Kathryn James - Mountain Expertise - guiding & instruction in North Wales

Rock Climbing Development Instructor training for Plas Y Brenin.
Great weather (when it wasn’t too hot 😬) for this course and fab to be sharing the delivery with Esther Foster Climbing.
Building the candidates repertoire of tools for developing rock climbers on single pitches. This qualification is about more than the techniques, we are developing decision, communication, listening and observation skills. The main focus is trad climbing with a day on sport. We need to help trad climbers become sport climbers and sport climbers understand being good trad climbers…so the candidates become good RCDIs.
Not much time for photos, but did manage to get some good ones on the final day whilst coaching and teaching lead climbing the pinnacle of the qualification getting folks in the sharp end to do their first lead climbs on trad routes. So much to put in place prior to this though; placing gear, movement skills, belaying, building belays, understanding what lead climbing is and the risks involved,and being ready physically and psychologically to get on the ‘sharp end’.

Some rivers, some lakes, some camping, some whittling, some ancient art, some swimming, some jumping in, some mountain walking and some Oslo exploring.

Norway…what a country. Beautiful clear water, delightful camp spots and massive cliffs yet to be explored by climbers. Feeling small paddling underneath them on a vast lake as part of the Telemarkscanale system.
Bilberries, raspberries and cloudberries supplementing our Expedition Foods breakfast and dinner.

Another great adventure with the Adam Harmer Anne Lumsden clan. ❤️

Thanks Plas Y Brenin for the loan of the

Out on Carreg Wastad at the start of the week. Plas Y Brenin MCI assessment of the problem solving and rescue’s aspect of the syllabi. Preventing problems from occurring through clear communication and good belaying position. Then solving some problems that might occur involving; hoisting, prussiking, escaping the system & abseiling. Making progress safely and efficiently is the key to success on MCI assessment. A great day on the crag, thanks Michael Rainbow for being a great casualty.

AMI Professionals Mountain Training

Some highlights from this weekends Eryri skills weekend.
Multi pitch climbing skills, advanced mountaineering, introduction to climbing and an introduction to mountain skills (navigation and scrambling).

Smiles all round, cooler weather than of late and all the wonderful magic that Eryri offers climbers, mountaineers and walkers, supported and delivered by a team of lovely instructors.
Big thanks to Charlie Chambers- Adelong cathwilson4_mtn_leadingedge Cat Forster Jen Thomas Grace Alsancak-Hay Sophie Holdstock ᴀʟɪᴄᴇ ᴋᴇʀʀ ᴍᴏᴜɴᴛᴀɪɴᴇᴇʀɪɴɢ Emily Coates for delivering the courses.

Thanks to the aretecentre for the accommodation, the perfect place for us to be based and access the best Eryri has to offer.

Rab UK continual support of WAAC is also really appreciated, as is Elouise French work to give everyone a friendly WAAC welcome and for helping out with the intro to climbing.

AMI Professionals Mountain Training Association

Holidays… 🇫🇷🇨🇭

Fun times in the Aravis and Mont Blanc massif.

Mountain Equipment

Busy week on MCI training part 1.
Day 1; Fundamentals of rescues and problem solving
Day 2; Using the climbing wall and single pitch crags as a MCI
Day 3; Multi pitch rope systems; series, parallel, lowering, abseils with safety ropes & stacked abseils
Day 4; Mountaineering 1:1
Day 5; Navigation

A great week of getting the fundamentals dialled, so there’s plenty of bandwidth for part 2. Part 2 focuses on working on multi pitch crags, teaching and mountaineering with 2 people on the end of the rope.

Some of these folks are back soon for part 2, hopefully they’ll be out putting into practise the skills they’ve learnt during part 1 so they are ready for the next course.

After they have completed part 2 they will be MCI trainees. The period between part 1 and 2 is a practise period to develop personal skills.

Thanks .barclay for your expert input through the week and delivering plenty of sound advice and positivity through the rain.

I hope the candidates enjoy the practise period; 1:1 mountaineering, climbing as a 3, navigating and practising rescues.

Adventurous couple of days working for with . Rock climbing, zip wire, abseiling, scrambling and walking all in the Ogwen valley. A pleasure to work with such a friendly well humoured bunch. Polite and fun folks and already pretty talented and familiar with moving around with ropes.

Bonus to ben working alongside Donald and , it’s been a while since that has happened.

Highlights from the 2026 Skye meet.

Big thanks to for their hard work providing the women with great days out. All the seasons in 1 week sums it up.

The shared successes on the hill and crag, cups of tea, tasting of local beer, saunas, wild swims and general love of all things mountain make these weeks special.

A safe space for women to be inspired by women to achieve great things in the hills and on the crag. Thanks for joining all of you, you all make it the special space that it is. See you next time or out there on the hills having your own adventures.

Thanks to .equipment.uk and for helping us keep folks dry and warm on these weeks by providing some top quality kit for us to lend out.

The Croft Bunkhouse near Carbost was a great base, and the new was beautiful, thank you.

Great day on pinnacle ridge, Sgurr nan Gillian. All the seasons in one day.
An excellent adventure with Claire for her final outing on the Skye meet.

equipment.uk

Worth a read...another great article from Claire.