It was impressive. Emma walking up Mind Control with plenty in the bank, Josh and Jack Ibbertson showing that the future of UK sports climbing looked bright, Hock still able to do a 1 armer on an edge with his dadbod.
​   Yeah the Ibbertsons were the coolest family I've met I reckon. The only downside to the trip had been Angus’ morning routine of doing topless yoga in the living room in his skimpy leggings.
 I looked back on 2 weeks in Oliana:
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   After picking the hire car up from Barcelona airport I went and grabbed my old friend Adam Hocking who’d arrived an hour behind. In 1994 Hock had won the Juniour BICCs and could do 2 little finger 1 armers without warming up, still strong he now had 2 kids and a dadbod.
We put the trance on and took off to an apartment in Organya where Emma Twyford, Angus Kille and Rhos (with an unspellable surname) were already ensconced. Rhos was the only person I didn’t know and it became apparent she had a humour dryer than the Sahara.
   The first climbing day we immediately set about looking at projects and I settled on Fish Eye, with form in the past to have had a good go at doing it in a session this was my goal for the whole trip and I have to say I’ve not been on a sport route as good for many years. The routes that go to the top of the main face of Oliana are around 50 metres long and on the main face the easiest of them are 8a+.
   A couple of days later both Emma and Angus were lobbing off near the top of Mind Control. It was obviously going to be doable after a rest day.  On the rest day we all took a spin up to Coll de Nargo and Hock impressed everyone by still being able to do a 1 armer on an edge and holding a front leaver off an edge for 10 seconds even with his dadbod!
   I was nominated to share a room with Hock. He had his laptop on until 3 am watching movies before turning it off and immediately starting a low rhythm of snoring. This helped give me stimulus for keeping the world up to date with the ‘cragdads’ progress and coaching tips during the week.
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   James and Jenny Ibbertson are their parents who are also great climbers, teach D&T, Geography and Psychology and are having a sabbatical for the year. They are keen to keep the youths away from social media and the often unhealthy elements it can entail. I was impressed with the Ibbertsons for not only being probably the strongest climbing family from the UK but for having an extraordinary attitude.
   Having a good scene out there has made me committed to head out to that area for 2/3 months next winter. Having been inspired by my young friends I also swear that I’ll try to be on form where Hazel says “oh, you’ve done that already” rather than “have you not done it yet”!
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It did feel good, a very potent form of escapism, totally absorbing and for my younger self an addiction. Something which lots of people tell you is a bad idea but you do anyway. I remember the first day I started in 1996. Sat at lower falcon it had become evident my climbing partner Adam Hocking was unlikely to arrive. Feeling pretty  frustrated I set off up a VS called Spin Up, it felt wrong from ten metres height and my instincts told me not to carry on like people trying their first cigarette. I slowly made progress to the top and once there my 15 year old self felt quite elated at having stopped my instincts from backing off low down. I walked back to the base and looked at a HVS further right called Funeral Way, my memory of this is vague and I’m pretty sure I backed off that day and did it at a later date.
  From that day a totally different realm of rock climbing opened up, without the ropes, the need to stop and place pro or of belaying a partner you could do a ton of routes so fast. When I hit 17 it had become integral with most of my climbing done alone. I remember Prana and Bitter Oasis being a big deal the first time I soloed them which makes sense as I wasn’t leading that much harder, eventually they were just part of bigger days out. Many routes in the Lakes I’d look at and wonder how it would feel to do them without a rope and more often than not I would find out. It became a habit and I saw it as an extension of scrambling. I did a lot of routes in the Lakes, down Borrowdale, on Pavey, Dow, Scafell, Hodge Close and down in Wales in the Pass, at Gogarth, Slate, Tremadog, Ogwen, Carneddau, Pembroke and elsewhere. Never too hard generally but quite extensive, in the several 1000 route mark, often onsight or routes I'd not done for a few years unless they were on a regular circuit.  ​

 I remember the feeling of euphoria of going near the edge soloing contrasting sharply with going to school a few years before when I dreaded going in. From wearing old clothes I’d acquired the name ‘Tramp’ which at various times (over many years) became a group chant; Tramp,tramp, tramp. Combined with being brought up a Jehovahs witness made Christmas time quite special and even a quarter of a century later when someone asks if I’m psyched for Christmas my eyes glaze over and I think about where I’d like Santa and Christ to go.
   On moving to Wales I remember a few times that first summer; spinning around on the top shelf of Lubyanka to look outwards, going for a swim beneath Main cliff after a few routes like Big Groove and Assassin in March, crawling through the hole on the top pitch of Ducking Stool and Ray Kay talking me out of Heart of Gold at a party. It had even helped me escape from an argument with an ex after a car chase.
   It’s a habit I got out of and in fact would more say lost for a good few years partly due to choking. This apparently can only happen to an expert and is where in extremely stressful situations the expert loses their head and becomes literally a complete beginner! Its one of those things you don't really believe in (like chronique fatigue/lazyitis) until it happens to you. I won’t linger on the details although it is worth a read in Matthew Syeds excellent book Bounce. Choking in a sport competitions is humiliating but think about choking when soloing. For a few years it felt like a piece of me was missing, imagine the strongest bit of your climbing just disappearing, almost completely. It led to some farcical and dangerous moments when I decided to rid myself of the block to regain access to this Elixir.
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When I set off to do the 100 in the Lakes it was still a big unknown wether it would end on the first route or thankfully as my friend Hazel would put it I’d get into the flow state which is what I was hoping for. The day after I was sat in the bath at mums flat having a bottle of wine, soaking in the fatigue and thinking about how much my poor mum had had to put up with over the years.
