With clients homeward-bound, the 'B' team arrived in the form of Guy & Oli Willett along with Jon Luckhurst.
After a couple of days of properly poor weather (and, sadly, an ever higher rain/snow limit) where I decided to take a well-earned rest while the guys went out to test out their GoreTex the forecast finally improved and we set course once again for Geitgaljern.
A familiar sight for me now:
While the guys headed up to Geitgaljern I went off to a neighbouring col to check out the access to Trollfjord.
Looking in to Trollfjord, debris in the valley bottom from all aspects having slid with the wwarm/wet weather, and a crown wall just belwo the col...::
Guy, Oli & Jon had some scrapey then powdery turns off Geitgaljern summit:
Meanwhile I enjoyed some nice spring snow back to the lower col which gave us ideas for a second run...
Jon seems to like his 14/15 Ranger CLs:
Knowing there was some reasonable spring snow to ski, we headed off down the West side enjoying some mellow slopes:
Objective number 2, one of Higravtind's South gullies:
Nice view from the col:
1 hour up, 90 seconds down... Guy is a small speck halfway down in this picture:
Ol & Jon in the upper gully:
A little bit of dry-skiing took us back down to 150m, for a pleasant walk back down to the car:
The next day the guys were all kleen to see some more of the islands, so we set the controls for the West. The initial target of Himmeltind was completely clagged in and very uninviting, so after coffee and waffles in Leknes we headed off to Store Klauva, which seemed to have a 'hole' of clear skies over it.
Oli striking a manly pose:
Jon taking the final steps:
Yet again, great (if windblown) views from the summit:
With the usually huge cornices mostly having fallen off in the warm snap of weather we managed to sneak on to the North face for a few steeper turns:
Fun terrain lower down:
A short skin to get over a ridge and we managed to keep skis on down to 150m - not bad considering how green the slopes around looked!
And there you have it... Our final (and fantastic) day out on Ristinden is here. With a terrible forecast I had pulled forward my flights home, and we left in what can only be described as "Fort William-esque" conditions - torrential horizontal rain!
Plans are already forming for 2015, don't hesitate to get in touch if you would like to experience these magical islands!
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