Tree-mud-rock

Well I'm on my third cup of tea, theres awesome weather and I've carved out a space in the kitchen of my mates house after the wreackage of a house party. I've also managed to pikey some internet from god knows where.

I've been up for a few hours waiting for everyone else to recover from the effects last night (I feel asleep on a freezer among other things) so we can get things together and go climbing. I can hear some movement at least. I've already digested all the climbing magazines I can find in the house and have been sat outside in a sleeping bag dreaming about Vector at Tremadog.

Tremadog has to be one of the best places to climb, ever. I know thats probably a really big statement to make and there will be plpenty of people who'll disagree with this, but anything that combines a cafe, short walkin and then climb from sunrise to sunset with the view across Porthmadog bay is fine by me.

Anyway regardless of the "facilities" the climbing itself is beyond. After spending my summer being a bit of a lobbing lemming** I've been getting a bit sick of it. Pushing yourself to the point that you spend more time clocking up more airtime than a rock time sucks. So I've stopped pushing myself. I did Merlin with the Direct start (HVS 5a) with Uncle Rob. I don't think I've ever had as much fun on a climb as I did with Rob. To say I was a little worse for wear when I arrived in the morning would be an understatement. A few brews later we decided to taclke it. Rob gave me every pitch because he said I was something I had to do and I'm so glad that he did.

I wobbled my way up the first pitch, dropping my wires (yep still hungover) before I could get my head in gear. the route was a little damp and I though I was off more than once but I pulled through and arrived at the belay. Rob joined me with my laughing and grunting to get into the groove. There was alot of debate about whether the tree was "in" as a hold. I said it was, Rob had other ideas and hauled up on it. The I started up the second pitch. A simple slab to a glorious looking crack. I was salivating at the though you jamming my hands into that the crack, but we stumped by the soaked slab leading up to it. After some necky climbing, and dodgy gear I was able to ram a cam into the crack. I sored up this (I love crack climbing) and then broke out to the right and it just carried on with beautifel climbing about the rib and then up the groove behind. Continuing with our casual approach to this climb, I untied from the rope, passed it rounf the tree in the groove and then tied back in. Rob laughed his head off when he got to this, after a moment of puzzlement. We topped out and waxed lyrical about what a great climb this was. Its almost a shame it was so good as we couldn't find anything to inspire us we when got back to the guide book. So we did what all good climbers do... headed to the pub.

Its now to days later and I'm still recovering from the initial pub session with Rob after Merlin. I'm back at Tremadog, this time poised below The Fang (HVS 5a). If you've never done this route, then go and do it. I've done it a couple of times and it already made it onto the annual list. I've done both pitches, but today I was here to help Stewie settle a score. He'd backed off the second pitch last year and its been eating away at him ever since. I took the first pitch (still feeling hungover) which is a bit of a burly climb, well the way I do it anyway. I'd choose to rely on my arms and jamming rather than footwork to get myself up it. This was obvious as we discussed the many different lines everyone takes on the first pitch. The point is, go and do it. Its worth it.

Eventually I found myself tucked into the dihedral below the ominously poised Fang being up Stewie. He deliberated for ages over the first move. If you slip off the gear isn't great (3 micros and a high runner) but the climbing is perfect and in complete contrast to the first pitch. Here I think a bit of foot work pays dividends. Its like super steep slab climbing round a break, then more slabby-ish climbing, with just enough gear. Not enough for comfort, but enough to keep you ok. Your out of sight of your belayer at this point so its all on you. Stewie did it in great style, and I seconded up arriving to find him grinning from ear to ear. I do love it when someone concores a demon, and bing part of it has made the fang a little more special now.

So back to the Cafe for a brew. Rob had elected not to climb today, and by elected I mean he had elected to keep drinking the night before. So it just left me and Tom. Before the other left Soames asked "You must have done Grim Wall?", "nope, somehow never did it". The outrage that followed confirmend this as my next climb so off me Tom and Rob trotted. Tom took the first pitch at 4b leaving me with the finaltootering looking wall. After a little route finding difficulty and thankful correction from Tom I got on the right line.