  Although kicked into touch as a regular habit the ability to cover a lot of moderate climbing fast is still there and once in a while there would be an urge to do so. Unless you are a very fortunate person life will have its periods of feeling rather flat and feckless and if you go out and do 30+ routes you know the feeling will evaporate with any worries just falling away.
    The last 2 years I had in mind a list of 100 Welsh routes to do but having left it too late in the season both years had settled on doing 60 of the best in September. This would still have given a very good day, giving homage to many Joe Brown with routes like Vector, Vember, Cenotaph, Cemetary Gates and I figured I could do it with plenty of energy still in the tank. I did the odd timing out of curiosity to give an idea of how long some sections might take. Gogarth was under 9 minutes, Pull my daisy, 2.45, Dervish 4 and thought I could rattle through a lot of it fairly quickly believing I was 17 again.
   The enchainment of routes in the mountains felt like my main forte and if you really want to do something you can find reasons to justify it. Taking something that you feel good at as far as you can, which you find tricky to envisage and pays homage to an area and some of its pioneers.  A channel of energy.
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   Nigel ‘Yorky’ Robinson was a friend of the family and a regular climbing partner of dads. One of those rare super nice guys on every level, driving goods he’d collected out to orphanages in Kosovo over many years. We had a day out one Friday in the summer going to Malham as the weather was duff but the original plan had been for him to join me in the Lakes as I got my head into gear for the welsh one, doing a 30 route day, when he said he was keen to come and hangout I was a bit incredulous. He met with the rest of my family for lunch at Shepherds café later that wknd.
   A few weeks later I’d just had 3 days climbing in Pembroke with Emma Twyford, a climbing partner of mine now for 20 years. In fact I first climbed with Emma when she was 12 and she said she was keen to try an E1, I pointed her at the Grasp she took 2 lobs totally unafraid then did it!
It had been a cracking weekend, Preposterous Tales and Stargate when piss wet on the 1st afternoon, Pleasure dome, mutiny on the bounty, big issue and a good piss up with friends on day 2 then Emma kindly took me up Barbarella and Headhunter before a good tide let us finish on Woeful on the last day. We finished with Fish and Chips in Aberaeron on the way back.
 I was starting an ML assessment the morning after when Eve Lancashire delivered the news that Yorky was dead. He’d been found in Donegal with boots and chalkbag on. He’d been so proud to go to his sons’ wedding 2 weeks before in Berlin.
The weather was appropriately shit on the ML to go with the news and it gave me some time to reflect on how nice a guy he was. When dad was on his last legs Yorky would travel up from Nottingham to the Lakes and take him out to crags and after dad passed away he would always email me and stay in touch with mum.
  At his funeral there was his wife Pat who is a stand up comedian and although we’d never met she took the time to grab me for a chat about Yorky. I also spoke with his son Tom who runs a Theory and Bio-Systems lab in Potsdam.
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  There is not much you can say when one of the really good and kind people of the world leaves it.  I’m glad it was quick, I’m glad it was doing something he loved but bloody hell I wish he was still around and can’t imagine the loss of such a character to the people who were really close to him.
   The best days I’ve had over the years haven’t been on my own, they’ve been the days doing a couple of routes with a good friend and having that shared experience. The wknd in Pembroke with Emma and having a brew on the top of Carn Gowla with my favourite doctor after climbing Guernica and going too direct on America were the best times climbing this year. It would be great to be climbing with Emma in another 20 years.
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   I often tell people I think the climbing and ‘scene’ in North Wales is a contender for the best in the world.  A recent day which involved shuffling a few centimetres higher on a sport redpoint, soloing some easy mountain routes and watching friends going for it and succeeding in their endeavours encompassed much of why I give Wales a big seal of approval.
   Dream of White Horses, Cenotaph Corner, Hope, Flying Buttress, Great Wall, Main Wall, Christmas Curry, Positron, Comes the Dervish, Right Wall, Vector, Path to Rome, Statement of youth are all route names that will resonate with climbers, the list of classics is near endless.
I’d made plans on this particular day to climb at LPT with Dan Mcmanus. The forecast was due to be poor until 8.00am before becoming good. I’d predicted that Dan would look out of his window which overlooks the Orme towards the end of the bad weather and cancel. At 8.00am Dan messaged to cancel proving my guess correct. Whilst on a big wall trip Dan will happily live on his own dandruff and wait out bad weather sleeping in a waterfall for a week but back in blighty he might crumble at the first whiff of a cloud.  After an hour or 2 of calls and counselling I picked him up and we headed down. It was as good as summer conditions get, dry with a costant breeze.
  After putting the clips in his project, Youthanasia, Dan did it first attempt making it look very easy, shaking out on most moves and obviously in good shape for his trip to Ratikon. Nick Moulden did a climb on the left and it looked like it was a ‘low gravity’ day on LPT. Having strained my elbow on an undercling on Sea of Tranquility earlier in the year a high step had proved elusive. I arrived there feeling good and getting past the elusive move got very excited, taking time to set my feet in the final positions I began to get set up for the last move before everything caved in and I was spat out into my usual air haunt. I was still pretty happy though and reminded myself that once this one was completed I’d have to attach a mobile at the belay of the last one ready to message Oli Grounsel immediately upon success.
  Leaving LPT I headed back for a brew, the day was cloudless and with friends in the Pass I drove round to see what was going on. The conditions were incredible, that golden light with a soft breeze.
I headed up to Dinas Mot and did Diagonal and Superdirect rapidly, feeling I was moving as well as I ever had where you hardly need to stop before going into the next move(doing Gogarth in sub 9 minutes a few days later felt similar). I think Diagonal might even have been the 1st route I did in the Pass with Wez and Adam Wilde sometime in the 90s.

Looking up at the Cromlech there was a climber in a white helmet setting off on Right Wall. Kate Keltie had been talking about it and as I made my way up it became apparent it was her.
