To begin at the beginning: It is winter, moonless night in the small town, starless and bible-black.

Hush the MMC are sleeping, the beekeeper, the climbers, the ramblers, the hikers, the scramblers, the bikers the walkers and the diamond-eyed stalkers. You can hear the dew falling and the hushed town breathing.

Captain Rocky the tired ice climber designer asleep in his bunk in the slate-roofed, sound proofed best room of the YHA dreams on…

Only four eyes are unclosed to see the black town fast, and slow, asleep.

An only these eyes search for rope, karabiner, harness, shoes, friends and friends as they are go out, out into the bible-black to seek out their pleasure under Main Wall.

They drive through Llanberis, past Wasted and Grochan and oh so gently thread their way to Cyrn Las.

“First pitch is mine” says Rocky as with big boots he lunges confidently into the dull mist of seepage that pervades the lower reaches. The wet has combined with the persistent lichen and moss to make the climb not only damp but also incredibly slippery so the positive smearing typical of North Wales Rhyolite is non-existent and the simplest of dry moves requires exquisite footwork and monastic faith. Eventually after some time the pitch is completed and Nick follows with equal difficulty. The second pitch is harder and Nick quickly swaps big boots for rock boots and slips and slides his way through another horribly greasy pitch where 9 out of 10 holds are useless with slime. The difficulty is further bore out by evidence of abandoned gear where other winter ascentionists had though better of it and backed off. The climb eases for the third pitch and then Nick again leads the crux fourth pitch. This involves ascending a horribly slimy chimney where the only decent bit of protection was one crack rendered useless by a broken wire jammed in it. After gingerly ascending this he eventually manages to jam a friend into a decent slot with considerable relief. The following pitches are considerably drier and finish off with a beautiful edgy slab where Rocky praises the slab climbing qualities of his big boots. A lengthy yet satisfying descent soon see the pair happily drinking tea in Petes Eats, defying the doom-mongers benightment prophecies of the excursion. A great route done in great style where the conditions certainly pushed the grade several notches above HS.

Meanwhile the rest of the MMC had roused themselves awake….

Lee, despite having left his walking boots behind went with Alix Wendy and Jude up the Moel Eilio ridge and got excellent views except when it clagged in at the summit. Jude had to escape early as she had made a rash promise to David to do some afternoon childcare. A walk well suited to those types in recovery or out of practice!

A party consisting of John B, Henry, John Pattison, Kate, Ricardo and Jane elected to do the 3* scramble Parson's Nose  

Down one before setting off John Pattison was ill and therefore couldn't join the group.   

John was keen to leave the rope behind to lighten the weight of his bag, though Jane was keen to take it and wished she had her harness and helmet too!  The climb to the start described as relentless certainly was.  

John, Ricardo, Kate, Henry and Jane, in Blue Peter style sling-made harness, roped up and started the route.  The first section was relatively easy going, all were passed by two older climbers solo'ing the whole thing - don't you just hate that!  The mid section not only provided some tricky climbing but also some foul language from various members of the group.  The drizzle made this slippery section even harder and all were grateful for ropes and climbing gear, especially Jane who also made use of a whole body jam in a mission to get up the route (this was the first of many moves using the "derriere" enroute).  

The cold made for freezing hands and chattering teeth but once the mid section was passed the rest of the route became easier again and a faster pace achieved the summit.  

A great day on one of the classic routes, followed by a classic and much welcomed tea and cake stop; that's pints of tea all round!

Cheryl M-J, Catherine Billson, Clare Attenborough, Mel McMahon, Robert Brooks and Andy drove over to Tryfan on the Saturday. Cheryl and Clare set off up the classic ridge scramble whilst the others headed round to Milestone Buttress for something a little more difficult. Unfortunately Catherine was put off by the mountain goat like pace of the three boys (or was that mountain goat like smell), and decided to rejoin the others. So Mel, Rob and Andy scrambled up Milestone Buttress and then the Milestone Buttress continuation, and very fine it was too. They rejoined the girls higher up on the ridge, passing another party of MMCers, until they reached the cloud bound summit of Tryfan. Then they headed back down via the Heather Terrace (don’t be fooled by the name: many a competent mountaineer has come to grief on this path). And then to Capel Curig for well earned tea and cake

