Gwilym's Adventure Blog

Today I was out with three instructors from Glenmore Lodge on the first day of the Mountaineering Instructor Certifcate Training Course. We looked at movement and footwork skills as well as digging in the snow to make belays. The conditions were nowhere near a good as last Friday and the snow cover has reduced alot and continued to thaw during the time we were on the hills.

Today I was undertaking the BMC FUNdamentals 2 course have completed FUNdamentals 1 a few years ago. We looked at footwork, hand holds, movement on steep/overhanging walls and route planning. The idea of the FUNdamentals workshops are to improve the coaching input for pre exisiting instructors as historically the instructor courses have been based around ropework and safety rather than the actual movement skills Sorry for the poor photos but the sodium lighting in the wall is quite bad

    Today I took part in two workshops. The first was DMM Gear Testing where we learnt anbout the gear manufacturing process and more importantly where we got to break things. The second was Dry Tooling which is climbing on walls with axes. This is a very physical exercise and got me quite worn out.

Busy Day in Corie an t'Sneachda Me in Spiral Gully II  Summit Plateau Looking back down Crotched Gully II My shadow in a Brockenspectre After spending most of the day in the car yesterday travelling the 550 miles from my home to Aviemore I was a bit slow off the mark this morning and didn't get into Corie an t'Sneachda until 11am. On the way in it was obvious that conditions would be good and I had a plan to solo 4 routes and get back of the hill before dark. It was all going well and I climbed Goat Track Gully II,  Crotched Gully II and Spiral Gully II. Half way up the last route I noticed poor placements with my axe and closer inspection showed a missing bolt and a wobbly pick. This ment I spent the rest of the route "daggering" as I didn't trust the pick anymore. Sensibly I cancelled the 4th route I had planned to do and headed off into Aviemore to try and find a replacement bolt. On the way back down I saw a number of amazing brockenspectres (okay so...

Having reached the end of the first semester I have now finished at Bridgwater College until April. Over the last 4 months I have taken groups out Sailing, Kayaking, Canoeing, Coasteering, Mountain Biking, Orienteering, Climbing (indoor and outdoor), High Ropes, Low Ropes and Forest School. The not so great side of it is that I have also marked in excess of 200 assignments but every job has it's down side. I am now packing up my house for the move north to Scotland where I will be based from Friday for the next 9 weeks. I have some availability for the week 21st March if anyone wants to make a booking for some winter fun, just get in touch via email .

 Feels like I am in Scotland already Looking like I felt after 36km  Andy Today like last week I was out on the Mountain Bike setting up, marshalling and taking down an orienteering course on the Mendip Hills. The winning team collected 7 of the 9 cards available in the time allocated. I manged to cycle 36km during the day and all off road (most of it felt like it was uphill but there were some downs). Andy joined me for one of the circuits round the course

Today I was at Chudleigh working with Brian and Jez with a group from the instructor training programme at The Manor House in Cornwall. We looked at setting up belays fro both top and bottom roping as well as general group skills and crag etiquette. The weather was great today and even warm in the sun. Bit cold in the cave though.

  Today I again escaped the marking piling up on my desk and headed for The Quantock Hills where it was icy in the shade but amazingly warm in the sun. This morning I had 9 students and we managed 10km across the top of the hills on the main tracks. This afternoon I had 8 more motivated students and we managed 12.5km taking in some good downhills and a monster uphill at the end. Thanks again to Jonny who was out with us getting practice for his Trail Cycle Leader Assessment.

Today I was up on The Mendip Hills with a group of students who were on an orienteering exercise. They had to plan the quickest way to get to all the points and collect the cards i left out for them. I had a 10minute head start on my Mountain Bike to get the cards out in time for them to come through. Andy was also out on a bike checking on groups. Apart from having to run 2km through knee deep mud carrying my bike it was a good day with 2 teams completing the 16km circuit in the allocated time.

Tree blocking Marsh Bridge Me Me  Dan Today Dan and I hit the River Barle in our Open Canoes for a quick paddle before the rain came in again. We paddled from Marsh Bridge down to Exbridge. As you can see from the video we had a bit of fun along the way. For those thinking of paddling it in the next few days there are large trees down blocking Marsh Bridge (though a possible sneak through on River Right for Kayaks) and one down blocking half of the bridge at Dulverton

Stand Up Paddle Board Race Some Very Expensive Boats  Flat Water Playboating Today I have been at The Outdoor Show at Excel in London. It is combined with the boat show and although I went on for a look around I avoided the urge to buy a 28ft boat for £98k. During the day there were wakeboarding, stand up paddle board, playboating, mountain biking and climbing activites to either watch or take part in.

 Unfortunately the last 2 weeks I have been stuck inside doing admin type stuff but today I managed to get out on the hills. I had 2 groups today each doing a 2 1/2 hour ride over the Quantocks Hills. We managed to do a mix of single track and bridle ways with the morning group completing 12 km and the afternoon group doing 10km. The weather deteriated during the day and ended up very wet and muddy.