On arrival at the base there was a bit of a party vibe; Gus, Duncan, Fatboy, Sophie, some Spanish climbers…..but as my eyes rose and I got a terrible surprise. Jesus.
  Howard Lawledge was 8 metres up Lord of the Flies!
I yelled to his partner:
“Sophie, tell him to get down, it gets serious above”
 I’d once watched Howard make a terrifying ascent of Minotaur in Huntsmans Leap involving all kinds of crazy disco legs,whole body quivers, gear dropping out, slapping. It hadn’t looked hopeful for him at all.
  At least there were 2 doctors on hand this time and Gus could probably catch him from 20 metres without straining.
 After shouting encouragement I went up Ivy Sepulchre and round to the top of Left Wall to get pics and become a voyeur.
  The Cromlech itself can seem quite intimidating, being exposed and high in the Pass. Right Wall and Lord of the Flies are both big leads giving runout climbing where a fall in certain sections would be highly unadvisable, courtesy of Pete Livesey and Ron Fawcett. Some of the biggest falls I’ve seen have been off Right Wall.
 My friend Adam Hocking had been a bit phased by it when younger but found it easy when he did it, which is no surprise as he was onsighting 8a/+ at the time. He helped talk a chap into trying it who had only led E3 previously. He put in a valiant fight. I was on True Grip opposite when he reached the good holds above the port hole. He was too pumped to hold on to them. As he parted company with the rock he let out a scream and I locked up on the holds I was on and gazed across terrified. The scream continued and he curled into the foetal position, some of his gear banged against the rock, unclipped from the rope and flew out towards the scree below. It looked like he wasn’t going to stop but thankfully he did. Lord of the Flies has also seen some big ones off the top. The footage of Big Ron on it is well worth a watch.
   Back on the routes Howard was looking very solid and it looked like the gear he placed was staying in. Kate was also looking well solid. I’d climbed with Kate recently and knew she was a great climber having a deliberate style well suited for trad but she’d mentioned she hadn’t onsighted E5 and I thought Right Wall a reasonably big lead for a first.
They both arrived at the ¾ ledge at the same time. Kate moved up towards the port hole which to reach and get passed many people find the crux. Reversing down a move or 2 but not bothering to step onto the ledge for a rest she committed above once more and reached the port hole. As an observer at this point and having witnessed the consequences of people ‘letting go’ made the tension feel palpable, staying focused for a few more moves the good holds leading rightwards were reached convincingly.

  Turning my attention back to Howard I was impressed how strong he looked on the moves as I’d generally identified him as a similar morph to the chap off the Mister Muscle adverts. Half a move below some jugs and bomber kit he locked off some crap holds and wasted time putting in some rubbish gear, much to my amusement, if he’d been struggling I would have said something…maybe. He was cruising though.
  It looked as if both Kate and Howard topped out at the exact same time, in sync. I went and offered some peppermint tea to go with the bilberries on top. North Wales and the Pass had given great times again. I had to shoot off to prep for work the following day but the others finished with a pint in the Vaynol before their journeys home. Reality kicked back in but the memory never fades...apart from Ry Pasquils, his is mush.

 
“Would it be the best new route you’ve put up?”
“Bloody hell, it would be”
 
  Thus was the reasoning for trying a rather risky passage and I think it’s fair to say one of the ‘best’ bold wall climbs to be found in the UK. A route which belongs somewhere in the 1980s being technically pretty straight forward but having those classic 6b/c rockovers which become strangely tiring and where a fall leaves plenty for the imagination. I’d slept poorly for much of the trip and could empathise with Edward Nortons character suffering from Insomnia in Fight Club. There were a few thoughts which were reverberating around during the week leading up to and during the ascent of it:
‘Mind blowing, reasonably unjustifiable, somebody in the higher echelons of Equip is a patronising tool, tormented ejaculation, indian face, hellraiser, bolts, massive falls, danger, old age, death, life ‘crossroads’ and desire’
It’s admittedly hard to make one climb sound interesting, myself I enjoy sci-fi, fantasy (not s&m) but I thought I’d give this one a write up as it did give what felt like a fairly powerful experience and after all, this is my piece of the internet so I'll bore you for a minute.
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Coir’-uisg  Buttress is in a stunning location. Arriving at Elgol supplies hopefully a view of the Cuillin ridge where a short ferry journey leads past seals to the landing where a short walk up the river leads to the Loch where the cliff can be seen in the distance.
 In 2007 Dave Birkett and Alan Steele put up Skye Wall having been tipped off by Tom Walkington. The pictures of the climb showed it for what it is, one of the UKs great hard wall climbs on immaculate gabbro.
Dan Varian had mentioned he’d be keen to have a trip up to try it and in mid October last year we had the opportunity. Making camp at the far end of the Loch we walked on to the base of the cliff in the evening to size it up and stash some kit. The skies were clear and it felt very warm for mid October. We walked out in the twilight and a near full moon came up and shone a light across the loch. The venue was idyllic and after having finished the busiest month of work for the year it already felt a worthwhile trip just to hangout camping.
   The following day was still clear but cooler. We did Skye Wall and a new route to the right which provided a great day out, one of those days where you feel you can’t put a foot wrong. A friend Ken Toms who passed away a few years ago once said that when you are climbing well it is one of the best feelings in the world.
   Skye Wall tackles a seam and crack on the right hand side of the face. The big expanse of rock to the left was unclimbed and appeared more featured with grooves and scoops to aim for. We left the morning after but made plans to return to attempt a new line to the left.
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  Roll on May 2017 and some exceptional weather, we made our way back to the campsite paradise with 3 more friends, Adam Long, Ben Bransby and Ray Wood. I felt haggardly tired that 1st evening and slept like a log, waking up feeling bouncy I was confident we’d be up at least one new route and probably 2!
