Cuillin ridge 2007; The Dubh Slabs

Sunday 17 June 2007

12 1/2 hour day

We set off at 10 for the Dubh Slabs, starting out up the green grassy gully and then making a few Moderate moves. Then we are on the famous slabs proper. Most of the time we are able to stand up on these as they are at a gentle enough gradient. We walk on mile after mile of slabs, then arrive at a wicked overhanging abseil at which I descend to the wrong place, perilously perched 6o feet below Jim on the massive cliffs that only later did we see in their full extent. I can’t climb back up as the rock is overhanging and shiny so Jim has to come down to the same wrong place as me so we can help each other. Jim holds my feet so that I can scramble over and up back to the right place. After this there is more hard scrambling and one difficult chimney. Then we are back onto the Dubhs territory we know as it is part of the Cuillin ridge Traverse. We see the first people of the day, after two and a half hours, on the top of one of the Dubhs. Jim goes down to get water from Coir’a Ghrunnda before we continue on to more peaks, along to Gars Bheinn and down a tricky scree gully and an uncertain path through slabs and cliffs back to the hut. A twelve-hour day, and we are feeling good. We get back to the hut at half past 10 and have our tea at midnight.