Starting out?

yes Simon,

one of only 25, and a few seconds made. Your jealousy can be tempered by the final cost as the £ plummeted against the $ and shipping and tax and the Post Office charge for collecting the tax........

get some G10 there great crampons easy to put on take off,  training is great but remember the key is not to fall over in the first place crampons will help you do that.

Well done  Jethro on your first 900m hill and a tough one at that, if you were in Scotland it would be your first "Munro" of course you would need to jump up on the adam and eve stone to get the extra 14m,

The courses on winter skills don't come cheap but compared to hurtling off into oblivion!!!

Winter mantra....Crampons and ice axe always in the sac

A big thumbs up from me for the Kahtoola Micro Spikes.  We went up to Red Tarn from Glenridding on Saturday and back down to Patterdale.  Not a single slip all the way round and we had full backpacking loads.  I was serioulsy impressed with them.  I wouldn't have fancy using them in place of proper crampons but for ice, and frozen snow on steep paths and one section of 30 degree frozen snow slopes they were excellent.   We didn't think it would be sensible to do Swirral or Striding Edge in them, but for general hill walking brilliant.

Also I may have bought one of the last pairs of mediums left in the country, the stock levels in the US are also pretty low for the medium size. 

I agree with SD, me and a mate went up Hellvelyn from Wythburn on Sunday and tried them for the first time-excellent! especially on ice and frozen snow. I reckon you travel faster than in summer, certainly easier to walk in than crampons.

I'd also second the comment about not doing Striding edge or Swirral in them, saw these two coming up of Striding and not sure if I'd like to try the micro spikes for this.

Hi,

Im no experienced winter walker but here is my two cents after going to the lakes and getting back today,

 I tried Helvellyn from Patterdale via striding edge on the Monday 16th, I got to the bottom of striding edge without crampons and I could barely stand up with the wind blowing me. The snow didnt bother me so much, it was just the wind and the cloud as well on the edge which would have prevented me seeing what snow I was kicking to check it was ok. Unfortunately I guttingly turned back as I had never been to Helvellyn before and never attempted such a ridge walk. I thought better safe than sorry. A few other people had to do the same and a lot of people had turned back that day. We did walk to Red Tarn across a lot of snow though fine.

 However I managed Bowfell which was very snowy especially up from three tarns upwards, yesterday the 19th. It was hard walk going up but coming down is not that hard. I also went across crinkle crags where there was a fair bit of snow. Decending in snow that has foot prints already there is much fun as you can literally snow run if you wish. It took us around 45 minutes to decend from summit of crinkle crags to oxendale because we were quickly running out light.

 Both Helvellyn and Bowfell had good 50m worth of snow stretch on the decents, and I found it much easier to decend in the snow than the scree footpaths due to the slipiness of the scree when wet.

 I also managed Ill Bell and Yoke which was nice and easy without crampons.

 I think at the end of the day it depends on what your attempting to do, anyone thats done Bowfell knows its hard going and is quite steep but it was fine without crampons. I think you can cope without unless your looking to do the harder routes like striding edge.

 I did not see one person in my week at the lakes wearing crampons!

I may consider getting some though, its just where to put them as I carry my camera bag on my back at all times rather than somewhere suitable.