Arriving at the base we geared up and Dan led up to a good ledge, I carried on through and after some prospecting a few metres above committed to some sloping ramp moves to gain a steep corner and a belay where this became a roof.  This is where we were hoping we could go, the roof looked short and with good gear and would lead into the stunning white groove feature. Looking back down the ropes hung away from the rock and it dawned on me why the last pitch had been trickier than expected.
Two moves across the roof led to a tricky move to gain the white ‘groove feature’. There was more good gear and I was ecstatic with how well it was going, believing it would be slabbing off above and become easier. After climbing up to the next roof and booting a loose flake off I made my way onto the main feature allowing access to the upper wall, a long sloping shelf.
As soon as I gained it the fun feeling left and the nature of the climb changed. There was no gear on the ledge but worse still the wall above appeared steeper and more impregnable than we’d hoped for.
After attempting the 2 most obvious weaknesses I eventually set off up leftwards from the hooks thinking the weakness above would lead to a groove on the left and possible belay.
 After getting into a pumpy position I prevaricated in this position to drain the rest of my energy before slapping into the scoop above. Once I was stood in this slight scoop I knew I was screwed and true fear set in for a minute as I realised I’d climbed myself into a cul de sac. It was one of those moments where you felt you haven’t just overcooked the chicken but the bugger is on fire, destroying the kitchen and scaring the neighbors.
 After attempting to climb the ‘weakness’ a couple of times I eventually committed to the one of the more terrifying lower offs I’ve been party to, using a shit partially in wire,  I was glad I’d been taking it easy on the cakes the month prior. I made it back to the safety of the hooks and lowered down to the belay. We abbed to the ground, I sighed with relief and Dan undoubtedly did the same after being sat at the belay for ages.
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​We went to the top of the cliff and abseiled down to the highpoint and I was gutted. It appeared devoid of gear and a quick brush wasn’t going to do the job. The ‘possible belay groove’ had no gear and led nowhere. I retrieved the gear and jugged back up and let Dan go down for a peek.
To say it wasn’t what we were looking for would be an understatement. Skye Wall had apart from one short section low on the 2nd pitch been full of good gear. We’d expected something similar on this. There appeared to be a few cul de sacs where you could get lured and climb yourself into a dead end.
 I considered leaving our 1st effort as the highpoint as we’d got to there in a ‘good style’, much like the tormented ejaculation. The dirtiest most filthy word in the traditional British climbing sense is almost certainly ‘bolt’, those things that foreigners and yorkshiremen use. Obviously I’d never place one at my highpoint but did think it would have been a great laugh with all the grief Dave Turnbull and Nick would have gotten, I figured they’d had enough in the last half year or so.
 Dan came back up and made his way out. I abbed once more to my highpoint for a last look and noticed a line of edges and sidepulls going almost straight up above where I’d been.  Once out I told Dan that after one more abseil of the crux section I thought we could do it and suddenly felt a palpable pressure like a lead weight pressing on my mind.  I really was getting too old for this shit, I’d come out for a fun holiday which had turned into some mental necessity to climb the ‘terror face’. I liked it less than that French climber with a name like a chocolate.

The mars one programme had seemed so far fetched at first. I couldn’t really believe people were going to commit to it and they would need to lack any form of sanity for even considering it. Imagine leaving Earth forever, never to see rivers, forests or friends again. To live a shortened life in small cabins buried under soil to protect from radiation. Lunacy...
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   Next up was a month trip in Spain.
I was climbing with my good friend, Si o’ Con Gatkins. Arriving at Oliana I warmed up flashing Fish Eye, I always knew it wouldn’t be too hard as my mate Hazel had gotten up it and she normally just lazes about doing very little. After that myself and Si checked out the moves on Dura Dura, some of them did seem tricky. However the following day I managed to do it 1st redpoint. Chris and Adam obviously hadn’t done enough hard limestone routes, I missed out the 2 crux moves via a quantum, counter rotational ‘chalk and blow halfway through’ deadpoint, the rest was piss. Punters. Si just spent the day doubting that thing Nalle did was as hard as his own blocs and slagging off the guy who appeared in Blocheads alot as being weak as piss. He also put chalk on some real nano holds at the base which I presumed would form a near impossible traverse.
  The main event came after a rest day. After climbing through the crux on the Dura Dura I broke right via a sustained sequence to join Papichulo at its crux, after doing this I broke right again into the crux of Pachamama before tracking way back left to take in many more cruxes on the wall. I’d gotten the name ready, the Dura Pachamodafuka face and possibly hard 9c. I was reasonably chuffed and as I was lowering off I expected a shout of congratulations from Gatkins but he just said routes were shit and didn’t have any hard moves on them. Cheeky bastard I thought.
    I retorted as I was being lowered telling him it had been clinically proven that people who climb routes are cleverer than boulderers, besides which it looked to be almost inversely proportional to ability, giving Doyle as proof.
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 This must have hit a nerve as he almost dropped me the final 20 Metres and as I landed hard an altercation ensued. After his powerful first hits I thought I was done for as I was still blasted from the 9c but luckily the endurance jabs won in the end and when Gatkins was fully down I embraced my inner bastard and snapped his tooth brush leaving it on his unconscious body. It had become apparent to the other parties at the cliff that we were brits with the hateful behaviour making it crystal clear. I gave everyone a smile, pretending to be nice in case it effected any future sponsorship deals. Even the Tories who would have all terminally ill Grandmothers working 15 hour days, 7 days a week in Sports Direct until they drop dead were seen as normal in the current UK climate which was some consolation to me for acting like a sod.
