Had a great day in Luggala yesterday. Perfect weather, not too hot, good breeze and the rock was bone dry. Started up Pine Tree Buttress with the intention of cleaning the direct start to the groove but didn’t get around to it, will probably go back and do this on a solo mission. The groove is very overgrown with some sizable gorse but I think if cleaned it will give a much better, more direct start, avoiding the very scrappy first pitch, making it possible to get to the belay at the foot of the slab in one pitch (rather then 3 as the guide book suggests).

Phil led the slab pitch (P4 in guidebook) in good style finishing up the crack that splits the steeper top wall. I think this is taken by Taktik, can anyone confirm?

I led the next pitch up to Conifer Terrace where we had a good view of the Vikings set.

We then traversed the grassy ledge – this would be pretty dodgy on damp day I would imagine – to the start of Clingon. The plan was to link the first two pitches together and Phil led up P1 no problem but continued on past the point where you breach on the overlap on P2, he found himself on some dodgy ground and took a whipper. He got back on route and build a belay I continued up P2, a lovely pitch, a steep boulder problem start and then sustained climbing up the groove to a excellent belay ledge with great views of the lake and the Great Roof above.

After some messing to get back the cam that Phil left behind after his retreat he set up off the Claidhmeah Solas pitch with its famous step. Seconding I found the step out right ok but found the next move a little awkward. It’s a great move but the best pitch is the previous one. We descended down South Gully and took 1.5 hours to get back to the car. A long tiring but great day. Now’s the time to get to Luggala.