had been forming on the easterly facing slopes over the past couple of days, was also forming rapidly on the westerly facing slopes due to the new wind direction.  On the summit, we bumped into a team from the Ice Factor  who suggested that the trench they had created on their ascent (also our intended descent) would prove useful, however so much snow had fallen that their foot deep trench had already filled in.

Not a great photo but it shows the
amount of snow on the descent path

We were able to forge a path back down the mountain, through at times waist deep snow, trying to stick to the line of the path as closely as possible, which was very obscure at times.  We made it down for just gone 4pm, allowing enough times to make it back for the rugby, but  I bet they wished they hadn't have bothered given the final score!  A great and very different three days, all reflecting the diversity and challenges of Scottish winter mountaineering.