  Whilst Gatkins lay moaning I updated my Instagram with some selfies I’d managed to take mid cruxes. When he came round we made friends again and after an hour I rechecked my Instagram and couldn’t bloody believe it, it had only got 500 likes, Hazel got 4 times that with some truly naff lifestyle pics. I put it on twitter as well, hoping nobody found it as vacuous as what two friends had been putting on it in the last year which was akin to a story about a real life Barbie and Ken.  
  Having gotten bored of Oliana we moved south to Santa Linya. Neanderthol, a 9b in the middle of it was the obvious choice and after a quick work it went first go, possibly the 3rd ascent as I think it got repeated by some chap called hacov sherbert but I’m pretty certain he used an inferior sequence, probably only 9a+. The other routes in the cave looked to easy to bother with so we left.
Arriving at Margalef First Round First Minute really suited my style so I did it much faster than the other 9bs, probably 40 minutes or so. I had to admit I was pretty tired after this few days of climbing so needed an easy day the day after so just did Era Vella. That guy J Christ was right about it, it really was piss, probs only 8b, Barrows must have over cooked it on his anal cap regime to say it was tough.
Updating my twitter feed afterwards I noticed expedition grants being given out for ‘snow plodders’. I’d always harboured ill feeling towards these grants being given to useless toffs with cheat sticks  who go away for a big hurrah and bring back tales of daring do but generally don’t actually need the money. I thought about writing into the organisation awarding the grants to say they’d be better off giving it to my mate Calum rather than the toffs but figured you’d have to be proper dick to write such an email, although I had heard of this behaviour from some individuals of low moral fibre.
At Margalef it was great to see a youth sport climbing team being overseen by one of the new super sport coaches employed by Sports England as part of the IFSCs matrix. Using his coaching eye app and punching data into another computer he shouted out positive and shrewd advice to the team members. John Redhead was really taking to his role in a big way and I couldn’t wait to see the fruits of his efforts. As we left I heard him shouting, faster, higher, stronger...
 After a fairly busy week we moved on to Siurana, the final part of the trip. The roads between the 2 cliffs were bendy so I was glad I wasn’t being driven by a toasted Jehovahs witness. 
​   Arriving at Siurana I had a good 1st day climbing Golpe de Estado and La Rambla. Although La Rambla is a trade route nowadays I was pretty happy to make the first Self belayed ascent, having to do many of the cruxes with only 1 hand. On lowering off the latter and arriving on the ground I saw something which completely blew me away, an astounding sight. I literally couldn’t believe my eyes on what was surely Tom Randalls greatest coaching achievement.
  The figure I was seeing was unmistakeable, leaving a bat hang rest in Kalea Borroka he set off waltzing through the crux on Estado Critico. I had thought he would have gone to join the fight against IS but hadn’t thought he would have lasted long in his normally ‘out of shape’ form where surely most 5 year old jihads could have caught up and captured him. This was a new man, an ubermensch. On reaching the chains having achieved a clean lead Andy Kirkpatrick shouted down to his belayer Bear Grylls in delight. Both popularists in their own right they’d teamed up, Andy having swapped his social media campaign for a lattice-bored regime. I gave them both a thumbs up although which digit I offered was a close call.
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   I know I said a month in Spain but I had gotten pretty bored of it after ten days and Si had some projects he was close to which Dan Varian apparently couldn’t even see the holds on. We parted company but still had bruises for remembrance.
   I contemplated booking a flight to the States to do Dawn Wall but thought better of it in the end as the Yanks always overhype the difficulty and that skinny Cheq kid seemed to make it out to be pretty piss, I doubted it was as big a deal as Pinch Direct on Etive Slab and certainly not as bold. I was also pretty nervous about the extreme vetting, what exactly does that entail and what do they expect to find up there?
  Instead I went back to wales. I headed straight to the Promontory Slab with Johnny, which offers technically the hardest trad pitch in Britain although not as big a lead as the Giantest. It has roughly a v13 starting 8 metres into an 8c slab, Johnny did a fine lead after minimum preparation, full of flamboyance and himself. I also managed to follow cleanly which I was chuffed with as I’d spent a bit of time floundering on a grigri on it in prior years. It gave a 9a trad slab. Johnny wondered why people had to train to climb 9a as he'd only done feet only problems for years which seemed to do the trick.
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   The day after I went down to lpt to belay Chris Doyle. He set off on Liquid Ambar and looked really smooth with the no solid food diet he’d been on for ten years really standing out, he probably weighed less than Oli. He climbed past the hardest moves and.....
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Sunshine, blue skies, shorts on and sat at the base of Dinas Cromlech on a Saturday in the middle of summer. Next to me sat Emma Twyford who I first started climbing with in the mid 90s in the Lakes. The cliff is one of the better ones of its type in the UK and I was surprised to see Dinas Mot on the opposite side also empty. On the boulders in the valley bottom lay most of the climbers in the Llanberis Pass.
   Climbing has certainly changed a lot over the last 20 year. I don’t know which has been the strangest occurrence although rumour of Dave Macleod losing loads of weight living on cheesecake and butter is certainly up there. Training for climbing and trying one project has in many circles become more popular than the actual activity along with moaning about minor injuries.
   Earlier in the year there was some debate about wether the UK had any world class routes and I thought it was ludicrous. The UK has tons and it’s often the history, character and landscapes of the routes which make them so special.
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   On this day at the Cromlech we’d just done Lord of the Flies, once at the limit of my ambitions it had become the rest day outing and having done considerably more climbing worldwide since first climbing it in the 90s I can say it’s exceptional. Admittedly most of the routes here are much smaller than those found on the ‘great cliffs’ of the world but for their size, enjoyment and variety I can’t think of anywhere better, nor indeed of as good a climbing scene.
