The next morning we didn't get up until 8am and after breakfast, we packed our day bags and set off to find some snow and ice to learn some skills.
We hiked back up over the boulders to the col, then set off along a ridge with awesome views of our valley and the mountains beyond. There were a few clouds on the peaks along the horizon, but the sun was shining and it was a glorious day. It was a fun scramble over the ridge and when we got to the end, we were rewarded with a view of the Spearhead Glacier in all its terrifying glory - a great expanse of ice and snow with incredible crevasses, dips in the surface where there are hidden crevasses, rockfall zones and overhanging lips of snow.
We scrambled up Spearhead Mountain and had lunch with a view before heading to a small, safe snow patch to practice skills on.
I learned about glacier travel, snow anchors, ice anchors, crevass rescue and how to arrest a fall. The latter was loads of fun - we hiked to the top and slid down, stopping with our ice axes at the bottom (woohoo!).
Then soaking wet, we hiked back to camp, which was starting to feel more like home.
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