What a route. It doesn't look like it'll go from the base of the route, especially at VS. There is gear all the way up, but the climbing I awesome. Its not slabby, cracky or anything in particular. Itr just tremadoggy gymnastical climbing. Your laying away from a decent hold to an undercut, stop place a piece of pro then stuff your fingers in a little crack, feel them set, move up, lay away again, placing your feet wide. I mean if I die, this is the route I'll just be climbing on until eternity. I just can't believe I've never climbed it before.

Fourth cup of tea now. All in all I can't believe that Tremadog doesn't get more traffic. I mean it used to, its right next to a road. Theres a great cafe, campsite and camping barn all at the base. Eric Jones is always around to help out youths there for thier first time, or just advice on routes. The pub is 15 minutes down the road as well. I'll stand my my first statement that Tremadog is one of the best crags, ever. so I've havn't been get over there!

** Taken from the old Llanberis guide in the slate terminology section "Youth who throws themself at hard routes regardless of the line, only to tick a grade... and then repeatly falls off"

A French Guy in the Lake District...

This is an old weekend to write up, but I couldn't leave it out. When I went over to France to do some climbing in Chamonix we stayed for a few days with Claire's sister just outside Geneva. Her husband (Fabrice) used to climb alot back in the day, although now he spends his time doing via ferrata alot as he's got no-one to climb with.

He took me and Claire sport climbing for the day while we were over in France. It was great fun. I said if he came over to Britain in the summer then I'd take him out trad climbing in the Lakes. Bear in mind that when I explained placing your own protection he muttered "kamakazi British trad climbers!". So heres how it went...

Seeing as we were based south of Coniston in a great little farm house (one of the benefits of crashing with Claire's folks while they were here on holiday) we decided on a roadside crag for out fist day. Me, Claire and Fabrice headed for Raven Crag behind the Old Dungen Ghyll.

The weather looked good, well good for the Lake District. We headed straight from Holly Tree Direct (HVS 4c). Seeing as I was leading I wanted to be on a climb I'd done before and thankfully this time it was dry. The first pitch went well and I brought them both up using my reverso as a guide plate. This is something I've only really done a few times but was quite confident doing. We moved quickly up the next pitch especially as I was block leading so there was no constant change of ropes. I quickly dispatched the crux of the route which I'd had loads of trouble on the first time. At the next belay Fabrice secured himself in a tree leaving Claire to belay me to the finish. I honestly couldn't believe how quickly we'd moved by block leading and using a guide plate allowing them to climb together.

Anyway as I was happy we'd climbed so quick I was swifley brought back down to earth as I missed the descent path. Seeing as someone else had obviously made the same mistake and left a big piece of abseil tat behind (seriously like 8mm rope cut off the end of a 60m rope), I tested it, backed it up, promised Fabrice that I wasn't really a crazy british climber and abseiled off. We all arrived at the floor safely and ran round to our next route (dispite accidentally kicking off an sheep skeleton).

Seeing as Fabrice had asked for "Traditional British Climbing" I'd had decided on Bilberry Buttress (VS 4c) as our second climb. The first pitch takes a blank but easy slab then a beautifel crack (beauty is of course in the eye of the beholder). It takes fist jams and makes me smile. I went up it happily jamming away and then brought Fabrice up. He looked as me like a crazy man when he pulled himself onto the ledge. He thought jamming was a odd concept, and had laybacked as much as he could. Claire having had to suffer my crack addiction before came up the easier groove to the left.

by now the weather had gone from good to worse. I'd been watching the weather building and the clouds coming in but now the rain had just started. Thankfully we were sheilded from the worst of the weather by the rest of Raven crag, but I had decided to get a shufty on. We did the second pitch quickly again, which had a right difficuly section just above the belay. Its also full of stuck wires (I counted 3) but I refused to clip them. The rain had really started as we set out on the final pitch. Its a bit of an esoteric adevnture as there is lots vegetation on route and a little bit of loose rock. But its a mountain route, what do you expect! I belayed in the rain and praying they climb quicker as they came up. This time I hit the descent right on and we got back to the bags, as the weather stopped.

