I'd had many a close encounter with kea but never while actually climbing....until last week. We were climbing on the North East Buttress of Single Cone in the Remarkables and as we completed pitch 3, the familiar 'kee-aaaaaaa' rang out.

Two curious kea kept us entertained as we reorganised at the belay, and one then followed me up the final pitch. As I got comfy on a ledge and the kea moved ever closer, for a moment I imagined that the kea was assessing the quality of my belay. But kea are never subtle in their intentions, and this kea simply just wanted to have a go at chomping on my sling.

Climbing with kea was the icing on the cake of a fantastic trip to the entry-level, multipitch trad playground that is the North East Buttress of Single Cone (at left in the photo). This area is approximately a one-hour walk from the ski field carpark and you are climbing with Double Cone watching over you, the sapphire Lake Alta below you, and a vista of mountains to the north. Routes on the NE Buttress range from two to three pitches in length, and further pitches can be climbed on straightforward broken ground higher up if you are keen for the practise. The crux grades range from 12 to 17, the rock is gorgeous and the pro bomber.

There are further two- to three-pitch mixed-protection routes on the nearby Alta Slabs – including a three-star route with the hardest pitch going at grade 16 – and longer, more sustained, one- to three-star multipitch trad routes with bolted rap stations on the nearby East Buttress of Double Cone. See the Queenstown, Rock, Ice and Mixed guidebook for details.

With a lack of easily accessible, entry-level multipitch trad routes in New Zealand, this area is a gem that deserves bigging up!

Ah, the South Face of Mount Cook, as seen from the backyard at Wyn Irwin Hut. Sunset highlights the features of the face on (yet another) breezy summer evening.

Mountainz wishes all our readers a Happy New Year – here's to glorious climbing adventures in 2010!

On December 5th and 6th, His Holiness the Dalai Lama will visit New Zealand and give two public talks in Auckland. Once again, just like when the Dalai Lama last visited New Zealand in 2007, our nation's Prime Minister will not formally meet with or welcome this great man, who is known and respected internationally as a voice for peace and human rights. While Prime Minister John Key denies that he is bowing to the Chinese government, it should be noted that in June this year, China's Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang stated that Beijing remains opposed to "foreign political figures having official exchanges with the Dalai Lama". Qin Gang added "any irresponsible moves taken by whatever country on this issue will constitute gross intervention in China's internal affairs and will certainly seriously damage China's relations with the relevant countries."

To Mr Key, your decision certainly does not reflect the will of many New Zealanders. In fact, I suspect only a tiny minority support your decision.

As a New Zealander, I am free to express the above thoughts publicly without fear of detainment, torture or death. The same cannot be said for Tibetans in Tibet who wish to express both their great love and respect for the Dalai Lama, their spiritual leader, and their disagreement with government decisions.

To His Holiness the Dalai Lama, please know there are many New Zealanders who welcome you whole-heartedly to our country and feel honoured that you have come to visit us. We apologise for the shameful actions of our government, who are taking, as you once said, "the short-term view". Please know there are New Zealanders who support you and the Tibetan people. You are not alone in your struggle.

In the above photo, I am flying the Tibetan flag from the Main Divide. In Tibet, the 'crime' of owning and/or displaying a Tibetan flag would almost certainly see a Tibetan sentenced to at least 10 years in prison, during which they would endure solitary confinement and regular torture. I encourage all New Zealand climbers who wish to show solidarity with Tibet to display the Tibetan flag – at home, in your workplace, and in the mountains. You can order one online at www.flagheaven.co.nz.

William Pike – he's the Auckland climber who got caught in the 2007 Ruapehu eruption and literally came within minutes of dying owing to a combination of traumatic injuries and severe hypothermia. William survived, thanks to an incredible rescue effort, but lost his right leg from the knee down.

By April 2008, William was taking his first steps on his new prosthetic leg. Come June this year, William had undergone 15 operations since the eruption and made dozens of trips to the Auckland Limb Centre, to refine the fit of his prosthesis. By this time, he'd made a comeback to tramping, sea kayaking and rock climbing but the mountains were still calling him.

