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How do these 2 compare for technical difficulty and exposure?
I did AE last Jan with friends as well as Liathach and have done CG a couple of times in summer. But if the weather carries on like this I'd like to go and have a pop at CG.
Is it something done ok solo or best roped up?
"Is it something done ok solo or best roped up?"
Depends on your confidence and competence, it is pretty reasonable solo but that said I have thrown a rope down sections before for less confident partners.
A cracking day out though, enjoy.
I've done them a number of times in both summer and winter conditions.
CG is more straightforward and if you're reasonably confident/experienced in moving solo on exposed ground using axes and crampons and winter conditions are 'normal', you should be able to solo it. When AE is in full winter condition, most ab down the Chancellor to save a bit of time.
The AE is longer, more sustained and getting off it can be more difficult. If you've done both Liathach and AE in full winter, you should manage OK on CG.
No implied guarantee, E&OE, climbing can be a dangerous sport etc etc...
Crib Goch is easier than both the Aonach Eagach and Liathach in winter.
A rope isn't required if you are confident on the ground and competent with axe and crampons.
I did it on my own last march in descent and it was fine (and awesome - good snow, sun and zero other people 🙂 )
Disclaimers apply: depends on conditions, you can easily fall off and die, etc.
Depends entirely on conditions. If you were capable of doing it safely you would know this already.
Harsh but fair.
@ SBZ. I put a similar comment at the end of my earlier post then edited it out on the grounds it sounded a bit arsey/argumentative. Think the comment is valid though. If you have to ask etc...
A differnt league. Done CG at night in howling gales and blizzard. Fun not hard, happily soloed it lots. Wouldn't consider that on the Scots one purely because of the size of them, also apart from the narrow bit of CG you can walk round the hard/fun bits.
you guys are nails done CG with a mountain trainer expert mate who worked at Brenin still makes me nervous to think about it now. Respect
Easy in summer but I am not a winter mountain expert as the above shows. He used ropes but only because I made him and he did not want to explain my death or watch me cry 😳
Your barking! I done CG last year, end of sept last year. Mate said it was an easy scramble. First time I'd tried such a thing. I suppose the technicality wasn't too bad, but the exposure did play on my mind. I suppose next time I should try some more sensible shoes/boots rather than the cannondale bike shoes I had on!
Depends on conditions - as above - I'd solo CG or the AE when it's in decent winter nick, but the beauty of winter climbing is that routes change massively with the amount and nature of snow and ice. Something can be desperate mixed one week and a banked-out broad snow hump the next. But anyway, CG is shorter and less technical than the AE in comparable conditions, but still has a serious consequences if you screw up - some big drops.
I'd say AE is more difficult due to potential navigation problems at the descent at the end and the overall length of it, a much more serious undertaking overall. They are much the same technically, although the AE has one or two major difficulties that can't be bypassed.
It's difficult to say for sure as I don't know you, but a winter traverse of CG should be safely achievable by most people (with crampons and axe and knowledge to use them), especially if done in good vis.
Can we have a winter climbing disclaimer button?
Done both, spent most of both unroped. Watched my mate lob into the top of a stone chute on AE off one of the pinacles, discovered people do fall in slow motion. Luckily he landed like a star fish and didnt go anywhere. Both of us got to the end fine. This might be why I put AE as a whole heap harder than CG, although I found the main difficulties on AE being the down climb at the start and the grove / corner towards the end. Later because there was v.little ice in it.
Want to do CG but never had the bottle - soles of feet tingle just watching Cliffhanger!
You do realise that Cliffhanger was not a documentary, don't you?
Opening scene made me laugh when she fell - I had that exact harness at the time 🙂
JP - yes I realised that, not as good as 'Touching Cloth' with Simon (slasher) Yates in it doing his impersonation of Wallace from Wallace and Gromit - 'Oh no Gromit I cut the rope (waves fists) I cut the rope'!
good luck on Crib Goch in this weather. Don't do anything that'll drag out the mountain rescue.
In Cliffhanger I thought Stalone had lost his bottle a little bit, especially having to warm himself after rock climbing in nowt but a little vest in a snow blizzard, ponse. In First Blood he was climbing down that vertical rock face with aplomb, would have easily made it if someone hadn't started popping at him from a Heli. Touching the Void is pure fantasy, ridiculous.
tankslapper - Member
JP - yes I realised that, not as good as 'Touching Cloth' with Simon (slasher) Yates in it doing his impersonation of Wallace from Wallace and Gromit - 'Oh no Gromit I cut the rope (waves fists) I cut the rope'!
I thought that Nick Park designed him.
Wensleydale! WENSLEYDALE!
Uncanny, I think you will agree..... 😆
Having done the AE and Liathach in winter,If you MUST do AE,leave it a bit till the snow has had a chance to harden,as it is dumping hard again.And make sure you have somebody with you who has done it in winter.Over the 2 mentioned, the Eagle's path is 50% harder than L-ch in winter IMO.I wouldn't like to have done it in Winter without having first been along in the summer.Zulus hits the nail on the head as well I am afraid.
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Wow! But not for me.
You do realise that Cliffhanger was not a documentary, don't you?
Cliffhanger is rubbish, not least because you make out the Via Ferrata that Sly would have used just on the edge of some of the shots, no, you want to imbibe the mountaineering master class that is Vertical Limit. It's where I learned that the best way to escape from a crevasse is using dynamite to blow it apart, a trick I've now used several times after failed ice axe dyno moves. Learned the latter there too, but also from studying Tom Cruise in MI 2, I think.
If anyone's after a good climbing DVD for Christmas, Psyche 2, which just won a double award at Kendal Mountain Festival, is highly watchable.
You do realise that Cliffhanger was not a documentary, don't you?
Opening scene made me laugh when she fell - I had that exact harness at the time
Strangely enough, last night, someone was telling me the harness manufacturer sued the film company as the harness wouldnt have failed in that way if used properly. Urban myth or not?
having done the AE W to E in winter I was under the impression that the final tower (up to Am Bodach) was the only tricky bit (it was verglassed). So many years later when doing it in reverse in summer I imparted this miss-information on to my unfortunate other half (who has a poor head for heights!)...she wasn't too impressed and made me carry her backpack as well as my own..this rather screwed up my attempted traverse without using my hands! 🙁
the actual ridge on AE is about the same as CG but CG is easier to get to and get off of.
both have their differences and I wouldn't like to compare them to each other as both are equally as enjoyable in their own right. winter adds a little spice to both but i would say AE is harder in winter (grade II/III scottish i think)
can I just point you towards these two people who were deluded to think the AE was ridable
can I just point you towards these two people who were deluded to think the AE was ridable
ha ha...
when I last did that in 1992, the video camera I was carrying was the size of a brief case.
Highclimber - just the info I was looking for, thanks.
And actually I take the earlier posters point about different conditions, despite the tone!
You laugh at those guys on bikes but a guy I worked with at the time (to be fair not the brightest nor the most familiar with bikes or mountains) saw my photos of the AE and asked if I'd ridden it...
brooess - there is no tone. it's the internet - it's tone free.
Surrounded By Zulus - Member
brooess - there is no tone. it's the internet - it's tone free.
Sounds like my wifes singing...