Now Claire wanted to explore some more, and after consulting the guide book she lead off towards Raven Crag East, a single pitch crag with a host of S's, VS's and HVS's. The rock was still a little damp, but our rats clearly still needed feeding so I went up Rowan Tree Groove (HVS 4c). It was a pretty good route by all accounts, and the gear for the crux was a few bomber micro wires (wouldn't want to run it out) but it was only a short move till the next good piece.

Sadly by now the rain had moved back in and we were getting cold. Also a crag with a pub at the base is never a good idea, so we packed up and went for a pint. Fabrice said he had enjoyed Trad climbing and I asked him if he wanted to try something harder and more exposed. He said he would. So on the next day we went to... Dow crag.

I've only completed a route on Dow once, after 3 attempts. The first ended in an abseil off, when we'd pushed on and were hopelessly lost on B buttress in 50mph winds, fog and rain (we were young and inexperienced). The second we also aseiled off in again very high wind, but this time it was probably for the sake of the rest of the party. My third attempt we did Isengard (HVS 5b) and then joined up with Eliminate A (VS 4c) in bright sunshine hauling our rucksack on the hard pitches. All in all this day had been great.

So we rocked up at the Walna Scar Road grabbed the kit and started on the walk in. On the walk in I noted the weather and how it seemed to be building. I figured that we'd be ok anyway and we headed for A buttress. The rock itself was damp and greasy as I found out when I tried to do Eliminate A. VS 4c in slippery greasy wet isn't good and I swiftly backed off on my trusty skyhook. When I'd arrived back at Fabrice and flicked off said trusty skyhook, I took a moment to explain its use. I don't think I made to case for "crazy english climbers" any better to be honest (retreating of little bent bits of metal). As wind had picked up, Arete, chimeny and Crack (HS 4a) had had a more time to dry off so we had a rest, re-racked and I headed off there.

I ended up running the first 2 pitches together as the second only covers easy ground (although somewhat loose). The first pitch runs up a fantastic arete (as suggested by the name!), but the compact rock doesn't allow for much gear. It did save alot of time running both pitches together in the end. The next pitch took the chimney. I'd wanted to avoid this as much as possible, thinking it would be hell in damp conditions. When I got to the crux it just turned out to be climbing over a giant chockstone involving alot of thrutching and salmoning that left us both smeared in green.

The next pitch took "Gordan and Craig's Traverse". I don't know how this traverse has got this name, but I'd love to know the full story behind it. This traverse pitch is a great one and I explained about placing loads of gear to protect my second and that the climbing wasn't actually that hard. I belayed where I'd belayed before, remembering the first time I'd met a friend out on the hill here at this very spot. Finally I nipped up the exit crack/groove, which proved to be harder than I'd anticipated. I'd used up every runner on my rack by the time I topped out. When I'd brought up Fabrice the cloud descended so we moved together until I was sure we where topped out on the summit.

To end the day we took a walk south down the ridge and back to the Walna Scar road, seeing as we'd carried up our bags it made the obvious option. I asked Fabrice what he thought about climbing in British mountains. He said sometimes the climbing isn't hard, but what your doing is. Your in a situation and its an adventure because you have to look after yourself (ok well I wrote it in better english but). He said he'd enjoyed "traditional" climbing in Britian, although I still think he thinks I'm mad.

On our final day we went to Hodge Close Quarry and went sport climbing on some slate. I nearly ended up in the drink climbing out above the pool. Fabrice lead a super strenuous 5+ which knackered us all out. It was a good day.

The thing about trad climbing...