In August, William returned to Ruapehu for a "very personal and emotional trip." Later that month, he climbed Tongariro with his dad and brother (pictured at left above). A film crew from TV One's Close Up accompanied the Pike trio, with a report on William's recovery and the Tongariro climb airing in September.

William is a keen supporter of the Westpac Rescue Helicopter and Waikato Hospital's ICU – both of which played key roles in saving his life – and is the face of Waikato Hospital's ICU Waiting Room Fundraiser appeal. Having his Tongariro climb featured on Close Up was a way of promoting this cause, and giving public kudos and thanks to all who have played a role in his recovery.

William wrote about the Tongariro climb on his website, www.williampike.co.nz.

Lying in a horribly drugged state in the ICU at Waikato Hospital nearly two years ago, it was difficult to imagine myself on top of another mountain. I spared a thought for the dozens of people who aided in my recovery – thanks to them I was once again standing on top of a mountain.

I asked William if he thought some climbers might find it strange that he had taken a camera crew along for his first summit since the eruption. He replied, 'Fundraising for Waikato Hospital's ICU Waiting Room had its own time constraints and politics that aren't usually associated with climbing. Because Waikato Hospital, and so many others, made it possible for me to enjoy the mountains again, I made it my goal to help them out.

'I'm comfortable with how I've gone about my return to the most beautiful place in the world. Among everything, I never forget: The best climber in the world is the one who is having the most fun.'

The Tour Backcountry Ski Touring Race held in the Craigieburn Range over the 19th and 20th of September was blessed with great weather, excellent spring snow and a small but very strong field.

Seven teams of two lined up at Cheeseman Ski Area on the Saturday morning, with a course of 1200 vertical metres, made up of three climbs and three ski descents. The Wanaka-based team of Gena Sibaev and Alexis Poilvert (pictured at left) established an early lead and never looked back, taking out the first day by 10 minutes, in 1hr 37min.

Day 2 of The Tour saw a new team on the start line, Chamonix-based Englishman Carron Scrimgeour and his French wife Julie Sinicali.

Second place team Gary MacPherson and Tim Ensor pushed Sibaev and Poilvert hard on Day 2, almost overtaking them on the first descent and finishing the day 5 minutes behind. The international mixed team of Scrimgeour and Sinicali battled the Christchurch-based mixed team of Duncan Sherrat and Kath Conlan. Sinicali and Scrimgeour won the battle but the Sherrat–Conlan team held onto third place overall.

Feedback from racers and race volunteers alike was very positive and bigger vertical has been requested for next year's race, which is scheduled for September 11–12.

A huge thanks to all involved in The Tour, especially the race volunteers, and sponsors SkiMoNZ, Dynafit, Singapore Airlines, the NZAC and The Climber magazine, Buff Head Wear, iclimb.co.nz, and mountainz.co.nz.

More photos and the results table can be found at www.thetournz.blogspot.com.

John O’Malley’s photo gallery is at www.castlehill.net.nz/gallery/thetour/.

Anthony Morgan and Pete Amos climbed Classic Hits and Memories at the Darrans Meet (3+, III), a 3- to 4-pitch route in the McPherson Cirque. It is thought their climb may have been only the second ascent of the route. Ant shares his thoughts on the climb....

I'd love to get the background on the route name. The only connection between the name and how I felt during the first pitch was the potential for 'hitting' the deck but perhaps it was a 'classic' Darrans winter climbing experience: thin ice, featureless rock, some frozen turf and not much in the way of protection.

The first pitch (shown in the photos) wasn't really in condition and couldn't be avoided – we tried for ages to find an easier, alternate start. Bouldery dry-tooling up an off-width crack lead to snow covered slabs. These were traversed gingerly up and right to a thin ice flow before climbing to the base of the chimney.

Pete scored well with the second pitch – fat ice and lots of screws, slings and cracks for protection. Beautiful bridging, swinging and side-stepping lead to the final curtain, and the end of our ropes. It was definitely a three-star pitch.

The curtain was short and close to vertical, after which the route eases off. Good ice for a v-thread was found about 20 metres later.

Pete adds, 'It never looks as terrifying in the pictures. Think of thin brittle ice over seamless granite, dusted with powder snow, with a smattering of turf on the side. Here you have the degustation menu of Darrans winter climbing!'