  There are climbs which rival those found on el cap, Longhope direct is the UKs version of Salathe wall, Etive slabs, Shelterstone and Dubh Loch could be some of the smaller cliffs in Yosemite valley. Gogarth and Pembroke offer as good a sea cliff adventures as to be found anywhere in the world.
    Climbing has given me a huge amount, the majority of my best experiences have involved it in some way or other and the majority of the climbing I do and have done is trad climbing. Seeing the fairly empty cliffs quite often I do wonder if it’s something of a ‘dying out’ element of climbing. I think this would be somewhat sad and would highly recommend anyone who has given it any thought to give it a go. If I could give every keen youth from a less affluent background the skills, equipment and opportunity to go out and do some classic trad climbs I would do so.  I’ve done a lot of both sport and trad climbing over the years and the easiest classic trad routes I’ve done still mean a lot more to me than the hardest sport routes I’ve done although an ascent of Little Chamonix is unlikely to get you much acclaim. A good thing about the easy trad routes is that you can enjoy them again and again.
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   A trip to Arran in May was destined to be the main trip of the year with John Dunnes route The Great escape being the goal. The plan was set with Ryan Pasquill, Ben, Dan Mcmanus, Dan Varian, Adam Long and Ray wood when a last minuter invited himself on the trip. I was very nervous about the stowaway as first impressions were of one of those highly spoiled, cham trustafarian types who often deserve a smack in the face until proven otherwise. When he mentioned he was keen for the guide scheme my suspicions deepened as the main test for this scheme is to measure the size of your ego to check if it’s of equivalent size to a sperm whale. But... Tom Livingstone ended up being not too bad.
The trip was a general success but as me and Ryan did the Great Escape on the first day through a mixture of celebrations and the weather our performance on the trip was a line graph going downwards.
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The Great Escape itself was an incredible route, Chir Mor and Sleeping crack offered brilliant climbing and views back down the Glen Rosa valley with the mound of Ailsa Craig prominent in the distance. Chir Mhor and the nearby area had a lot of potential for new routes. We just did the one, a new E7 right of Sleeping Crack which involved a leap for a huge chickenhead and a wiggy couple of slab moves to leave it. I’ve only just named it, Chickenhead Spread. The naming of the routes is often more fun than the climbs themselves.
Bransby pulled a big block off on the first day taking the biggest lob, Varian put up a new and good looking v12 and as usual Ryan drank more than anyone else.
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 I’ve rarely been into new routing as I enjoy doing the existing ones. This year has been quite different. On the commute back from Manchester to North Wales I listened to the radio about 2 black holes colliding and scientists measuring the gravitational waves from it. Something struck a chord and the resulting route Gravity Wave is actually a great route which Emma made an exceptional ascent of as setting off on a route graded harder than e7 without pre inspection is still a rarity in UK climbing and which normally happens on the usual bunch of climbs which are ‘sporty’ in nature or have 100 online videos choreographing every move.
 Since then I’ve been looking at many of the bits of rock I was curious about for years with a clear intention of trying to climb them and I’ve been looking at North Wales and some other areas in a different light. It’s yielded about 14 new climbs this year with hardly having to look very far for them.
   The Pass, Tremadog, Ogwen, Pembroke and particularly Gogarth which has given 4 very good hard routes ranging from the perfectly protected Divided Britain to the very adventurous Combined Energy. The last one being of particularly high quality which was found on a trip to Gogarth after a fight up a George smith e6 called Fishura, a sizable roof crack with chimneying contortions, flopping onto the top I had scars over my back and felt I’d spent a week with a s and m dominatrix. I set up the belay, drank from my flask and grinned at how little fun calum would have seconding it. I looked at a quartz jug at the apex of the arch and thought about how wild a lip traverse to gain it would be if it was possible, the overhanging groove above looked like it could be a total shitfest or amazing.
   A few days later on a Wednesday night me and dan mcmanus went and tried it. We each gave it a lead attempt and got to the quartz jug at the apex of the arch. The usual scenes of getting pumped, damp rock and gear ripping were involved. We gave up as it got late and I headed off to work in Manchester. All day in work on the Friday I was thinking about it wondering if the groove at the top was doable. That evening I met up with dan in bangor and we shot to the cliff near porth dafarch. I went up first and gaining the quartz jug I tussled up to the crux in the groove above which keeps you on your toes to the end. Dan did it first go as well having a similar tussle with the final overhanging groove. The name helping to consummate our relationship!
    On the drive back across Anglesey one of the best finishes to climbing at gogarth is the panoramic view of the mountains with crib goch often standing out.  We went for celebration drinks at the heights still chatting shit about the climb. It was the best of the new ones covering unlikely ground and feeling adventurous. I haven’t been able to get enough of Gogarth this year in terms of a place to hang out on an evening as well as the varied climbs to be found there.
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   The last new route at Gogarth was climbed with Eve Lancashire, a black groove which looked like it could have been tough but with a sinker right where you needed it to give a fun short E5 which we named Eve McDangermouse. It’s been good to climb with Eve Lancashire who with sister Gwen give the strongest trad climbing sisters the UK has ever seen and it’s been refreshing climbing with someone who is keener on climbing than training.  It’s worth remembering that many of the UKs top sport climbers very rarely climb above E5 without use of a top rope and if they do it normally involves a cameraman to capture the rarity so being able to onsight E5/6 on a variety of different rock types is a bigger deal than the modern media often makes out. I’ve found it interesting that recently people have been taking the ‘sport grade’ of a trad route as everything whereas there are lots of trad routes which are French 7a that are considerably harder leads than trad routes which are 8a or harder but have good gear. Precariousness, blind moves, lichen, loose rock and danger all play a big part amongst many other factors.
  Going back to Eve Lancashire.