"You have to be strong in your body, but also strong in your mind"

The quote is by Didier Berthod, sponsered by BD. A swiss guy who comes from the land of bolts (Europe) but is very ethical about trad climbing.

Anyway I went to Llangollen the other day. I went climbing with James. Many a drive through or past Llangollen I looked up at the limestone escarpement running up along the valley. Eventually I've finally made it to the base of them. We went to Trevor rocks. Now being pretty aposed to bolts myself we went to Quarry wall as there was a bunch of trad lines. Recently I've been pitching off routes left right and centre and I'm getting quite sick of it. Maybe I'm just not as good as I think I am, or I'm just getting tired and not listening to my body when I should stop.

Anyway like I said, pitching off things which I sort of getting me down. I told myself not to climb anything at my limit and therefore shouldn't fall off. Me and James started on a HVS 4c (I must apologise that I don't rememeber the names of any of the routes as James still has the guide book), This went fine, there was less gear than I would have liked and more loose rock than I would have liked. It went well, so on James lead he took a 40m VS 4b traverse. He split it into 2 pitches and climbed it well, although he did wander all over the face ("james your a little too high!").

The one face of quarry wall (if you havn't been there) is almost slabby. The other is vertical and unforgiving on the forearms, as I was about to find out. For god only knows what reason I jumped on E2 5b, described as pumpy in the guidebook. I didn't feel like climbing it, and if the gear was anything like the rest of the cliff, there wouldn't be enough to feel happy.

So half an hour later I find myself completly gripped, my forearms burning and screaming. I was so pumped I couldn't even squeeze a cam trigger, god knows how I even opened the carabiner to get it off my harness. Panic welled up inside me. I wasn't high above gear, but the rock wasb't great and I didn't trust my last piece too much. I started bricking it, talking quickly and trying to stuff in a good piece of gear. I crammed the cam in, almost screaming as it hurt so much. Not that I would have done anygood because I fell off. My arms just failed and popped off.

I only fell about 4m any my gear held. I lowered off and felt sick. "The best climber is the one having the most fun" (Alex Lowe). For a while now, I've been climbing hard and falling off. I'm not having fun.

James lead another VS 4b, then I did a HVS 4c and then we went sport climbing (and ticked off 2 6a's) for the last hour further down the climb. All in all it was a good day out with James, but not with myself. I'm away in the lakes with Claire this week, then going to Wales with the lads. I'm not going to fall off, I'm not going to push it.

(obviously thats a lie and I will, but its nice to think I'll try not to)

Falling off mincer, an odd day out...

We (me and Dan) went climbing on sunday (after coming back from the alps). We finally did "Via Dolerosa VS 4c" which we've been meaning to do it for ages. It says "finest VS on grit" in the BMC Roaches guide. Now I'm not going to say if it was the finest VS but it certainly was a damn good VS. I took the first 2 pitch togther and Dan took the final pitch (this way we both got a decent bit of climbing in). We both really enjoyed it.

Then we go on The Mincer (HVS 5b). I've lead the final section before (ie the crux then the crack after it) but really wanted a to do the start. Dan jumped on the lead and after a few attempts decided he didn't want to do it. I then took it up. I made the first move and moved swiftly across the slab to get in some other gear. The I threaded the thread with my thinest sling, using my Abolokov thread (I've used this little piece of wire more in summer climbing than winter). I then cammed up the roof and headed out for the crux.

This soon ended with me coming off the crux and ending up dangling a few feet above the floor upside with my nuts trapped in my harness somewhere. After spinning me around Dan lowered me off. I was pretty shaken and greatly thankful to Dan, who's though thought in belaying probably stopped me having any injuries. After taking a rest and drinking another can of pepsi I headed back up. I fell off again (small fall this time) for finally nailing the crux and pulling through. I'll go back and lead it without falling off one day, but I was happy with what I got. Dan seconded it well, apart from getting a little unstuck on a offwidth (his hands are smaller than mine).

