Hiking, Scrambling, Mountaineering, and Climbing

To be fair if you’re sport climbing and falling on the rope a lot, I can see it makes sense (assuming you’re really comfortable tying it) as you can undo it with post climb, weak fingers…. I have had too many climbs where i was trapped on the rope afterwards until the pump went away!

You can't tie in at the end of a rope with it, but this is one of the best things about the alpine butterfly.

Easy to tie with thick winter gloves or mild frostbite
Can be tied one handed with a bit of practice. (but not with cold hands or gloves!)
Easy to untie after loading
Perfectly safe for tying in at the middle of a rope.

If you're counting hitches, then the clove has to be pretty high up on the most useful list.

Gah, alpine butterfly is of course a hitch and not a knot.

Yeah I do understand it, wonder what grade untying a very stuck figure 8 gets...

I wouldn't say so, the alpine butterfly stays in the rope regadless of whether it is fixed to an object, which I think qualifies it to be a knot.

TBH, the first time I had considered the difference between a knot and hitch was yesterday...and it shows!

But you can't tie two ropes together with an alpine butterfly, so it fails the "knot" test.

A knot can be used to tie ropes together, or to themselves. The alpine butterfly is a loop knot.

Fair enough

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Had three days up in Snowdinia last weekend. Great weekend of ridge walking and scrambling. Saturday we did the Snowdon Horseshoe in amazing weather. Couldn't park in the Pen-Y-Pass car park so had to change our route slightly and ascend up to the Crib Goch ridge from the road rather than follow the Pyg track. Meant we got a bit more ridge scrambling than we would have otherwise done and a much quieter route up. We didn't bother with queuing for the summit selfie on Snowdon and just carried on past to pick up the Watkin path and back into quietness as soon as we dropped off the top.
Saturday was Cnict and Moelwyn Mawr and the abandoned slate mines in clear blue skies but mad wind - must have been 60mph in parts. Walking up Moelwyn Mawr was easy with the wind pushing you up.
Sunday was Cadair Idris circuit, again with clear blue skies, wind still quite strong and pretty cold.
All amazing views and scenery. Only downside was the litter, especially on Crib Goch and Snowdon. Picked up a few bits where I could but there was a lot of broken glass coming down off Snowdon :(

I am in the early stages of planning a long through hike, are there any good online tools for route plotting I should be looking at? I have a plotaroute.com account which is pretty good (free version) and I have used it for plotting long runs but thought I would ask is there anything else I should consider before paying for the premuim version with OS maps - it's only £18 a year which seems pretty reasonable tbh.

I’ve previously found the OS Maps app pretty terrible. So much so that I didn’t bother to renew my subscription.

My girlfriend swears by Outdooractive (used to be called Viewranger). I have a RideWithGPS subscription and use that to plan walking routes as well as cycling routes and it’s been great.

I know it's intended for riding, but I use RideWithGPS for planning hikes. OSM Maps and Google Maps together are great, because you can quickly switch between OSM, actual maps, satellite and terrain.

Edit: got beaten to it.

Ridewithgps just works. But you can use bing maps for zoomable OS mapping.

I've been back and forth with them about needing to change the name.

I use that combined with local geographic maps.

First munro of the year with my girlfriend yesterday: Lochnagar.

What a ripper it was too.

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Couple more.

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I would ask is there anything else I should consider before paying for the premuim version with OS maps - it's only £18 a year which seems pretty reasonable tbh.

Have a look at backcountry navigator. Single payment and have access to OS maps through it.

I have found OS maps app to be great. Well worth the money.

Edale -> Wessenden inc bivvy stop last night after 7 miles (near the Snake Inn path turn) on The Pennine Way then detoured off to Marsden, quick pint, homeward bound now.

Amazing weather throughout, except for the inevitable cloud over bleaklow this morning ;)

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Guess the Lake.

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Derwentwater?

Yep. Pretty obvious with Skiddaw and Blencathra as a backdrop.

Lovely walking weather though.