Damon Clutterbuck has years of backcountry snowboarding experience and is clearly at home in the snow. At the Darrans meet, he was the guy taking his crampons off when we were all glad for having ours on. The photo above shows his tracks coming off the eastern slopes of Mt Talbot down to Black Lake.

Damon offered his thoughts on riding and skiing in the Homer Hut area.

'There is definitely scope in the Darrans for snowboarding and skiing if you are willing to kick steps.

'Off Barrier Knob would be awesome, I really regretted not having my board with me up there, you could ride all the way from the summit to well below Gertrude Saddle in good conditions. I only noticed one tricky section just above the saddle, which with more snow base would become easy.

'The basins below Barrier Peak and between Barrier Knob and Peak would be easy to ski off also. Homer Saddle could be another relatively easy descent and possibly the Crosscut Bluffs, with a good snow base.

'Probably one of the best descents would be from Traverse Pass on Talbot down to Gertrude Saddle. The eastern slopes of Talbot are sweet, I did the lower section but looking down from Barrier Knob, I could see that had I had enough time (and energy!), the upper section is do-able and would be a fast way down to Black Lake.

'Obviously, all the descents would depend on snow conditions and skill levels but there are infinite possiblities over there.'

Damon added, 'I also did my first ice lead at the meet, on about WI1 I guess, and built my first ice belay all by myself. I was stoked on that and blown away that I didn't drop all my screws! Stoked!'

I recently swapped a few emails with Queenstown climber Sally Ford, regarding the number of WI2–3 routes up at Wye Creek, an ice and mixed climbing area in the Remarkables, Queenstown.

Sally emailed me the above photos, saying:

'These photos were taken in previous winters. The photos where I am seconding and abseiling (right and centre) show Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, a 2–3 pitch WI3 route and my favourite. You can walk off the top of this route but there can be a band of sh***y slabby stuff near the top (15m at most). If you do walk off, head to safe terrain and bring the second up from a pit or rock.

'The easiest climbs (WI2-ish) at Wye Creek are on the right bottom tier, (shown in the photo at left). The climb in the photo is WI2 and is not named, but it's the slab to the right of Iron Curtain. If you climb on the right bottom tier, make sure people don't start climbing the harder lines above and knocking ice down on you.

'At the left end of Wye is the next level of difficulty, and there is a nice half slab even further left. There are bolts on the right side of a rock prow at the left end and you can use these to top rope a thinner, more difficult line after you have topped out on a less difficult line, and abbed down to the bolts to set up your top rope.

'There is also ice climbing at the Lake Alta slabs in the Remarks, but you have to get there early as the sun hits the ice here by 11am.'

Sally recommends the technique of leading on pre-placed screws and putting a few extra in between, for those new to leading water ice.

With winter on the doorstep, the excitement among climbers is palpable. So I thought I'd cobble together some of my favourite winter climbing photos, taken around New Zealand, to up the growing anticipation.

In the top montage, from left to right:

The Gertrude Valley, Darran Mountains. Mt Belle, which has probably never been climbed in winter, is prominent in the distance. Homer Hut is nestled in the trees below Mt Belle, just off the Milford Road.

Driving lonely roads from Mt Cook back to Queenstown in a storm. Winter climbing makes you skinny, so pizza and fries were high on the agenda, although the transition back to civilisation after spending a week in the mountains is often jolting.

The east face of Mt Sefton, viewed from the back porch at Wyn Irwin Hut, Mt Cook Village. Drinking coffee in the sun at Wyn Irwin is the perfect end to a Cook climbing trip. Don't forget to feed Arthur and Martha, the hut's resident Paradise ducks.

The Psychopath Wall and southeast face of Mt Talbot, Darran Mountains. To date, only three lines have been climbed on the Wall in winter.

In the lower montage, from left to right:

The Barrier Face, Barrier Peak, Gertrude Valley. The face is around 1100m high and is one of the more achievable climbs near Homer Hut. It was first climbed in the winter of 1971 by Darran's winter pioneers Geoff Gabites and Pete Moore.

Pinnacle Ridge, Mt Ruapehu, viewed from upper Pinnacle Ridge. Scene of my first proper alpine climb and my first solo climb. Good memories.