Whilst chilling out at the base and shooting some photos of a guy doing The Swan, we heard a rock fall off Valkyrie. This was quickly followed by loads of smashed blocks raining down off valkyrie and the cry of "I'm ok, but my arm is broken". We did the only thing we could do at the time, which wa sgrab the gear and ran to the top. Dan not wearing his harness stayed on the top, and rigged a belay, and I went down to him with enough gear to bring him down on a Y hang. The guys name was Ian. I found him sitting on a ledge, quite obviously in pain. I checked him over as his helmet had been ripped off bby the block. Since there was no blood and no other injuries I set about trying to deal with his arm. He'd broken it above the elbow, and seeing as I had no way to immobilise it, Dan sent down some warm jackets and I stayed with him until a guy from Bolton MRT and Buxton MRT arrived. Eventually he was given morphine and the arm stablised with a sam splint, then he was lowered off with an MRT guy. I stripped out his route.

When it was all over everyone involved, sat around sorting out gear of which everyone had everyones. Only then did I realise he still had my bodywarmer when he went in the ambulance. I've been in touch with his friends, apparently he's had surgury (metal plates) on his arm and is recovering well in hospital. He thanked me for all I did, which wasn't really much at the end of the day.

After a mentally tiring week in the alps then this, I was pretty much wrecked. Its the first accident I've been around and had to deal with, thankfully not on my own, but I don't doubt it won't be the last. All in all I personally was really shaken up by the whole thing, but I was pleased when Dan said he thought we did everything we could for the guy, and our performance ourselves fills him with confidence with our abilities.

I just did what I think any climber would have done in my position.

A whole new playground...

Writing up a week away always seems so hard. I always fell like I want to include everything, but always seem to have to many words. Anyway I'm going to try and do my best of putting down all the stuff that really mattered on this trip, because we seemed to do so much, but in such a sort time.

I guess the whole trip started in Wales on the friday. I'd gone out to meet everyone for Becca's Birthday and Dan came over after his mountain bike course. Due to transport problems people couldn't arrive with late in the day, so I went solo aiding on Craig Pant Ifans upper tier. This was alot or work, but I tried out a new system with my reverso. When everyone did arrive, I got a bit of climbing in nipping up "The Micah Eliminate (HS 4b)" with Tim Nixon and the "The Fang (HVS 5a)" with James Holmes. Both really good climbs, then topped off witha night of drinking and BBQ.

Saturday I drove up and met up with Dan at about 4ish so start our journey to Ecrins. I'd been worried about what to take with me, so I pretty much packed everything. The car looked a little over loaded to say the least. We drove to St Albans (Dans hometown) and manged to leave some kit behind, before leaving for the ferry at about 11. The drive to Dover was uneventfully (appart from the Dartford Tunnel, which turned out to be a bridge!). Traveling with Dan involves a lot of sitting around while he sleeps. Boarding the ferry went fine and we slept on the crossing, planning to carry on straight with the driving as soon as we where off.

I took the first leg on the french roads, which went fine and we had no problems. We had a couple of hours kip at the roadside in an "Aire" (french service station). Literally just dossed down on in the carpark next to the car. We then drove through to Dijon, Reimes, Lyon then off to Grenoble and finally on our final stretch to La Berade. The final journey into the mountain settlement of La Berade was very scary. Bascially they crammed a route onto a like 75 degree mountainside. With a cra full of gear, it was pretty tough driving, made worse by our tired state. We got there though.

We soon found the campsite and set up. Then explored La Berade, finding the Masion des Guides, PGHM and the local shop. We tried to plan some climbing, something we soo realsied that we should have done back in England. We settled on a plan to take a day to get our heads around everything on the monday, and sort some stuff out. I think at this point we were completly overwhelmed with the size of everything, compounded by being so tired after the long drive.

