Slacklining DJs

The music that was playing at the comp seems to have gone down a storm with tons of folk commenting on how good it was. I must admit, I kept that part in the family as the DJs were Dave's sister and her partner Ronin. Katy's myspace is here. If anyone wants a free mix CD, PM her and she'll send you one.

UK Slacklining Masters results

Michael Aschaber (Austria)

• Best International: Andy Lewis (USA) - £500 and a quaich (he looked a bit confused when I handed it to him and had to explain to him later that is a 'cup of friendship' and not, in fact, an ashtray...)
• 2nd International: Michael Aschaber (Austria) - £300
• 3rd International: Damian Cooksey (USA) - £200
• Best effort International: Nils Daimer (Germany) - Tensioning system

• Best UK: Jon Ritson (Lakes) - £500 and a quaich (also equally confused by the quaich/ashtray...)
• 2nd UK: Frank Kroner (Glasgow) - £300
• 3rd UK: Andrew Marshall (Belfast) - £200
• Best effort UK: Rupert Ollinger (Edinburgh) - Slackline kit

Andy Lewis (USA) winning Best International

Check out Andy doing the splits on the line in the clip above - one of the highest scoring tricks you can do on a line.

Well, there were a few twists and turns in the run up to the event but I think I can safely say that the day was a real success. A big 'Thank you!' to everyone that made the day possible.

Bad weather forces change of venue - eek!

We are now paying the price for the fantastic run of amazing weather we've been having here lately and that price is lots and lots of rain and it doesn't look like it's going to stop. As a result, we had to take the difficult decision this evening of changing the venue of the UK Slacklining Masters to a nice warm, dry indoorsy one at The Nevis Centre in Fort William.

In actual fact, it wasn't that difficult a decision if you'd seen how soggy the playing fields were today!

The date and time are still the same - 12pm this Saturday.

Frying eggs the hard way.

Whilst I’m on the subject of frying eggs, it reminded me to tell y’all about Oleifera Rapeseed Oil. Back in the days of PO (pre-Oleifera) I was an advocate of organic sunflower oil for all things frying, baking and cooking as I found olive oil too heavy and with an overpowering taste. Lately, I’ve been trying out Oleifera which as well as looking quite classy on the old kitchen work-top, has converted me to the benefits of rapeseed oil. You know when you fry eggs you get that crispy hard bottom and edges? Well, I did anyway, but crispy bottoms are now a thing of the past and you don’t even need to use that much of it, so it isn’t swimming in grease.

Award winning design, a great product and guess what?

It’s Scottish! Yahoo!

Scottish cafés we like part two: Lochaber Farm Shop

A welcome addition to the café scene in Fort William is the arrival of the Lochaber Farm Shop’s new café. In their new purpose built lodge, they offer the best of both worlds. You can sit down and enjoy the view of Aonach Mor whilst eating one of the best bacon and egg rolls known to man and then do what I do and pop across the hall to buy the same locally produced bacon and eggs to take home and munch your way through each morning until you run out and have to go back and buy some more. Not the healthiest, I know, but they taste so damn fine. I may end up the same size as their purpose built lodge if I’m not careful.

The shop itself has the best fruit and veg available in the area, far superior to the standard offered by Fort Williams’ big, local supermarket. If you know Fort William, you’ll know which one I’m talking about. Not long after we moved to this area, I made a lovely venison casserole with meat and veg bought from the Farm Shop and whilst eating it we couldn’t figure out why the carrots tasted so funny until it dawned on us what they actually tasted of – carrot! That may sound odd but they were the carrotiest carrots either of us had ever tasted. And they were organic and local. Far better than the bland, wobbly affairs on offer in town…

Just because I can, here’s an aerial view of the café, now that won’t be happening with every café I write about!

It’s a bit out of the way up at the Lochaber Rural Complex on the road to the Nevis Range gondolas and trying to remember on which days of the week it’s closed can be a bind (I’ve turned up many a time at the shop pre-lodge days to find it shut) but well worth the trek and perfect for fuelling up pre-skiing/boarding session.

Ben Nevis from the air

I cannot begin to describe just how awesome today was. Seriously. It all started last night when Dave Brown happened to mention that Diff, his partner in Hot Aches Productions, was coming up to Fort William in the morning to do some shooting for a new film Triple Echo are making about Ben Nevis. They needed aerial shots of the Ben; the weather was perfect and the helicopter was booked. I got to thinking…

So at half 8 this morning, I phoned Triple Echo and asked if there was any chance of a lift. It was a long shot but it worked! If I could be at the Nevis Range car park in half an hour, they’d see if they could squeeze me in – woohoo! Sheepishly blagging some wood (see post below) was nothing compared to blagging your way into a free ride round Ben Nevis in a helicopter on one of the best days of the year for it.

Click on the pictures below for a larger image.

All of the pictures I took in the air were shot through the helicopter window, so there are some reflections. But they still give you an impression of how awesome Ben Nevis is!

The shapely ridge of Carn Mor Dearg

A stop for lunch

An unusual view of the summit plateau of Ben Nevis. It looks so innocuous in sunshine, but can be a very scary place to be in a winter storm. You can see the summit observatory ruins clearly.

A-frames for slackers

With the morning spent sheepishly blagging my way round Fort Williams' building merchants, BSW Sawmills and Travis Perkins came up trumps and supplied us with the timber and materials for building the a-frames for the slacklining comp for nowt - cheers guys! Donald, a cabinet-maker in a previous life, produced 4 frames that could withstand a slacklining hippo landing a back flip. I was his trusty apprentice for the day doing helpful things like standing on wood to weigh it down whilst he sawed it, that kind of thing, though I did wield the drill on occasion.

Donald's excuse was that it was getting cold.

Winter walking in the sun

Dave succeeded in dragging me out of bed this morning at the ungodly hour of 5am to get a lift from him and Michael up the Ben to go a spot of winter walking. They disappeared into the darkness as soon as we left the car and I followed on at my own plodding pace. We headed up from the North Face car park and this is the amazing view I got as I approached the CIC hut at about 8 this morning; not long after, the clouds cleared, leaving behind a clear blue sky all day. I headed back down from here to Achintee down the tourist path. The difference between the two different paths is amazing. In the morning I was being overtaken by fierce, bearded mountain types powering up the path to arrive at their routes in time for daybreak and on the way down the tourist path, being met with people posing such questions as, "Is there any snow at the top?" It's quite scary really...

Anyway, Dave and Michael got a new route done today whilst I pottered about in the snow, a VII, 7 on Trident Buttress.

Slacklining update

The fabulous Tim Emmett has agreed to be our MC for the day at the UK Slacklining Masters.

If any of you have ever met Tim, been to one of his lectures or seen him on the telly racing Jeremy Clarkson up Verdon Gorge on Top Gear, I'm willing to bet you'll have been bowled over by his enthusiasm and energy.

This is tremendous news and I can't wait!