Sweden

was a washout. Apparently, west sweden is the new west highlands.

We went to Utby, did one route, it looked like it could be alright when dry. We decided against Hono. We went to Marstund, the rock momentarily dried out, the DWS was ok if you like friction slabs and ledges, it was fun, the routes were short, no swims were taken. Soon the rain came back.

Gothenburg in the dry looks like a great climbing city, the locals are keen and the routes are soft, and plenty of potential, not much steep stuff but everything else is there.



And the baked goods are great.

Old School Training and Summer Plans

Hidden away in the corridors of uni, there is an old wall. It's always deserted, holds polished, sharp and snappy with an array of bizarre jamming cracks. In places, it's polystyrene innards spew out. It's six years older than I am. The landing is unforgiving. If you are lucky you might land on a passing medic to cushion your fall.

It's awesome.

Uni finished, summer plans include a couple of trips abroad, morocco and sweden. Both look brilliant. The cham alps calls but I'm not that keen, good lines are still there to be climbed, keen parteners everywhere, offer of free accom, but I've fallen out of love with it, well not all of it but I'm not psyched for 20 pitches of easy rock and ice in a day, dodging missiles, down to the valley, repeat until death/end of trip. There was a line on the freney I wanted to do and the ginat in lush neve conditions looks balling as well, another look at the dru, the gulley on mont dolent. Spring and autumn look like the time to go, winter is for scotland of course, summer in the alps seems to consist of everything being out of condition and chatting bs in the valley, excessive pasta consumption, rest day frolicks on bolts, being outclimbed by goats, man it's so good.

But this summer is about scotland for me.

Monar

Ben Alder

Carnmore

Orkney

Mullach Coire Mhic Fhearchair

Hell's Lum

Corrour

Barns of Bynack

Need to be fitter, stronger, cleverer. Feeling inspired.

A quick trip to hell

Fantastic weather meant I was thinking of a route in the cairngorms that I've been wanting to get on for a very long time.

We arrived in coire an t'schneada about 7:30 after a very early start. Spent some time looking for crag swag, was pretty successful, another couple of trips and a decent rack would be aquired. If you've lost gear on it and want it back, holla at me.

Then we ran up fiaciall ridge, which I'd never been on since our previous epic descent of it last winter, gazing at some hard winter lines which looked very doable when they're not snowed up.

Onto the plateau, checking into a few nice snowholes, over and down to hell's lum, a few people about, loads of people on the shelterstone, all climbing one route in a caterpillar train, possibly the needle, looked class.



Must be very intense in winter indeed.


Wasn't entirely sure where the line I wanted went, eventually figured out where it might be.

6 feet under.



Chopped our way up the neve, a schrund big enough to eat you, had a look, decided falling into the schrund would be bad times, left it for another day.


We then headed down to loch a'an for some bouldering.




Mclellan on boulder.

It was actually really good, we did a pile of stuff, I'm beginning to understand why boulderers go bouldering, as opposed to climbers who go bouldering to get strong for routes.

Particularly fun was a steep roof on excellent holds. Want to do a really excellent arete I saw but the landing was pretty poor, and it was hard enough that I wasn't sure I wouldn't come off. Loch A'an is not the place to hurt yourself. Will go back again with a pad.


Psyched for shovelling.

Grit and rain and chips and drytooling

Went out to the roaches, it hailstoned, did some bouldering.

Went out to stanage, it rained. Spent 3 days climbing Robin Hood's Gully, a 12m Vdiff.
It was awesome. The cave was ace, at first I thought I'd discovered Parisellas of the Peak, however, the rock is a little bit soft. But, you can easily make new holds with your hands so it's not all bad. The next day was sunny and excellent, did various trad things, got bumped up on big air.


Went to almscliffe, it rained, did some bouldering.


Went out to black rocks, it didn't rain. It was awesome, got on some pretty tricky slabs, loved it, will be back for sure. Mclellan as usual was drawn to the worst routes on the crag, "What's that you say? Green gully? Sounds brilliant." but i vetoed the worst of them. Tried to lasso a tree.



On the only non-slab route of the weekend, I fell off a couple of times, Mclellan fell off, it felt tricky.


Went out to some limestone quarry (masson lees), we couldn't find it in the dark, it rained the next day. Were planning to go drytooling on Sub Rosa which looks really wild, instead we just made and ate some chips.

Chalked up

Been making lots of visits to the chalk, 4 times this term, living the dream.


Cool stuff that happened:

1) Discovered saltdean west, previously I'd just been going to the pleasure/thunder dome. Attempted to do a traverse of saltdean west. There's an excellent roof section at the start but the rest is pretty easy.

2) Discovered the way to climb well on chalk and still be weak is to dyno everything.

3) Saw a helicopter when I was on the route, it came in close, thought it must be surveying the cliff for building or something. Then noticed that it was a police helicopter. Bizarre I thought. Eventually the police rolled up on the beach, appartently someone thought we were gonna jump.

4) Strong wind from the south = terror. On one visit, the wind was about 50mph, the waves were breaking onto the steps, about 5 or 6 metres in height. The most impressive thing was the noise of the waves and the pebbles rushing back down the beach and occasionally bits falling off.

Duntelchaig winter

Went out to duntelchaig mega psyched shortly after the cold snap in late december, it was warm but I was hopeful.

I'd hoped the thaw would have stripped back the snow and left a helpful bit of ice in the cracks.

The project was black, seeping and totally unwintery. I was gutted.

The day was salvaged by playing on some icicles nearby. It was about 10C and the ice was keen to detach itself from the rocks, and the topout of 10m of unfrozen vertical heather was unappealing, crampons balled up with mud.


Newmark + ice heading towards the ground.

Climbing without gloves reminded me of cham. It was ace.

The rest of the hols were spent going to various other projects, again conditions weren't helpful and/or I wasn't good enough, yet. Got some useful info and know what I need to do to make it happen, back to training for a couple of months, then crush.

Roll on easter, psyched!

Winter

Was busy for the rest of term, with alot of work to finish off, but got out on the chalk, at saltdean then at telescombe, it was ace. Loads of brilliant new lines waiting to be climbed before they fall down. First time placements and most of them were pretty secure. All the established routes were very juggy, which was interesting and not what I'm used to.

Extreme wild camping in Grindleford.

Got back to Sheffield for some grit, it was pretty banging, did mostly bouldering which was ace. To finish the term, I managed a visit to the climbing hotspot of Swindon.