Grey Peak, Mt Haast, Lendenfeld Peak and the North Shoulder of Mt Tasman, viewed from Pioneer Hut, West Coast neves. Climbing here in winter is all about quick access, good ice and epic descents in the dark.

A peak in the Eglinton Mountains, Fiordland. I hazard a guess that very little climbing has been done in the Eglintons in winter. This image was taken while mooching around Knobs Flat, waiting for the Milford Road to open.

These two images compare the January 2008 snow cover (above) on the Main Divide at Aoraki Mount Cook with the January 2009 snow cover (below). Both images were taken from the Mt Sealy/Annette Plateau area.

The photos look pretty similar huh?

Yet by January '08, many popular alpine routes had been cut off by schrunds and crevasses, owing to less snowfall than usual the previous winter and spring. Climbs that were still accessible had bullet proof ice and ice screws were being used on the easier routes because stakes wouldn't go in.

It was a scorcher of a summer indeed, with locals in the Mount Cook Village commenting that the conditions in January '08 were more like autumn conditions, and that it was the worst they had ever seen it for the time of year.

Cue mutterings about global warming and whether or not anyone will be able to climb in summers to come...

However, winter and spring last year brought good dumps of snow, making for filled-in glaciers and easy access this summer. Cue a huge collective sigh of relief!

What is interesting, however, is that conditions up high remained 'dry'. Climbers reported a lack of snow on ridges and in areas usually considered mixed terrain. Why the snow from last winter and spring has stuck around down low but not up high is a mystery yet to be solved, but it does explain why the snow cover looks so similar in these two photos, despite the two seasons being rather different.

UPDATE: Andrew Finnigan emailed Mountainz with some thoughts on the 2009 summer alpine conditions.

'Mount Cook locals who remained in the village during the 2008 winter reckon there was less snow compared with the previous winter because of the predominance of the easterly wind. Hence there was loads of snow at Mt Hutt and the Craigieburns but not much at Ohau and the Wanaka area, as these locations are too far west.

Maybe it is summer that has been key this season, rather than a good previous winter and spring? I think the winter and spring were still poor for snowfall but this summer was cooler and had more cloud cover. There was also more snowfall through summer.

A 40cm snowfall to 2000m in January might not seem significant but it might take 5 days to melt off, thus entirely stopping melt of the winter snows for 5 days – a pretty significant period.'

SECOND UPDATE: Simon Allen echoed these sentiments in an another email to Mountainz.

'Contrary to what has been stated, early summer snow depths about the Main Divide were very comparable between the two seasons. True, the storm patterns were quite different during previous winters, but overall, snow depths were similar. This was seen in snow depth models and also from annual snow depth measurements conducted by NIWA in the Jolly catchment.

It was definitely not “good dumps of snow” that made this season different from the previous year. Rapid melting during early to mid-summer seems to be the key. From November '07 through to January '08, the weather was extremely dry and cloudless, creating the rapid deterioration reported by all. Although overall temps during this time were only 0.8 degrees above average in the Mount Cook village, I suspect daily maximums (most important for melt) were much higher than average.

Best solution for future years, especially given climate change scenarios for the Southern Alps – go climbing as soon as possible after the spring nor'west snow dumps and avoid the risk of conditions crapping out by January. Summer '07/'08 showed how quickly a perfectly good start to the season can turn bad!'

I was rifling through dusty photos taken well before digital cameras were used by anyone other than nerdy astrophysicists, and came across this photo of a snow groomer on the Tasman Glacier. Well, that's what people told us it was at the time. They also told us that in some winters the groomer was buried by snow and not found again until the following summer. Seeing as it was our first trip to the Tasman Glacier, we thought this must be the norm in the New Zealand mountains, and that perhaps there were snow groomers scattered all through the Southern Alps.

However, not only did I not find a snow groomer elsewhere, such as on the Linda or in the Balfour, I never saw this one again despite many return trips to the Tasman. The photo was taken in 1999. Has anyone seen it since? Was it actually a snow groomer? And did it have an affectionate name such as Mertyl?

Five climbers approach the summit of Lendenfeld Peak, with Mt Tasman providing the impressive backdrop. The photo was taken from Mt Haast on the West Coast neves. Click on the picture to get the full view.

