This text was read by OCR from a scanned newsletter and has not been proofread yet, so expect odd characters and mistakes.
Herewith a fine Liteewny contribution from pave, (call me Sper ia LU Willis: _— Pm? me with: a ' rant amount» of effort from Murray, the bus ; -*. ' finally arrived at the. Top, 'O the Bruce ‘and three " drowsy trampers followed me up the hill’'to the top of the second chair while yet another secretly: © “evaded hut. fees by walking .to.the hut flats shelter. The three remaining were to follow the next day.”
? se SN : A x : R N
A fine morning found us at the Rocks putting on a brew at 9.30. Dan and Greg found a deceivingly steep looking route. When Adrian and I arrived we were ready before them and rather than encroach on their route I moved left up an even steeper wall and put ina runner at 40 feet, below a bulge. The ice was good and gave me confidence. This was fortunate because the wall was vertical and I had not been able to spare a hana to put in a runner.
I ran a full rope lencoth without reaching a belay so was forced to drop the rope (waste of time without runners) rather than risk Adrian taking a fall... After this a brew and lunch break was called about the same time as the weather began to deteriorate. It was soon snowing and even though the others had not arrived with the hut shovel, we decided to start, the cave using two tin shovels, one of which soon "retired"... It had been a bad year for snow and within five feet we met old hard ice and even a bit of rock. . The cave was little more than a concave pit so a fly was erected across the front to keep spincrift out. By morning all space was filled with spindrift, and when you tried to move you thought the next person was leaning on you. After unsuccessfully nudging him, you discovered you were, in fact, encased in an iron-hard casket. of dry, compacted snow. Having slept with my duvet on, its rio wonder I wasn't hot. The morning was fine and with great effort we went off to do some more climbing. Unfortunately the wind was blowing spindrift over the top and it continually flowed over our heads and down our necks. . Again the weather gave out about midday and we blindly ploddec across the plateau, bumslid down the glacier, anc headed for the easy way down on the chairlifts. ) 7 . aeeee Dave Wills