New routing in the Peak

(never work with children or animals, huh?)

With a day’s good weather and a host of jobs and commitments that would take up the rest of my weekend (one of which is actually writing this and the guidebook so it’s partly my own fault) I could only manage to get out Saturday. This was spent in the Peak District, with Ronnie, Sheep and Toaf, at Castle Naze. I not entirely sure why we ended up at Castle Naze. Maybe it was the fact I’d spent the night before eyeing up a possible line on a blank bit of rock or maybe it was because Ronnie kept going on about how he’d never trad climbed there.

The first route we actually did was an attempt on the blank section of rock I’d seen. For anyone with a copy of the Roaches guide present it ran between 2 classic VS’s, taking the slab between The Crack (once the hardest route in the Peak) and Nozag. I noticed that nothing took this clear slab line a while back, but I’ve been trying to stay away from Castle Naze as I feel like I’ve climbed everything I’ve wanted to climb there. I guess this day was different.

The line itself Toaf named “Reincarnation” (more on why later) and we graded it HVS 5a. Being perfectly honest the line is an eliminate and is escapable onto one of the VS routes either side. If it wasn’t for these possible escapes then I think it would probably get E1 as the gear is a little fiddly and run-out. The route runs straight up the blank face below the slab. This was pretty hard and I had to use the thin flake that runs along the right hand edge make some upward progress. From here gear can be arranged and then you can pull u and gain the slab, staying close to the left hand edge (as this is where most of the good holds are anyway). A few delicate moves on poor edges and smears will get up you up the face to the big ledge beneath the final short wall. I actually really enjoyed leading it. It is a line I’ve wondered about for a long while and it was nice to add a slabbier climb to the Cracks area of Caslte Naze.

The second of the routes be did was called Belladonna and grade E1 5c. This was again in the cracks area and again something that I’ve been looking at for a while. Belladonna makes follows the easiest line of weakest between a vicious E3 5c and imposing E3 6a. Because of this the line wanders around a little and really tests your gear placement and fore-thought when it comes to placing your runners. I had a great time of the route and didn’t really feel it pushed me that technically. It has an awesome finish, up a slightly overhanging arête which require a lovely rock-over/mantle-shelf move before pulling over the top.

And our third and final route provided us with probably the most excitement and is the reason for the name “Reincarnation” for the FA. The route was named because we put up a possible new route in the same day that I broke an old one, as Toaf so kindly put it. I’ve not done Birthday Climb (HVS 5b) but I’ve always looked up the wall that it takes, with its single pocket in the middle of the face, wondering how it only gets 5b. Well I decided to find out. I was going great until I couldn’t work out how to gain the actual wall. The guidebook was pretty vague and I wasn’t really pushing myself to work out how to get it. In the end I found the hidden flake round the corner that was the key to the route.

So I’m up not high up on the face. I’ve got a piece of gear in between the hidden flake and the wall and I’m grasping the pocket with my right hand. I smear my right foot on the wall beneath the pocket, ready to pop up to the final hold. Everything feels good and the move isn’t even that long. I got for it and it seems the second my right hand leave the pocket, my right foot loses all friction on the face. I fall off the arête and straight down, hearing a horrible grinding noise from the cam above me and as I settle I feel a load of loose rock fall on my head.

My first thought was “phew, that could’ve gone worse!” but then I look up at the cam, which had opened up like an umbrella and I see that I’m hanging from 2 lobes. I look at how far my next piece of gear is beneath me and yell for Toaf to lower me off as quick as he can… and as smoothly. On the deck I breathe a sigh of relief and laugh about it. I think I scared the two guys who were watching from a another route. Without pulling the ropes (very unethical I know) I just back on and climb up. I make the moves across the face again and get my hand in the pocket. I fight my left fist into a jam below where the cam in placed. It all feels wrong and my hand feels loose. I reset the cam with great difficulty and grab the flake. It moves, so being as gentle as I could I make some progress upwards, with the new found knowledge that if I do fall now my cam isn’t going to do squat and I’ll have a flake coming down the face soon after me. I slap the top hold and breathe another, even bigger, sigh of relief.

To cut a long story short the flake was kicked off the route after a lot of discussion between ourselves about the best course of action. As it happened the person gearing up underneath The Crack was Martin Kocsis, a BMC representative and after I realised who he was (something that I got the feeling annoyed him) he suggested that removing the flake was the right thing. The route was simply unsafe with it there.

It would be a great time of open up a discussion on “acceptable levels of risk within rock-climbing” here but I’m not going to, because as the end of the day the decision was simple. Nobody goes out rock climbing for the day with the intention of dying and this flake posed a real risk of that reality. Climbing is dangerous, but a massive part of it is levels of acceptable risk. I’d expect a horrendous large loose flake at Gogarth or even in the mountains, but in the Peak.

And thus Martin himself trundled it off down the face and we watched like happy school kids as it exploded into a multitude of fragments. Looking up that the face and with the flake gone there is another possible line or even a direct start to Birthday Climb now possible. Birthday Climb itself will probably get a higher grade because of the lack of hand jamming options, but I guess that’s up to general consensus to decide. As for me I’m just glad that I got to have a good day out climbing with my friends, and walk away from it uninjured. 

 

[Martin Kocsis is a BMC Officer, who claim to fame (or infamy depending on your stance) was an article in BMC magazine summit. The article (Pragmatism over Idealism) is about our approaches to climbing and attitudes towards fixed gear. It was NOT written from the point of view of a BMC officer, rather a normal climber. If you want to read the article it is here,  and it’s something that I recommend. I for one agree with his views on fixed gear]