Sunshine in Wales... never!

After a late call in the week from Soames asking if I wanted to join him and Stuart on a little foray into Llanberis pass over the weekend I struggled to find a partner. In the end it was left up to some bright spark called up Mick early on the saturday morning and we had a foursome for a weekends climbing. Hell we even had a good weather forcast. 

Stuart is planning a weekend at Clogwyn Du'r Arddu (known as "cloggy") later in the year and with this in mind Soames thought that Stuart needed a weekedn of climbing VS's in Llanberis Pass to prepared him for it. Me and Mick just wanted to get out and get on some rock. I wasn't feeling well (my nose leaked snot all weekend) and Mick hasn't been out climbing on real rock since last summer but like that was going to stop either of us. It was agreed that I lead an hard pitches and we'd sort of stick to around VS/HVS, cue our first route on the Wasted, Lion (VS 4c). 

We could ask for much more in our first route. It took a diagonal line up some pretty cool terrain. I think the pitches to mention are the 2nd and last. My lead 2nd pitch took an intricate slab which them lead to an overhanging chinmey! What more could I want. The chimeny was turned on the which lead me to belay in a groove. A great pitch! The last pitch was this route Mick lead. It's actually the final pitch of Crackstone Rib and is a classical pitch in a great position. Mick lead it really well and we topped out to walk down. 

After talking to a guy on my P3 belay of Lion and commented on the route he'd just lead, Ribstone Crack (VS 4c) and said that it was a great route. This was our second route of the day with a long 38 metre 4c pitch up one of the most obvious cracks on the Wasted. The pitch starts off as a scramble but then suddenly it's full on. I climbing it happily, placing so many runners in the route that I was close to running out. The second pitch swung you out onto the face again and Mick took this while I layback belaying in the sunshine.

Stuart, leading Brant Direct (VS 5a)

Our third route was again on the Wasted called Shadow Wall (VS 4c). This had been Stuart and Soames's first route of the day. Mick took the 4a pitch that followed a groove into the corner and then after a little faff whereby we dropped the neat coiles of rope down the route, which proceeded to get tangled and stuck (I had to down climb) I set off up the short but harder 4c pitch, and what a great pitch it was. Taking some rising "steps" out from under the overhang suddenly I looked down and too my horror I was now hanging out over the cliff. I'm normally ok with exposure, but this caught me completly off guard! This is a must do route, and there's an abseil off from the belay above. 


This was probably my most productive day in the year so far, but there was more to come. Me and Mick headed down valley to Clogwyn Grochan for a final harder single pitch, Kerwendal Wall (HVS 5b). Previously on this cliff I've only done Wind (HVS 5b) so I've been eager to get back there. Kerwendal wall was a good route, there was more then enough gear on it, but it often seemed difficult or awkward to place. Like a few routes on this section of the cliff it sort of runs out near the top onto more broken terrain. Not bad for our last route.


We now swifty descended and Mick nipped back up the pass to fetch his car while we waited at the roadside below Grochan. Infact a nice chap came up and offered to trade a beer for a cigarette. Soames gave him two and told him to keep the beer, but he's wasn't to be diswaded and insisted we have it. What a shame we had share a bottle of cobra in the evening sun after a great days climbing.

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I woke up at 2am, freezing cold because like an idiot I'd fallen asleep while I was looking at the night sky, leaving my tent wide open. I also realise that I should just start bringing a pillow for car camping weekends. I drifted off only to wake up to a red sky (tent flysheet) and a sneeze from another tea, it was brew time. 


Seeing as the pass was filled with low level cloud, we opted for a pete's based breakfast then back to camp to depitch all the tents hoping the cloud would all burn off. It had also by the time we'd got everything done so it was back to the Grochan for a few routes. Me and Mick went for the classic Spectre (HVS 5a) which is a really engaging route. It's got an awkward 4c pitch, then a great 5a pitch avoiding an overhang by climbing round an arete and then I great 5a crack pitch which is of a totally different character to the last one. This one in a jamming-laybacking-thrutching-festival of burliness. I guess it might be a nightmare for some but I just thought it rocked. The route was supposed join another route called Nea for a final 4b pitch, but there was so much traffic from people abseiling off and other people on route that we opted for a quick abseil from the top of spectre. 


