A veritable spree of new routing…

(A Rams & a Man, head to head?)

Well that statement isn’t entirely true as I wouldn’t be surprised if some of the routes have been done before, but we’ve actually taken the time to record and name the lines. We also found no evidence of previous gear placement or polished rock. Seeing as the majority of the spree was done on the high tide area, where the rock quality is grainy and brittle at best, you’d have thought there would have been something. 

I’m getting ahead of myself here and should probably start at the beginning, or at least not so close to the end. Soames and I have been away climbing in North Wales and new routing at a cliff on holy Island… and we’ve had a blast! We managed 25 lines in 2 days. We’ve stayed true to the Gogarth (and Rhoscolyn) ethic and tried everything ground up, if not onsight. All in all I can safety say we’ve had a whale of a time (no pun intended considering it’s a sea cliff). 

Our day started bright and early with the filling and refilling of many flasks and cups of tea at Soames house in the wee small house of the morning. As our journey continued we sampled our first bacon or sausage sandwich for the Rhug Estate which has now established a permanent set of buildings rather than a collection of converted caravans. There really is nowhere else to stop for breakfast on a trip to wale. Soon enough we found ourselves, having taken the wrong turn again off the A5, driving along the bumpy track which leads to Porth y Garan. We could have parked at Rhoscolyn Main area, but I think we both preferred the cliff top work. 

 

We parked up to watch a big sea smashing itself against the cliff. Soames had the glint in his eye of a young boy on Christmas. I probably had the worried look of someone who doubts his ability to swim with a rack on, in such conditions. Because the weather was as I’ve said, instead of sitting around in the car we headed out onto the cliffs to start doing some work. If I’m honest I don’t think Soames would have sat around all that long anyway, what with the sea like it was.

Start doing some work? It really has been a while since I’ve ventured out armed with a pen, pencil and bunch of papers in a trusty plastic wallet. As the sea raged along the base of the cliffs we literally set to work working out where the already recorded lines were on the cliff. I took this time to try and map the top of the cliff, not only for posterity (for the guidebook) but also to find the new routing opportunities. It really wasn’t long before scribbling on paper started to become tedious and I started itching to get on the rock.

And so we did. Back at the car I knew I needed to rehydrate, what with my early start and overly efficient insulated cup (it keeps the tea almost too hot to drink, see). Soames had found a pack of stubbies I’d thrown on the back seat and cracked us both a beer. It seems a bit early to be celebrating an hard days new routing but what the hell! It made for a good start to the day. 

As for the climbing, well, we just seemed to climb on and on. The sea cliff itself topped out to a low angled slab, which dropped back down behind it but leaving a 10metre high cliff behind it. We’d already nicked named this High Tide Walls, due to their ease of access regardless of the tidal conditions. I’m currently in the process of typing up all the route information for this (and the other areas) but we managed something like 14 routes on these rocks. The rock quality itself changes throughout the length of the cliff as the geology subtly differs. Some areas are a little crumbly and snappy, but they will clear up in time where as other are pocketed and compact. Some resemble the rock of Yellow Walls at Gogarth itself, while the white slab area is reminiscent or the Wen slab, with its compact white quartzite and multitude of small edges. The descents make it easy enough to tick off a host of routes in any given period and we stayed tied into the same ends of the rope for much of the day. 

As the day wore on the tide rose to its highest point and then started its gentle drop down the cliff. Over in Porth Saint Bay to the south the submarine started its slow rise out of the water. This curious feature (as short stack which has a long dyke of rock heading out to sea at its base, all coloured red) is mention in the old area guide and I didn’t believe it when I read it. Now throughout the day I kept an eye on it as once it has made harbour in the bay it means that the platform at the base of the sea cliffs are free from water.

Because of these tidal constraints and darkness we only managed a single route on the cliffs that plunge out of the water. It was my lead and I head to a clear line I’d spotted on our recce a few weeks before, a broken crack and flak line which took a feature, dubbed the central tower, right up its main face. 

