Raeburn's Buttress, Ben Nevis...

Toby Keep and I decided to head up onto Ben Nevis today to see what was going on. The forecast was for windy conditions with the potential for gusts to 80mph - clearly a day to be a bit canny with your route choice.

We decided to have a look Raeburn's Buttress and the Castle, an area neither of us had been to before. About four pitches of ice (pictured) took us up to 'Boomer's Requiem' V,5, a pitch which has the reputation of being the steepest V on "The Ben".

'Boomer's' is very thin at the moment, so you may need to wait a bit if it's on your list. We opted for 'Raeburn's Buttress' IV,5 which gave some good sport. The right wall of the cave mentioned in the guidebook was insufficiently iced but yielded to some upwards flailing. This led into 'Intermediate Gully' which was sheltered from the wind.