Summer Mountain Skills
Navigation techniques and movement skills.
Comprehensive mountain skills courses designed to boost your skills and confidence for walking in the mountains in summer conditions. Choose from a focus on either navigation techniques or movement skills for more technical routes including scrambling.
The courses run over three days, this enables plenty of time to gain new knowledge and to put it into practice. Therefore, ensuring you leave feeling able to continue using these skills independently. They involve a variety of different practical sessions as well as at least one full journey day through the mountains.
Maps &
Mountains
Join us for a 3 day unique navigation and reading the mountain landscape course in the West Highlands of Scotland.
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Boost your skills and confidence with using a map and compass in a mountain environment. Learn how to plan routes off the beaten path and route find in complex, pathless terrain. Discover the landscape of the highlands and how understanding more about the rocks at your feet can be useful when moving through the mountains. The culmination of the course is to put everything learnt into practice to explore one of Lochaber’s classic hillwalking routes.
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The course will be based out of Fort William and you will get the opportunity to visit a diverse range of beautiful locations in the local area. Fort William can be reached via public transport and lifts can be arranged from there.
The maximum group size is 6, ensuring plenty of time for everyone to benefit from 1:1 support and guidance. You do not need any previous experience of using maps or compass to participate. You will get the most out of the course if you have a good level of hill fitness and some previous experience of mountain walking.
The three day course costs £235 per person which includes transport from Fort William if required. It does not include accommodation or food.
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Interpreting maps; features, contours, scales and direction
Paper map based navigation techniques
Compass bearings, pacing and timings
Route finding through pathless terrain
Digital navigation aids and their uses
Introduction to the geology of the West Highlands
Landscape stories of the area including natural and human history
A mountain journey including munro summits
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Fri 10th - Sun 12th October 2025
Fri 21st - Sun 23rd November 2025
Bespoke dates available on request. Contact us if you are interested in this course but the above dates don’t suit.
Rocks
& Ridges
A 3 day mountain skills course to build your skills and confidence on technical and exposed hill walking terrain.
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Join us to gain skills and confidence for more challenging mountain adventures involving steep ground and scrambling. Learn different techniques for moving safely and efficiently over rocky ground. Discover how to improve your strength and balance, movement on steep slopes and how to reduce anxiety on exposed ground. Understand how to make good, safe decisions and route find effectively in complex terrain.
The culmination of the course is to put everything learnt into practice on a classic ridge walking route. The will be one of the following: Ben Nevis via CMD arête, Ring of Steall or The Grey Corries.
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The course will be based out of Fort William. Over the three days you will get the opportunity to visit a diverse range of beautiful locations in the local area. Fort William can be reached via public transport and lifts can be arranged from there.
The maximum group size is 6, ensuring plenty of time for everyone to benefit from 1:1 support and guidance. You do not need any previous experience of ridge walking. You should have a good level of fitness and be capable of walking for 8 hours in the hills.
The three day course costs £235 per person which includes transport from Fort William if required. Accommodation and lunches are not provided.
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Techniques for moving safely and efficiently over rocky ground
Techniques for ascending and descending steep slopes
Exercises for improving strength and balance
Controlling nerves and anxiety on exposed ground
Use of walking poles to support movement
Route finding and decision making through complicated ground
Introduction to the geology of the West Highlands
Landscape stories of the area including natural and human history
A mountain ridge journey including munro summits
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Fri 8th - Sun 10th August 2025
Wed 3rd - Fri 5th September 2025
Bespoke dates available on request. Contact us if you are interested in this course but the above dates don’t suit.
“‘It had everything - expert guidance, a wealth of mountain skills knowledge, challenging terrain, stunning landscapes, and a great bunch of people to spend time with. The course built over 3 days and culminated in an incredible walk to test out all the new skills we learned.”
— Louise Neicho