A new day rolled in and we breakfasted and set about sorting out some climbing. Eventually we planned on a doing a peak called Pic Coolidge (3775m). For this we checked the weather and called the Temple des Ecrins hut to stay for the night. We packed for three days, taking enough gear to bivi out should be need it. We totally didn't know what to expect so we ended up playing it a little conservativley and taking more rather than less. That said, we totally didn't take enough food with us. We started off on the the 2.5 hour walk in up the valley to the hut. Uphill all the way, this was pretty much a killer as our packs were so heavy, but we pushed on as we needed to make sure we arrived for the evening meal.We thought that tea would be a just bowl of food. Oh how wrong we were. We were stuffed after out 3 course meal of soup, stew and then apple crumble. Eventually we got talking to the other on our table in a mixed on bad french and better english. Most of the peoplie on our talbe were heaidn up Pic Coolidge on the next day. We repacked our bags, leaving behind all our bivi gear and surplus stuff, then headed to bed.

Tuesday morning, 0400. I'd slept fit fully. I'm used to being really confident about when I go out climbing, but here I just felt out of my depth. I was nervous. Breakfast was very continental (bread, jams, and hot chocolate) but damn good, then we headed off. It was pitch when we left, but soon brightened up. We'd planned for 3 hours on the walk in, but it was only mostly up on scree, with a small no cravassed glacier to cross, this would put us at the Col de la Temple, where our Route (the South Ridge) started.

So we raced in, bouyed up with manic enthusiasum. This rapidly degenerated to a fast plod as the terrain stayed steep and scrambley. I'll happily admit that I was getting knackered, so we had a welcome break when we stopped to to gear up before the glacier. I noticed that Dan was more nervous than me on ice/snow. It was well frozen neve, so I just stomped off up this slope, hammering ahead trying to get off it as quick as possible. Dan followed and we each picked our own way up the massive scree slope above. I wish I'd taken Dans line as my was totally bollocks, quite literally 1 step forward, 2 steps back. We finally made it to the col, in 2.5 hours so the going was good.

At the Col we roped up and started moving together. We raced on , moving together well and finding our route without much difficulty. The rock was good granite and thankfully wasn't actually that loose. The route was pretty easy to follow being as it was so obvious, we covered a rock ridge, then back onto a scree slope. At this point I think we were higher than we'd both ever been. We were getting a little dehydrated, but wern't really having any affects of altitude. The scree gave way to a final snow slope which we headed off up. This slope proved a right killer. We just didn't seem to find an easy way to walk up it. We followed it into a gully, where I almost came off. I managed to stay on, and Dan braced himself. I was pretty lucky I didn't go, I would have dragged Dan off with me as we were still moving together with no belays at this point. I think we both subconciously slowed down a little, and took our time a little bit more. I know I did. Thankfully we pulled out of the gully, back onto a ridge up the summit. Moving together, on a pretty steep ridge I placed a load of gear. With eyes on the prize I didn't want to screw it all up with a silly slip off. We summited about in about 2 hours, 30 minutes over guidebook time. Somehow this small fact didn't really matter.So we'd done our first peak, but an old adage was going to make it self very apparent.

"your only half way there when you get to the top"

Its not that we made any serious mistakes on the descent. The final snow slope on the way up (the first encountered on the descent) had been in the sun for quite some time now and was getting quite slushy. Weary of the many people descending above us, we moved as far away from them as possible lest they drop any rocks on us. That said, we raced down the slope with not other problems. We moved together well, and quickly but lost about an hour as we let our route finding slip. I was leading at this point and I just didn't look around enough if I'm honest. We managed to get down pretty well, but by the time we reached the col. We where both suffering from tiredness induced by the drive, the walk in to the hut, and doing our first route. Mentally I think we where just overwhelmed by the size and scale of everything. I think this photo sums us up well.From the col, we descend the really dnagerous scree slope, quite paranoid that we would bring it down on the people below us, thankfully for us we didn't we crossed our finally snow slope and de-kitted in the boulders ready for the walk down. As much as we struggled to keep going on the walk down, it only tok us 1hr 10m to reach the hut, where we rested. Eventually we realised that our propsed plan of biviing out was a little too much for this first trip, so we repacked and headed back to La Berade and enjoyed a beer and a pizza in celebration of our first route. Whilst we sat at the cafe, loads of people that we'd met at the hut and on the route seemed to be walking by and all stopped to say hello, ask if we'd enjoyed ourselves and what our plans where. This was really cool, and made us feel quite at home. We dossed down at the campsite under the stars for that night with a plan to relocated to La Grave in the morning.