Apart from the Main Wallers the only others attempting some climbing beyond scrambling were Simon MC and Neville who headed down to Tremadoc to knock off Christmas Curry after finding it listed as the top Severe in a list of Britain's favourite climbs. After a slippery scramble up the wet leaves and muddy bank (Tree Mud Rock. Ed.) they reached a slab leading to a wide chimney. Consultation with the guidebook revealed that this matched the description of the start of Christmas Curry, if you ignored the bit about the tree to belay the 2nd pitch from. Simon set off to lead the first pitch, hoping to find the tree hidden behind a rock, perhaps. After it became clear that the most tree-like object within the first 20m was a shrub, Simon set up a belay point on a small ledge. Neville then followed him up and attempted to lead the second pitch. It soon became clear that the only way up was to ignore any environmental sensibilities and struggle gracelessly up the shrub. The 3rd pitch, of what was now clearly not the desired route, was a messy scramble up a now rain-soaked route, followed by a short climb up very wet rock. After unsuccessful attempts by both climbers to find some friction on the rock, up two possible lines, it was decided to down-scramble to the top of the 2nd pitch, where someone had kindly left the remnants of a previous abseil. Luckily the rope was long enough to enable escape to the ground (though a contingency plan had been devised in case it wasn't), and the two soggy climbers made their way back to Eric's Cafe. (Surely the best candidates for the traditional dinner meet cock up Ed?)

The dinner was excellently raucous and it was good to see that the sartorial elegance of the club had improved enormously from the yardstick of Ron Hills and fleeces. Special credit must go to Chuck in his Yashmak and Robin in his brown velvet suit (no so much Austin Powers as Austin Allegro perhaps). The slightly gentle pace of the service meant that come the time of the awards the audience was glowing slightly more than normal though it is still on record that Robin managed to win the Cliffhanger award with some complex tail of trying to find and Italian in Italy.

On Sunday, those people who wanted to do a shorter walk also picked Moel Eilio, so, after a woodland walk above the quarries, Lee ended up joining the mums again. A monstrous Pete's Eats faff ended with a trip to the Slate museum where we discovered an excellent puppet show, face painting and a Santa's Grotto! A big hit with the kids, if not particularly extreme...

The 'Sunday Glyder Fach Challenge Team' left the hostel just after 8am on Sunday with Jane B., Mel and Rob B., meeting up with Dave Dees for a sprint up the north side of Tryfan, down the other side, up Bristly Ridge, along the top and back eventually to the car. At this point Jane was thinking - I should go back, I'm too tired but was encouraged to continue, on and up (little did Jane know that Mel was also thinking about turning back but didn't say as much as he knew someone would join him and the endurance event would be over sooner). Although obviously recognised as an extreme, hard-core mountaineer party, dressed appropriately (for the biting 50mph northerlies) in four layers of thermals and GoreTex, they were slightly surprised to stumble across a Welsh farmer on Bristly Ridge dressed only in a T-shirt and wandering around with his Border Collie as if it were a sunny summers day. Guided ably by Dave and with Mel as pace maker, they were back before 2pm. Cath, Rocket and Robin had a leisurely start to the day at Pete’s Eats and had a strange conversation with two fellows, claiming to be from the southern part of the MMC and having been members for 3 years, neither of who were recognisable. It turns out they were from the other MMC - the Merseyside Mountaineering Club also in Llanberis at their annual dinner meet!! Weird! What are the chances of that? Then Robin went for a run outside Nant Peris.

Simon and Neville decided better against a second attempt at Tremadoc and tagged along with the walkers. Chuck, Jane Kilmartin, Phil, Nick, John B, Henry, Ricardo, Kate and Clare decided to blow away the morning’s crapula by blasting around the mountain bike trails of Coed-y-Brenin.

Eight of them started the Karrimor trail in fine style and they were soon whooping and bumping their way along the finest trail in the Kingdom. Henry’s hangover proved to be worse than the others and he did a Captain Oates after a while and slunk back to the Café where he joined Clare who had elected to do a shorter route. It was then noticed that Phil was no longer with the team. After waiting a while and deciding that searching for him would be useless and that he was a big boy the remaining six ploughed on regardless, slightly concerned as to what the final rate of attrition would be. Then, after barely two hours riding (though at a fairly brisk pace) they found they had completed the course! This must have meant that they had missed put a section though where exactly remains a mystery to this day. There then followed a cathartic session of bike washing using the world’s most powerful jet wash while an increasingly anxious Jane waited for the absent Phil. Presumably he showed up eventually but while most drove off with their bikes dripping cleanly in their cars the plaintiff Hibernian cry “Pi-ip” was left echoing unanswered in the gathering Welsh gloaming.

Sorry if the meet report didn’t do justice to your activities but if you don’t submit the raw product it won’t get written up. A big thanks to Stephen and Wendy for their organisation efforts.

DT