David Dewar came down from Scotland for a week of climbing with Mark, and sometimes Kathy too. We had some great weather as you can see from the photos below.

I shot this photo out of a wee window in the Aiguille du Midi cable car lift, just as it was arriving at the top station. Notice the dents in the bar on the right! I suspect it was pretty windy the day those were put in.

On our first day of climbing we did a bit of a "warm-up" on the Arête des Cosmiques. Though David has done this route before it is always fun and he was keen to do it another time.

David down-climbing in the ice gully between the towers. This is a little variation on the route, that is lots of fun. Most folks avoid this section. In the previous photo you can see the gully between the giant towers.

Our home for the night, the Refuge des Cosmiques. Climber watch the sunset from the deck.

Our objective for the next day is the Contamine-Grisolle route on the North Face Triangle on Mont Blanc du Tacul. I have drawn in our route.

Climbing up the edge of the entrance gully. The sun comes up.

For our third day, Kath joined us for the East Arête of the Pyramide du Tacul, a fun rock climb on great granite. Kathy took this photo of me(Mark) leading, low on the climb. The Petit Capucin is the tower in the background.

David climbing high on the route. You can just make out he dots of walkers on the glacier, far below.

David on the crux section of the Pyramide.

The summit hero shot on the Pyramide. The big peak behind is the Aiguille Verte. Les Drus is the double summitted tower on the left and Les Droites is the peak to the right of the Verte. The Aiguille du Moine is the nice looking summit in front of the Verte.

Kathy rappelling on the descent.

Nest we decided to take advantage of the good weather and conditions and to a great classic, the Arbengrat on the Ober Gabelhorn. In this photo we are hiking up to the bivy hut below the peak. The route climbs the thin couloir to the ridge left of the top, then follows the crest to the summit.

The views of the north side of the Matterhorn are quite impressive from this climb. Here, we have a fine view of the Matterhorn's North Face at dawn, from partway up the route.

David climbing along the Arbengrat. Here we turned the first small gendarme by an exposed traverse on the right. The Matterhorn and Dent d'Herens are the big peaks behind.

Looking up the same section of ridge. Kathy took this picture of me. The next big tower is turned on the left.

The summit of the Ober Gabelhorn.

We hiked on down to the Rothorn hut, then continued down to the Trift Hotel for the night. Here we enjoy a well earned beer.