I'd just like to rant about abseiling. I kow abseiling should be a last option and that you can generally walk round most route but I tend to abseil alot. All weekend I saw some pretty "interesting" abseil practise. I saw people throw ropes onto other, let thier ropes pull of loose rock and bring that down, throw ropes wildly all over the place and get carried by the wind etc. At best it's just rude at worst it's down right dangerous. It doesn't take much to abseil considerately, without dropping rope over everyone. Rant over.


We made it to the floor and waited for Stu and Soames to get down, whilst waiting for Sickle (HVS 5b) to become free. In the end Mick decided to sit it out and Soames was suffering with a knee injury so Stuart and I teamed up. Stuart took the first pitch and climbed it really well. It was a proper hard start (jamming) followed by a rather delicate traverse out onto the face before you reached the good holds by the belay. I then took the second pitch. It kick starts with hard step out, which I almost retreated off. I couldn't see how to do it, so I fell back on the "just hang around a place more gear" before I actually committed to it. In the end the move wasn't that bad and I set off up the rest of the pitch enjoying every move and trying to place as much gear as I could (it was a traverse afterall and I had Soames watchful eye on me, reminding me to protect my second). The pitch was simply awesome, all the moves were there, and you where in a great position on the rock under the overlap before breaking out up some slabby terrain. There was even a size 4 cam placement!. It was a pretty cool pitch. Stu handled it with no problems (not that I was expecting him to have any) and poked his head round the overlap, smiling. We abseiled off, carefully to avoid climbers beneath us and that was our last route of the weekend.

For a while I've been pretty bummed out with my climbing. I've spent too much time getting caught up in grade b/s and egotistically climbing, instead of enjoying the pleasure of moving over rock, finding yourself in awesome positions, pushing your mental barriers and sharing cool journey's in the vertical with your climbing partner, and yourself.

Sid's Birthday weekend

It was a good friends 30th birthday this weekend just gone. Infact thats a lie, it was his birthday a while back but we had a surprise celebration for him this weekend. Thankfully most of the people turned up, we ahd a good weather and I think everyone had a good time. The climbing was in the Peak District and seeing as we were in Macclesfield for his birthday, we end up at Castle Naze on the saturday and made a trip over to Froggatt on the Sunday. 


I should probably start with Friday which was sort of hectically planned on the last minute (even though I'd made a facebook group 3 weeks before). Sadly a few people decided to drop out at the last minute but on the whole I think it was a success as 18 people crammed into Sid's house for a party. In the end I went to bed at 0300 and I was one of the first, hence our late start and castle naze the next day.


Arriving at CN in the early afternoon we stuck a small problem. Toaf had brought jake his girlfriends dog, without telling anyone. Castle Naze has a ban on dogs according to several signs on the gate, and we'd deliberatly left Sids dog at home for the same reason. Well Toaf had to take his dog for a walk somewhere else while we all went climbing. Arriving at the crag we all set about finding a route and a partner. It sort of looked like I wasn't going to climb much so I set about lending my rack out to whoever needed it. As it happened Sid jumped on Pilgrim's Progress (HS 4b) and Tim jumped on The Scoop (HVS 5a). Both guys seemed to have a whale of a time on each route, especially Tim with his broken toe!