    Eve is a brilliant and exceptional trad climber but also possibly the most dangerous climber I’ve climbed with. It’s tricky to know exactly where to start, lobbing off the top of Rare Lichen having missed out the best RP to protect that section was quite ‘out there’ and not wearing a helmet on Swanage due to having a truly shit role model nearby. But, perhaps Catatonia gives the best example. We arrived at gogarth late and somewhat cloudy and damp we get on an E5 called Catatonia after doing a classic E6 called Sea Witch. I lead the first 6a pitch and she seconds in her pink crocks.
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​“Good effort Eve, you can get your rock shoes on for the next 5c pitch as your leading”
  “No, I’m wearing these”
“I’d get your boots on”
“James Mcbullshit I’m wearing these”
  I stared at her incredulously, kind of liking her attitude even if I was getting ripped into by some kind of super mouse for offering sage advice. She duly led the pitch fine and I was impressed and unnerved by the show. I presumed she was just bored and I can empathise with that having spent time with the likes of Calum, Hazel and Doylo.
   Of danger in climbing I could write a good few essays. When I was younger I used to seek out the serious routes which had a big history and reputation and I was after pushing myself into desperation to see what I could do when right at the edge. I had a set of other principles which were also on the less healthy side, those ones I will take to the grave. The younger I was the more dangerous the moments were. Dave Kells asked once if I ever thought I was going to die and I was shocked he’d asked as I think I was into treble figures by that point.
   I still remember the closest time though. I’d been climbing a year or 2. I set off walking down Borrowdale in October as an angry 16 year old with the intent to solo Greatend Corner on Greatend crag. I remember feeling highly dislocated from ‘normal’ society, a sentiment I imagine some people can empathise with in the current climate where racism, lying and bullying are traits that will carry some bastards far.
   The climb was dirty and wet and I soon got pushed leftwards, after nearly falling 3 times I arrived cold and a bit strained on the ledge beneath the top pitch of Banzai Pipeline. That was too wet and I knew I was properly stuffed. I set off upwards into unknown ground picking a line of weakness, pumped, struggling, slapping and trying as hard as I could I was still unfortunately parting company with the rock when the ‘breeze’ pushed me back in where by some good grace a good hold came in reach and the top soon after. I’m in no way religious but the moment would certainly have given Dawkins pause for thought. Having been back since I’ve never quite worked out where the hell I went but it was right at the limit of my ability at that point, probably beyond it. There were other moments where the wind played a part in avoiding disaster but never quite as near the edge, even from 1000s of solos in the Lakes and Wales. There was a moment when Emma Twyford was younger on Greatend crag when it appeared a breeze also saved her.
So, Eve I’d like you to receive some more sage advice from a fellow climber who can be dangerous, and I’d like any person who climbs with you to tell you the same;
 wear your helmet, get in loads of gear (it’s good for getting you fit), consolidate through the classics of the grades, stick knots in the end of your ab rope and use a prussock, concentrate when your climbing- especially on not pulling holds off. If your thinking about Indian Face do The Medium, Ambassador and even Face Mecca beforehand as stepping stones. Meet your partners on time and put your rock shoes on for E5s.  The last critical point of safety is to remember to never, ever nick my shades. I wouldn’t give this advice to people I didn’t like. If Farage and Trump got into climbing Id get them on Indian Face as soon as possible, I’d bring my popcorn and offer to belay with a big Cheshire cat smile on my face “it’s this way gents”, but I’m not one to fantasize.

   On a different note is the Extreme Rock book. I think there is potential to finish off the ones I’ve not done by the end of next year although it would require a concerted effort and luck with the weather and finding a way through the odd pitch which has fallen down such as the 3rd pitch on Cougar. I have an appointment with Neil Foster to do the last one I have left in Wales. The majority of the routes I’ve done so far have been exceptional.
   The last one on a recent trip to Scotland made me think about the history of the climb and was more testing than I would have expected, no offence to Murdo. Setting off on the main pitch on Run of the Arrow I had my trainers on my harness and was expecting a quick run up a classic e6, not quite as cocky as it sounds as I’ve done a few 100 of this grade and normally get up them first go although I’ve found an easy way of finding fear is to set off on them when very tired or hungover.
 Dinwoodie had onsighted to the high flake on it on a 1st ascent effort and then managed to scrape in a wire somehow and make an epic retreat. Later on Pete Whillance abseiled the climb and then did it.
  My guidebook said many wires in the cracks on the face, I got 2 ok RPs next to each other which and the sequence above felt E6 leading to easier climbing and the end of the good feet. I did ponder for a few minutes there. I knew Pete Whillance would have had a fag where I was and carry on regardless of facing a fall which I thought you’d be very luck to survive. I was pretty impressed Dinwoodie had got to this point without knowing anything about the level of climbing or gear he faced which must have been one of the pushiest efforts of the time.
I eventually climbed higher to get in an RP and reversed back to make the grim move to get gear in the lower bit of the flake where I didn’t actually get anything useful in. I extended the top RP miles to stop it coming out with rope drag and eventually committed to the 6b moves up left. I spoke with Tony Stone later who said I’d missed some key sideways stopper but either way I didn’t clock it and as a lead without the bashed in wires it felt more dangerous than many E7s I’d done, quite like the routes found on north stack. Dan Vajzovic got off lightly as he was close to getting guided up it the week before but his boots looked a bit too crap.
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   I didn’t manage to get out and reccy the Welsh 100 until August. I had a day out which was the first time on that style in half a year and I actually felt the best I’d been for more than a decade moving fast and confidently over 15 to 20 routes it felt like what I had in mind would be possible. I booked off the 6th September as annual leave for it which was my only window due to work but the weather was shit so June next year will be the next opportunity. I’d like to do it as homage to many of the classic routes in the area and particularly Joe Brown who did the first ascent of many of the climbs which I have on my list.