Ever since nearly getting washed out of the triangular niche on Castel Helen when there was a high sea running I’ve been pretty afraid of sea cliff climbing. At the same time it isn’t cragging in the peak district or staring as the space beneath your feet on a high mountain crag and this little bit of fear is something that I cherish in sea cliff climbing. Plus it adds so much more to the day; the anticipation of low tide, the desperate need to actually top out on your route (as you can’t just abseil off) and the clean worry that you’ll not be able to complete your route, regardless of grade or style. I’ve had to prussic out of a sea cliff once before and I did it shaking from a recent ordeal on a route, while watching all my mates climbing up in the evening sun. It defiantly left an impression.

The route we climb I named Tide and time wait for no man, after a message Soames had sent me  a few days early when commenting on the early start and high sea. We’d gotten up early and been climbing a waiting all day for access to the base. It just so happened that the sea was running a nice high 6 metre tide and the high point of which occurred rather annoyingly in the middle of the day. We grade the route VS 4c originally, but after some considerable discussion and comparision to the many other routes we climb it’s been left at HVS 5a. The rock which resembles Sennen cove and is interspersed by breaks and dark crack lines, doesn’t have the nice deep crack of the southern granite. This quartzite has been rounded and sculpted by the sea leaving behind a great variety of holds and gear placement. The inventive climber here will be rewarded!

We must have topped out in the last rays of the suns light and while I was still youthfully fired up to go back down and carry on climbing, by headtorch should it come to it, Soames was the voice of reason. We were both knackered and the prospect of new routing in the dark on a cliff we hardly knew would have been folly. A retreat was ordered and it wasn’t until I’d filled my sack and started the plod back up the cliff top path that I realised how tired I really was. I good decision made by Soames.

 

(Just a horse)

And another good decision was the curry he had made for our evening meal. I’ve obvious not raved about his cooking on here before, lest people get wind and steal my climbing partner for his culinary expertise. We dined and drank stubbies in Erics barn before the walking to the pub later in the evening. I could hardly stay awake in the pub as we toiled away writing up the recorded routes and thinking up inventive names for them. By the end of the evening I must have nearly fallen asleep at the table. My sleeping bag was a welcome companion.

Morning wasn’t cold, which was a pleasant change. Soames didn’t actually emerge from his sack before me for once and this gave me a chance to return the favour of his cooking the night before by boiling the kettle over and over the multitude of cups and flasks and reheating some soup for the day. I think we technically skipped breakfast, though our single banana and the lumps of bread and cheese left over from the night before was distinctly continental. Before long we found ourselves following the cliff top path back to our little piece of rock history.

(Finally! A picture of us doing some climbing!)

With a high tide in again we carried on ticking off the many lines on the High Tide Walls waiting in anticipation for the sea cliff lines we wanted to put up. As the day went on we toiled away trying the harder lines of the cliff. They provided some good entertainment but some were worryingly close to the edge of my mental ability. Eventually the Submarine had made harbour in Porth Saint Bay and the real fun could begin near the ocean below.

For someone who’ll freely admit that sea cliff climbing scares the … well, it scares me I was very eager to get back to the base. This time both Soames and I got to put up a line. Mine carrying on what seems to be becoming an obsession with what we dubbed the central tower. It took a shallow crack line which joined a series of right facing flakes, this wound its way up the cliff to a very difficult finish over the final tapered summit. It has been a long time since I’ve genuinely thought that I was going to fall off climbing, but this climb did it for me. I felt like I’d climbed myself into a hole and one that I wouldn’t be able to climb out of. With frozen fingers I pushed on reaching for blind holds that shouldn’t have been there but were. I topped out with that small smile of a close call.

Soames line made recorded ascent of what has been dubbed Gambler’s Wall, named after his route “Queen of hearts”. This took a blunt arête and for a while as Soames was on the lead I thought he was going to take a clear traversing line which made its way across the face. Instead he stayed true to the line and tackled the arête head on, providing a hard and awkward crux. By the time we topped out the darkness was similar to that of the day before when we’d finished so a retreat was ordered, as today we still had a three hour drive home.