(Adam and Scott relaxing in the sun)

As for my climbing that day I seconded Pilgrim's Progress which was pretty cool, I managed to borrow a pad and a spotter (Killian) and did the a Direct start to The Scoop. The route went at 5b/5c depending on which guide book you read. I think it was probably 5b, but the crux was actually rocking over into the scoop, rather than the crimpy wall up to it (which I manged with ease), I soloed the rest of the route. I also did an E1 6a called Orm and Cheep. I had a pad beneath me as the start is a V3 boulder problem. Apparently you are allowed one side runner, but me and Tim couldn't work out how to place it without going off route. Instead we opted otu of the siderunner and had a pad instead (fair trade?). The route then took a pocketed wall above, off a collection of small buy very good gear. I enjoyed it. I also had a like solo up Icebreaker (E2 5b), which I've done before so knew I could do it. I don't think it's 5b. Then I did Syringe Benefit (E1 5c) on the Quarry face, with Stu. I happen to like quarried rock alot, but quarried grit is a little special. It's sharper edged, looser and has a different feel to it that "natural gritstone". Either way the route was pretty good and I managed to get loads of gear in it. 

(Tim Nixon, after comepleting what I think was The Crack)

There was one rescue that day, and that was of Toaf, who soloed the normal start of the Scoop, only to realise it was a long way down to jump and a commiting distance to finish up, without a rope. He got lowered off. All in all it was a good day with everyone getting something done I think. I forgot to mention my first route I did. It was Deep Chinmeny and at only VD it helped me continue with the esoteric and traditional bent I've been on this year. It's a full on thurtchy squirm up a foot wide chimney... I love it!

We all nipped back to Sid's for a bbq (at which I burnt my thumb) and some wii related fun. We actually managed to get up a little earlier on the sunday so we could tidy the house and head out climbing on the east peak. Bring on Froggatt.


I've not been very psyched to go to Froggatt for a long time and true to form I didn't really get much done at all. We had several good leads that day of Sunset Crack (HS 4b), Sunset slab (HVS 4b), Three Pebble Slab (E0 5a) and I manged to try and lead Science Friction (E6 6a) but fluffed it mentally at the top and got a top-rope rescue from Tim. I still completed the route under my own steam and then almost technically fluffed it too. I did managed a repeat of Sundowner (E2 5b)but this time trailing a rope instead of soloing.

(beware! rock monsters)

We all did have a good little play on Tody's Wall, a little hidden bouldering wall that has several bouldering problems on it ranging from 4c to 6a. It's actually a really nice little place and has encouraged me to find more of the bouldering at Froggatt. Then I guess we just all sort of headed home, knackered. 

All in all it was a good weekend. Climbing wise I didn't feel that I'd achieved much at all, infact I did more hungover on the saturday at Caslte Naze than at Froggatt on the sunday. Well bring on the next weekend I guess.


p.s. I forgot the mention that I did the Cave Crawl at Froggatt again. This is a must do route, and probably the best route a Froggatt for the grade.

A fairly lazy weekend... trying to dodge the rain

...and by trying I mean actually getting rained on. We headed to north wales for the weekend, under the premise that the weather report said showers and it actually would just shower! Instead it rained saturday, pretty much none stop and the showers? well the were just periods of heavier rain!! Didn't stop us from getting out climbing though. 


Instead we headed out into the rain for a short multipitch route on Milestone buttress. This was to be Edd and Stu first mutlipitch route, but I figured that they could handle it. I took the first pitch, a horribly damp slab which quickly moves into a groovey squirm sort of move before another section of slab. I belayed trying to avoid the rain, before just giving it up, accepting I was going to get wet. I brought both Edd and Stu up together and tried to shoot some footage of them climbing at the same time. I guess the short video I'm trying to make with show the mixed results I had. 


Stu then took the second and probably hardest pitch of the route. This he managed fine, even thought it was soaked through and it was his first multiptich route. While he was leading I explained the whole "multipitch thing" to Edd, who was still unsure of the whole deal. Then Edd set off and left we standing around on my ledge, getting cold.