All these photos are from the Advanced Technical Climbing weekend on Ruapehu last weekend. I know what you are wondering. What do we get up to on these weekends? Well I'm not going to tell you. It's a secret. You should have been there. You'll just have to guess from the photos.

The night shots are of a bit of top-rope mixed climbing. It may look like we are super hardcore and climb all through the night but it's not actually that late - it's only just got dark. We were all in bed early, which pleased our mothers no end. Because the ice had been soaking up the sun's rays throughout the day it was somewhat soft and it was common for our picks to rip straight through. Anyhow, we got to implement the main principle of mixed climbing which is to hook, hook, hook. The next morning the ice was hard again and we made shorter work of the climbs.

The other images are of climbing on Pink Floyd Buttress in the Pinnacles. The mountain did it's usual thing of cloaking us in mist mid-afternoon, which didn't aid the photography. Things cleared as soon as everyone was at the top of their respective pitches. No-one was interested in reclimbing the routes for the benefit of the photographer. Lazy.

Canadian Andrew Rennie (right) introduced us to 'The Rope Game' while we were chillin' at the Darwin Corner snowcaves in Aoraki-Mt Cook National Park. If anyone wants to volunteer a better name for the game then be my guest. Essentially two combatants stand on blocks of snow just large enough to take both feet. The idea is then to pull the other person from their stance. Or alternatively to let them over-balance as they pull too hard. However, a contestant can't continually let the rope slip through their fingers in a bid to stay balanced because they lose if the other person gets all the rope.

Easy enough huh? We assume the game is used to solve all mild disputes in Canada in the same way 'Paper, Rock, Scissors' is throughout the rest of the world. The fact that climbing gear is used in everyday life in this manner is the reason why gear is so cheap in Canada.

In our case, Mt Darwin is the stunning backdrop and the dispute was who was getting the last can of beer.

I always knew there was nothing to match good old oiled cotton. Breathable well before Goretex was invented, it went as stiff as a suit of armour when the temperature dropped and could deflect speeding bullets. Ah, the good old days. Here I am in full Scottish conditions wearing oiled cotton and scratchy tweed climbing breeks. Not that you can see much through the spindrift.

I do actually have "leashes" on the tools, just that back then the "leashes" consisted of bits of string and were only meant to stop you dropping your axes when you ran out of strength. Yes, we really were that hard. If you look very closely, you'll see a hammer on my harness. That was my old North Wall Hammer. I whapped it into a vice and bent the pick down with a length of scaffolding. It was more secure than a straight pick, but still wobbled about in the ice. In my right hand is what used to be my cutting axe. My mate got it bent for me in an induction furnace at his work because I couldn't bend it with the scaffolding. It actually ended up a really good tool, and I kept using it for quite a while, even after I bought some Terrordactyls. It had a longer pick so you didn't mangle your knuckles every placement. We always used to climb with three tools because they all worked better in different stuff. And we were afraid we'd drop one! The string leashes were usually bits of mangled reject 5mm cord...

Left: the sharp crater rim with crevasses below Paretetaitonga in the background. Middle: the Crater Lake encircled by the Pyramid (Peretini) traverse and the Cathedral Rocks (Matihao) and Te Heu Heu in the distance. Right: the crater face of the summit of Ruapehu, Tahurangi.

You can see a series of shots taken by Peter as he ascended the Turoa side of Ruapehu that show there is already enough of the white stuff to make a trip to the mountain worthwhile.

We were climbing in deep snow and were quite aware of the chance of triggering an avalanche so for part of the climb we climbed roped together on opposite sides of the ridge, the idea being we couldn't both get swept from the mountain. This worked well until we ran into a sizable cornice (also pictured) high on Mt Christie, and this put an end to the attempt.

The low-light was I pretty much fainted from cold pains in my fingers on the descent after my gloves got wet on the sunny side of the ridge. The temperature difference between sun and shade in winter is huge. Fortunately I had made it back to the belay just in time before blacking out for a few seconds and Alexander was able to hold me on the rope. The main picture was taken shortly after, continuing our descent to the col on the right side of the inset.

By the beginning of January, which is still peak season (not a bad pun), the mountains looked as they do in March. Maybe worse. As the snow melts, hard ice layers are exposed that make even the introductory routes serious propositions. Crevasses open up everywhere and cut off access to the majority of routes. Rocks no longer have anything to bind them together and pepper poor climbers below.

