Expedition Reports

Exercise COCKNEY GLIDE was an Army paragliding expedition to Andalucia, Spain, undertaken in early March 25. The expedition was based in Algodonales, a historic hill town, perched on the edge of the Sierra Grazalema national park. Six hundred metres above the town towers the Sierra Lijar – a superb paragliding mountain that enables flying in

Ex Dragons Winter included two groups and a total of 14 service personnel from 135 Geo Sqn RE, 3MI Bn, 144 Para Med Sqn, East Midlands UOTC. One group was looking to pass Ski Foundation 3, involving mostly ski touring and contributing toward eligibility for a Ski Leader 1 application, or a ‘Quality Mountain Days

100 Regt RA undertook an overseas AT offshore sail training expedition in the Canary Islands, Ex CANARY UBIQUE (Ex CU) Leg 7, between Sun 29 Dec 24 – Sun 12 Jan 25, involving 12 personnel, of whom 9 were Army Reservists. The expedition took place on St Barbara V, a 42-foot Rustler ocean-going yacht provided

Day 1: Monday 10 Feb: The group set off for Netheravon from Merville Barracks, with a 164-mile journey ahead. Despite the M25 traffic, the group arrived and immediately began ground training for skydiving. The instructors began with teaching safety procedures, equipment handling, and body positioning for the freefall. They covered everything from how to inspect

Members of 3 Military Intelligence (MI) Battalion travelled to Nepal to tackle the rugged and remote terrain of the Limi Valley and to learn more about the communities, culture and heritage of our Gurkha colleagues. Exercise TERTIUS YATRA 2024 took place from 11-29 November 2024, comprising 13 personnel from 3 MI Battalion, plus a Mountain

In October 2024, 16 members of The Honourable Artillery Company set off to conquer Himlung Himal (7,126 meters / 23,379 feet), a remote Himalayan peak on the border between Nepal and Tibet. Armed with crampons, dreams, and not quite enough mars bars, we battled thin air, frozen boots, and each other’s bad jokes. Base camp

2023 was supposed to be the year our mountaineering Exped to the Moroccan High Atlas Mountains came to fruition, however fate as always was yet to play its hand and a week from deployment Morocco was hit with a terrible earthquake causing the sad loss of thousands of lives. It was therefore decided to shift

“Their sacrifice created our freedom” HRH Princess Anne the Princess Royal speaking at Arnhem on 21 Sep 2024 representing HM the King. On 14 Sep 2024 nine members of the Reserve and Regular Army from all over the UK, set off from a beach in Essex to paddle a kayak across the North Sea to

In the heart of Spain, a grueling gravel bike race known as Badlands pushed eight army personnel from both regular and reserve forces to their absolute limits. This challenging expedition, designed to test individuals in new and demanding ways, saw participants traverse a staggering 780-mile route through some of the most remote and breath-taking landscapes

With the support of the Ulysses Trust, 100 (Yeomanry) Regiment Royal Artillery embarked on an epic mountaineering adventure – trekking the Grande Randonnee’ 20 (GR20) from the South to the North of the Mediterranean island of Corsica, starting in Conca and finishing some 16 days later in Calenzana. The GR20 is widely regarded as one

Introduction: The British Army and Everest have been intertwined since long before the remarkable exploits of 1953 – surveying, attempting and admiring the vast slopes that lead to the roof of the World. One hundred years after Lieutenant George Mallory vanished above the clouds, the challenge remains ever gritty, demanding, and breathless. Unlike many major

Ian, how do you fancy leading a Royal Air Force Mountaineering Association Alpine trip this summer? Of course, my answer was ‘yes’, even though I only had a few months to find other instructors, team members, gain approval and financial support. A lot had changed since I had left full-time Royal Air Force Service in

Exercise SKIMO WARRIOR in April this year was the final exercise to prepare the UK Armed Forces Team to compete in the Patrouille des Glaciers (PdG). The PdG is the most prestigious ski mountaineering (skimo) race, with 4,386m of ascent over 58km from Zermatt to Verbier. Teams compete in patrols of three, racing through the

AIM: The exercise took place over the period of 10 – 16 June 2024 and involved 8 personnel from the Regimental Headquarters permanent staff cohort of 203 MMR, conducting 6 days of cycle touring in Northern France. The overall distance was 238km and was conducted from Cherbourg to Caen. BENEFITS: 203 MMR conducted numerous exercises

Ex Snjor Mountaineer was the Army Mountaineering Association’s recent flagship ski mountaineering expedition to Iceland, which aimed to prepare for and then summit Iceland’s highest peak, Hvannadalshnúkur – a feat that had not previously been achieved by a British Military team. WO2 Ross Penver, the Exped leader, aimed for the Expedition “to expose a group

Introduction: The focus of the exercise was for five members of the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry (FANY) to attend and complete the rigorous static-line parachuting training course at the Centre École des Troupes Aéroportées (ETAP) and thereby earn their ‘French Wings’. Over two weeks, participants underwent intensive physical and theoretical training alongside 125 troops from

In October 2023, in-year Army-wide saving measures were announced that effectively turned off the public funding for adventure training for the remainder of the Training Year. Not to be deterred, 3RWELSH looked at options to deliver low-cost training delivered using non-public funds and the result was a week on Scotland’s west coast in near perfect

The AMA winter meet is a highlight of the year, weather permitting and, for the last two years has been based in Glencoe. This is a world class destination for winter mountaineering and the Glencoe hostel provides an excellent base. On arrival we met our instructor for the week, Andy Hogarth, a runner who climbs

Ex TELEMARK TITAN 2024 was the FANYs’ first foray into telemark skiing as part of a fortnight of race training in Pralognan-la-Vanoise, culminating in the British and British Army Telemark Championships. The Corps was keen to take part in the exercise as, since 2019’s Ex Viking Challenge, kindly sponsored by the Ulysses Trust, members had

JOINT GLACIER 24 was a seven-day adventurous training expedition to the Stubai Valley in Austria. The purpose of the trip was to take eight non-skiers and eight with a variety of experience and instruct them either in skiing or take them to their next qualification level.The purpose of this type of trip is to expose

Exercise MONTY MERGER 24 (MM24) was the most recent iteration of Headquarters Home Command and Standing Joint Command (UK)’s annual skiing Adventurous Training expedition. Split across two weeks, there were all levels of skiing ranging from beginners through to those developing their instructional capability before attending the Ski Leader courses which will qualify them to

The 2023 MR Sailex once again generated excellent participation figures with 47 reservists from across the Maritime reserve taking part, representing 12 units. This was the fourth running of the event, which has been supported each year by the Ulysses Trust, without whose support the event would simply not happen. Aims Maritime reserves Sailex has

WHAT WE ACHIEVED​​PHASE 1: ​ Novice climbers, many of whom were completely new to the sport gained the required knowledge to safely climb using a top rope on a sport climbing route. Students with previous experience were able to gain valuable log book days, in preparation for the Rock Climbing Supervisor qualification.​ PHASE 2: ​ Once students had gained sufficient experience and were

During September 2023 the Honourable Artillery Company (HAC), an army reservist unit in the City of London, took 22 soldiers and officers out to the Mont Blanc Massif, with the objective to summit Gran Paradiso, a 4,061m peak in the Aosta Valley, Italy. This expedition comprised a core component of their Alpine Mountaineering Foundation (AMF)