After what seems like forever (but was probably only 5 minutes) I set off up the damp second pitch. I've done it before but it was a pleasure to do it in the wet as it was hard. It's not often I find a VD really hard and scary, and major kudos to Stu for leading it but I was scared. On a lighter note I manged to get a jammed nut out on the way up (this replaced the size 6 I'd just retired the day before for a frayed cable). 


Then came our third and final pitch and what could be more traditional than doing a chimeny in the wet. The chimnet itself was actually reasonably dry, but getting into it on the polish was HARD. I actually fell off it, a very humbling experience I can tell you, but it made me put that little bit more effort into it second time round. I did get up it and so did Edd after much complaining and trying to get out of seconding it (and he loved it). Stu just seemed to flash up it like most things. We then pitched the last 15 metre second, as it was soaked and it wasn't worth the risk. 


We descended very carefully down the right hand gully. It has a stream flowing down it, but we where all soaked or at least pretty damp by this point to care. The down climb was almost as hard as the upclimb and just as much fun, especially when Edd decided to sit in a waterfall. I've not seen someone that wet in a while. Making it back to the bags Edd proved his worth by producing a cherry pie from his bag and sharing it out. We bugged out to Pete's.


Infact we were in for more luck in Llanberis. I found a £10 note on the floor which provided us with a pint of tea each and a plate of chips to warm us up, then the obvious course of action was to find somewhere dry to sleep. The rain by this point had stopped we we chilled out under the Cromlech boulders and cooked up. Edd had alot of fun burning things with his new pocket rocket... namely his sausages. Then off to the pub for a couple of pint and a warm fire to dry our kit!

When someone dies in a book, do you feel sad? 

A character in the book I've been reading has just died. Actually she was "put down" by a close friend (an act of kindness believe me, it's a zombie novel) after she has betrayed all her friends for the right reasons. The fact that she doesn't actually exist doesn't matter to me. She's still gone.

I read alot of books, both fiction and non-fiction. People die all the time in them. Try Marie Coffey's Book Where the Mountain Casts Its Shadow for a little light reading. Several people die in them, doing what they love (climbing) and normally pushing the boundries of what they personally could achieve. I've never met any of them, some died before I was even born. I'll probably never meet any of them, but there are stil real, right? 

The only thing for me that defines their reality is normally whats written down on paper and in print media. They are as real as the words that describe them, and if you've spent 300 pages on the edge of your seat following thier life, they can be as real as the person sitting next to you. 

I'm not trying to belittle the death of so many real people, real loved ones that people could hold or touch or smell, all I'm saying is it sucks when people died in the books I'm reading.

Roach weekends...

So for the past couple of weeks, due to limitations place on me by the weather, partners and prearranged I've ended up at the Roaches bumbling around this gritstone playground, trying to find some inspiration. The first weekend we suffered some bad weather so the morning was spent dodging the rain under various boulders, climbing so called easy gully in the wet (not as easy as it sounds, especially with a pack on) and trying to find something that resembled dry rock. And we found it...

Raven Rock Gully, Left Hand. 

At the nice grad of VS 4b I wasn't expecting anything too hard, just something thatw as sustained 4b all the way up, and it was. We actually got the recommendation to do the rooute from a party on it at the time who told us it was pretty dry, until the exit and that it was an awesome route. No I don't know if me and Stu had got the bug for a very esoteric and in the finish sense of the word "traditional" route but we went for it anyway. 

Alex or Stu embroiled in the chimney

So you start in Raven Rock Gully, but take the left hand side and head for the larger exit at the top. Easy peasy yeah? well actually no. It was cold and damp but weirdly un-green. I climbed up and up until I found myself on the crux at the top, which was wet to boot. At this point the party who'd just done the route offered the coffee around at the base and we all had a good laugh when I requested a cup, whilst squirming up the crux. The crux as it happened was a cool chimeny after placing a bomber and quite painful handjam and then forcing your way ouf of the top. I know I screamed bloody murder to try and get out, covering myself in mud and destrying the flesh on my hands with grit rash as the guy beneath cheered me on (see traditional). I crawled out of the boulder choke only to be greeted by the guy who'd lead the route before me, standing there offering my a mug of hot coffee. He just said "coffee for the champion?" I couldn't say no.