In the first couple of weeks of 2008, parties were turning around on classic climbs such as the Silberhorn and Syme Ridges on Mt Tasman, the East Ridge of Mt Cook and De le Beche Ridge. The Hooker Glacier was cut off and there were reports of rockfall from the Footstool to Aiguilles Rouges.

The above picture was taken by Lars Anderson from the summit of Mt Sealy. Obviously it is more than one picture, but it was skillfully, even lovingly, stitched together into a 270-degree panorama by Cameron Mulvey. Cameron looks after the Canterbury Mountaineering Club's Wyn Irwin Hut in the village and loves nothing more than making panoramas on his laptop, so you can make his day by paying him a visit on your way home from the mountains.

But I digress. Points of interest are the nearly naked upper slopes of the Footstool and Sefton. Only diminishing hanging glaciers remain, hoping to make it through to winter. If you pan left of Sefton you can see the rockfall from the recent major collapse on Mt Vampire.

If you don't know already, access to Gorilla Stream is via Tasman Glacier's terminal lake in a motorized dinghy, which is usually used to whiz Japanese tourists around the lake to look at icebergs. The icebergs are cool and all but are covered by rock debris and I caught myself wondering that if the lake was in Japan would there be an elderly man sweeping the rocks off the icebergs with a straw broom for the sake of tidiness?

Here, we have arrived back at the wharf. It doesn't have a cafe but the view is something else. Fortunately the Danish guy who was refuelling all the boats advised us of the lake's temperature - six degrees at the surface and colder beneath. "It makes the women perky and the men this small." He indicated a length of about two centimetres with his fingers. "Climb back up the rear of the boat to get out of the water or you won't be able to get out," he advised.

No kidding. If I'd jumped straight off the wharf I'd have drowned due to my limbs freezing up before making it back to shore. Anyhow, our three second splashes (that's about as much as we could handle) were a superb end to the trip.

In the picture I am prussiking back up a line I managed to fix the previous night. The schrund was only passable by climbing some sketchy unprotectable rock and free standing columns of snow (not ice) far on the right. For some reason the laws of gravity had been temporarily switched off and I had got above the schrund. As there was no protection to be found above the schrund either, I had to climb 80m higher to get in a snowstake. I tied our two ropes together and abseiled back down on a single strand to the schrund. I couldn't get enough swing going to clear the large crevasse so spent a pretty frustrating 15 minutes getting back out of the hole.

We decided to get some sleep and deal with the slot the next morning. And that's what I'm doing in the picture. Trying to deal with the slot. I can tell you it is not easy to prussik with 80 metres of half-rope stretching above you. I felt like a yoyo. As soon as I weighted the rope I lost 7 metres in height. If only I'd brought my mini ascenders... The worst part was clearing the lip of the wall, having to clear metres of snow to climb onto something firm. An hour later both the packs and Mark had negotiated the schrund. If we'd accidently left $1000 of gear below the slot I don't think we'd have gone back to retrieve it.

Every schrund turned out to be a technical climb. I think by the time we got out to the Fox Neve we had graded the "walkout" at about 4+. What was supposed to take a couple of hours had taken one and a half days. The worst part of the walkout had been earlier than our encounter with the mega schrund. Having come off Silberhorn the previous day, we bivied in the upper Balfour. We hadn't been walking out long before we were forced to take running jumps across slots while being belayed. The packs were then hauled across by rope.

The trouble really started when we passed the Hidden Face of Tasman where we encountered the largest crevasse I have ever had to deal with. There was no doubt we had to abseil into it and make our way out to the side, but we were fairly convinced our two ropes weren't going to reach the bottom. Without exaggeration, the crevasse could have swallowed several blocks of Queen Street. We had only one option, and that was to abseil at the extreme right edge of the glacier, where the drop was hopefully only 50 metres.

We needed to be quick, because the Hidden Face was collapsing every 10 minutes. The avalanche debris was pulling up a few metres short each time. The issue was the snow wasn't taking stakes. Mark would dig as deep as he could, place a horizontal stake, and stamp all the snow back in place - and the damn stake would pull out without the least protest. Each time the ice cliffs collapsed we didn't say a word, just watch the approaching debris out of the corner of our eyes, and held our breaths.