La Grave was a much bigger place than La Berade (with a much nicer road up to it). It had few more shops, but the main attraction was the Telepheric, which would get us up to +2000m and down for about £12. We agreed this was a small price to pay to get us out of a crap walk in. We got a plan in mind to do a route up the Enfortres Rocks, then up the glacier to the Breche de la Meije. Then from there we would attempt to climb up the Grand Doigt. This route went at AD, but we figure with a bivi at the base of our first route, we'd avoid the walk in and be there with enough time to get up and down. We resupplied at La Grave and took the Last telecabine up to the half way station and then set off across the moraines to find a suitable bivi spot and cache for the gear.

We'd packed a few extra jackets and warm clothes thinking it would be really cold sleeping out, but oddly it wasn't. We screwed up our route finding again on this walk in, costing us some time walking up scree slopes instead of the path. We found a nice flat spot between the moraines, about half a km from the base of our route. After flattening off the area, we settle down for some tea. The whole noodly-soup in a freezer bag idea worked again for our evening meal which also included bread, cheese and saucisson. We set the alarm clocks for 0300 and snuggled down and watched the stars some out.

I've never really bivied out in the mountains until this night (there was a failed attempt on Idwal), but it was amazing. We had the whole sky to ourselves and it truely a great night out. Its got me fired up for biving out in Britan much more especially since its so much lighter than a tent.

Well we woke up, at 0500 instead of 3. It was appear that I set my alarm and 3pm and Dan slept through his. No worries as we were already in prime position to start the route. We breakfasted (very continental) on hot chocolate, cheese, bread and snickers! We sorted the kit for cache and then headed out. We crossed the first snow slope and then had a pitch of climbing to start us off. After the first pitch we got moving together up the broken ground and ridge system. I think we both knew we wern't going to get onto the AD so headed up the most interesring way up the ridge. We moved together really quickly, over a few areas of loose rock (Dan later confessed that he'd very nearly been off a couple of times). All morning as we where moving we could here rock fall on the walls around us. In the end we missed the route and ended up on a knife-edge ridge which abruptly ended in a absiel. On our right was a sizable drop onto some scree, the left and drop into a madly cravasses glacier. Confronted with this dogdly looking abseiled Dan called it a day. He won't mind me saying that he got gripped. After some sugar and some water, we started our descent, bearing in mind lessons learnt on the climb before about route finding. We did pretty well, and took a lazy descent, mind full on knocking off any rocks.

I thought I would be really annoyed if we had to back off something. I wasn't at all. In fact I'm glad we made a good decision and Dan said something, instead of pushing on. I know I can be pretty unbearable if I suffer a dissapointment on a climb. Well not this time as I was more than happy with what we'd achieved. We legged it back to the bags and then to the telecabine to get down.

We decided that because of the need for another 2 days to do another route, and the fact that we where pretty wrecked (physically and mentally) we'd head home stopping off in Font on the way. Needless to say Font was crap and it meant we also had to navigate around Paris (also a crap idea). Eventually we got home.

I've learnt alot on this trip. Like a walking axe is clearly better than a technical tool for walking in the alps, Using huts and any means of getting up a mountain (telecabin, train) should be taken to reduce tiredness, planning is very important, as well as realising that you need to start small and build up (I didn't start climbing at E1). I can't wait to get back to the alps (possibly even this year) as like the post title says, its just a whole new place to play.