It seemed that my joking cry for a mug of joe had not gone unheard and he snuck up and waited in the rain for me to finish. I thanked him profusley and brought up Stu (and Alex Maggs who joined us for the adventure). What every happens this was definatly one of my favourite routes to date! I just wish I knew his name.

                                                              

Roll forward to the weekend just gone. I think it's safe to say that the saturday was a wash out, literally. It rained pretty much all day in the peak (although I hear it was quite sunny in Birmingham). Sunday was another matter completely. It was sunny and I mean really nice and sunny. Since Tim had work in the afternoon and therefore needed to hit the road at 1300 I spent the morning bouldering on the lower tier boulders. We nipped up and ticked of Three pocket slab the classic V3. It was nice that I didn't have to spend ages "working the problem". 

Then we headed to The Dignity of Labour (V6). I'd already baulked at the idea of a V6 but Tim reassured me that it was only 6b, which is within thew relm of a workable grade for me. So Tim, Stu and I worked this problem for a while trying out various different idea to make the first long move. There was heel hooks, toe hooks, smears, crossed hands and then Stu cracked it by taking a slightly more logical and easier approach (read as: brute force). We then did all the moved to the last mantle which exited onto a clay cover slab and at that height I didn't want to fall off anyway. Instead we called it quits and decided to go and brush off and finish it another day. 

"what the hell do I do with all this rope!"

I think we had what the spanish would term an early cestia after this and lay encamped on our bouldering pads till Tim had to go. Stu and I headed off to do some real climbing (joke!).  We started with me leading Bengal Buttress (HVS 4c). This although is an absolutley cracking route, is also really run out and falling off it would not be advisable. The meat of the route is a nicde run out from your gear in a diagonal line across the face, blindly finding holds as you go and hoping that you won't fall off. For any 5a leader I think this would be a great route to test thier mettle. From the belay I took a call from Matt Snell who'd biked over to join us for some climbing.

Haven't you forgotten something?

Stu then lead The Pinser (VS 5a). I've done this route before and I know how good it is and seeing as Stu wanted to push his grade he figured that this was a pretty good route to do it on, however he's never lead on double ropes before. I told him it would be pretty easy and I'd shout down all the instructions he needed and he set off. The start of the route is a cool 5a boulder problem and I think is the technical meat of the route. Stu actually did it without the ropes on as I'd advised him that he might want to boulder the start. Instead he just did it anyway and then we threw the ropes up to him. He climbed it really well, placing more than enough gear all the way up and using the double ropes well. Snell seconded him as I was too busy taking photographs.

I then tried Bloodstone (E5 6b) and got stumped by the 6a move to gain the slab. It wasn't that I was afraid or couldn't commit to the move, I just couldn't work out how to do it! I then had to abseil down and strip it out while we moved off for Snell's lead.

Snell about to attempt the overhang

Damascus Crack (HS 4a). This has got to be one of the best routes of it's grade at the Roaches. Snell choose to lead it as he was looking for a nice S or VS to do and it was pretty ungreen. Earlier in the week He'd had a mini-epic getting over the overhang of Crack and Corner but I knew if we goaded and pushed him into the proper finish then he'd get over his fear of all things overhanging. He did fly up the initial crack having no problem. Then his head started to play up and the prospect of the overhanging wall above him. After some encouragement he gradually moved up and up, placing lots of gear till the final big move. This was a big lip to overturn. Then suddenly he went for it and in a true tradtional style it was a hands on feet off thrutchy salmonly move over the lip. Proper gritstone climbing! 

Both me and Stu seconded him as it was to be our last route of the dark, thanks to the falling darkness. I guess I can still find some good sport at the Roaches, even if I am a little sick of going there!