Eventually, Mark was able to work some magic and it looked as if the stake had a chance of holding so we just went for it. The abseil was amazing - I can only describe it as vertical ice caving - threading a path through every ice formation imaginable. We both made it down and at that point we had thought all our troubles were behind us.

Late afternoon on the second day we reached Katie’s Col. The relatively uncrevassed Fox Neve lay before us if only we could find a way past the last major slot. It didn’t look hopeful. The bridge across was no more than a metre thick. For sure I would break through the bridge and we would be stranded. But given there was no other option we had to give it a go - at least Mark and I were separated by several crevasses so there was no chance of us both falling down the same hole.

Sometimes a mountain gives you a break and this was to be ours. Looking back I couldn’t grasp how the bridge hadn’t collapsed. We had escaped the Balfour. We were very aware that we were due back at work the next morning and were debating whether to turn up a day late or mission an all night walk out. We then kicked ourselves for not realizing a much better option, and skipped merrily 30 minutes down to the Big Mac landing strip and hitch-hiked a ride back with a workmate on one of the tourist choppers.

This all sounded quite exciting, so a few of us in a supreme impulse of irresponsibility, decided to go have a look. To do this we decided the best approach would be up the Turoa side with an early start under the cover of darkness. We were rewarded with a beautiful night and a full moon to light our way. We were pleasantly surprised to find we were the only people around - I was half expecting a steady queue of climbers waiting in line at the summit.

We reached Tahurangi at 7am and were rewarded with an absolutely breathtaking view of the devastation below. It was evident that Dome Shelter (on ridge in middle of the top picture) bore the full brunt of the eruption. Judging by the almost hut sized boulders scattered around it, the climbers who were there that night were relatively lucky to have got away so lightly. The lake itself was a little lower than before and absolutely calm.

I've included a couple of photos of Dome Shelter taken more recently. The chimney entrance is still accessible, but since the eruption blew the front door in, the interior is now completely full of snow. (Ed's note - yes, you are looking at a boulder on top of the hut).

I chose this picture because it was taken during one of the most atmospheric moments I've had in the mountains. I'm sure much of the headiness I was feeling was due to our arrival on the Divide late in the day - knowing we had a lot of work to do through the night to return safely to Pioneer Hut. Although the ascent had been comfortably within our abilities, I find it can be difficult to set aside the sense of foreboding when being so high in winter. Like all climbs onto the Main Divide from Pioneer Hut (west), the reward is a view down the huge vertical drops onto the Grand Plateau and Tasman Glacier (east).

We were to arrive at Marcel Col after a number of abseils, Andrew doing well to find anchors in the deep powder and on the rock. The glacier home proved to be almost impassable, and required several hours of rope work to negotiate. It was one of those extremely cold winter nights when a climber cannot stop shiverring, even if breaking a knee deep trail uphill while incased in down. We eventually reached the hut after what was yet another 24 hr climb for winter '04.

Towards the top I started passing these burnt out holes in the snow where hot ash or whatever had landed. On the top it felt a bit weird. I was on my own and definitely felt a bit lonely and vulnerable; hoping that the mountain had finished with its malevolent intent!! Anyway, it was a great day out.

For those who are not familiar with Ruapehu, the photo is taken from Te Heu Heu looking across the Summit Plateau. At far left, and seemingly untouched, is the high peak of Tahurangi (about 3km away). The crater is immediately in front of Tahurangi, but down and out of view. On the right and covered in ash and mud is Dome Ridge. Dome Shelter, where all the action happened, can be seen emerging from the debris in the inset.

Tshering was in New Zealand to brush up on his technical climbing before starting a guides' course with the with the NZMGA (he became the first Nepali to gain a UIAGM-affiliated guiding qualification - although he'd already guided Everest twice by that time). He kind of blew us away. Despite having to climb with some pretty old fashioned axes and a lot of borrowed gear (the airline lost his luggage), he left the rest of us in his tracks. Although I feel at home in the mountains, it's something else to watch someone whose home really is the mountains.

Tshering now runs his own guiding company in Nepal.