Whilst reccying the route I’d take from Rampart corner to the cromlech I did find a gem at the opposite end of the climbing spectrum. A new highball arête. I must have walked near the thing a hundred times on MLs but I looked at it with a modern eye and knew if the high pockets were ok it would be climbable. I’m not generally the keenest boulderer but I do love arêtes and it rekindled a desire for bouldering I’d not had since climbing Careless Torque a few times in 2010 when I worked out a short person sequence on careless torque for the start and the finish and me and bransby did it within 5 minutes of each other with Ron Fawcett giving us the thumbs up down in Hathersage afterwards. One of the better days I’ve had on the grit was repeating it again after doing Unfamiliar and finishing on the arêtes above.  Although not quite as striking a line as Careless it is up there with it in terms of quality climbing and is a great spot to hang out. The Devils Blade. It’s possibly a bit harder than Careless as well.
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    Finishing on a highball is appropriate as my next trip will be the person I most associate with nails ones, Dan Varian. In October we are hoping to visit Skye Wall and Sron Ulladale but the weather will inevitably dictate the play. The face I cleaned up on Cloggy in early July is looking like it will have to be a rite of spring.
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  Having arrived in Madrid I was kindly picked up by top alpinist Manuel Cordova. Pedriza lies an hour North from the biggest city in Spain above a lovely town called Manzaneres el  Real.  We stayed in a small town nearby, Soto del Real. Each day would have a similar framework for food, we’d have toast at eight in the morning, Manu would have a small banana (3inch by 1) and a cereal bar (114Kcal) for lunch, I would have twice as much as Manu and we’d eat a main meal about ten or after at night. 
    We spent the first 2 days on El Reloj (the clock) which offers vertical crimping style routes of between 20 and 30 metres in length, all of top quality, some of the best we did here were:
Codan el barbaro 6a+
El Bodeguero 6c+
Metal  Y Tan 7b
Orquidea salvaje 8a.

  On the 3rd day we went to an area which was the ‘real deal’ of slab climbing and one which I’d not experienced considering I’ve climbed a lot on granite and slate. On the Placas Principales, sector derecho  o muro superior.
    It felt like a shorter bolted version of Etive slabs. We had two more members of the team Aitor, top guy, climber, local, filmmaker and Dario who directs Desnivel which as well as being the main Spanish climbing magazine is a huge mountain bookshop in the centre of Madrid.
    Aitor recommended a route called Azul de Samarcanda a 6b+ diagonal line as a warm up!  Aitor lent me encouragement on the first 3m I managed to clip the 2nd bolt with relief and thought back to Dawes words. It had felt like an e4 6b and although I’d felt good on an 8a and 8a+ I’d done the prior day I knew I was in for a Pedriza kicking at this new and very different venue.
     The 2nd warm up Semilla Negra, 7a+ felt like a grit e6 6c. The next was Jartum, 7b+/c  which felt like an e7 6c which is ridiculous as the bolts were really close together!  La Llambria, 7c+/8a felt much the same in terms of lack of security and by the end of the day I felt mentally drained from the feeling of possibly falling off nearly every move all day.

  Aitor suggested that they feel more secure if it is 5 degrees cooler and I mentioned I’d be keen to go somewhere with grips the next day. Later that night we headed to the Desnivel bookshop in the centre of Madrid where I wished I’d spent more time on Duolingo before dithering through a presentation. The Main Square in Madrid is a five minute walk from Desnivel and myself and Manu strolled there afterwards for a late night paella.

   The following day we went to an area with a different style again: Risco de la Peseta. Starting on some great 30m slab pitches on the lower tier before going to an area with some great lines. I found it difficult to gauge the angle but Aitor had assured me there were holds on the climbs here as I was keen to use my upper limbs. Aitor was keen for me to try a classic 8a+ called the Pelaez de Yemas . Getting up it without slipping off felt something of a miracle and if Aitor mentions there are holds on routes I wouldn’t expect any good crimps. If anyone enjoys classic climbs on the slate such as the Medium they would do well to pay this sector a visit.

   That night we were joined by Pedro Pons (Boreal team manager) and Nuria along with Ignaci and Sara. The last time I’d seen them was at their lovely guest house overlooking Chulilla. It had been a rather noisy last night in Chulilla and it tested my Spanish to the limit to try and palm that whole evening off onto Jordan and Nathan but I think I managed it.
   The following day involved an hours’ drive to meet up with many other climbers including Luiz Munoz, Jesus, Carlos Lagrono and Nacho Sanchez. We went to a pretty impressive limestone bouldering venue which certainly pisses over any I’ve seen in Britain. There were some strong scenes, none of which involved me and I was instantly missing the slabs of Pedriza. People more than 6 foot 5 were trying a font 8b dyno which did look impossible. It was great to see Pedro looking steely strong, Carlos romping up an 8b and Nacho nearly doing a rather chunky looking font 8c with the last deadpoint to a mono looking particularly hard. I would have liked to have had Dan Varian and Ned there to do some ‘team sends’.
   The following day with a much smaller team we headed to El Muro (E). This face offers yet different climbing again being a steep slab and offering climbing which feels just off vertical with some normal holds here and there. The top routes we did here were:
 Puro Barrio 6a+
  La Raya del Luis, 7a+
 La Mana de Espana, 7a crack
 La Correvuela, 8a

   La Correvuela was probably the best route of the trip and is like a shorter and more difficult version of The Indian Face climbing lots of Shallow Scoops but with thankfully plenty of bolts. 
   Later that day Dario made the funniest comment of the trip saying how there were lots of charismatic climbers in Britain. He obviously hadn’t spent much time in Sheffield, although with improvements in stem cell therapy there is hope yet. Dario put a few short videos of some of the climbs online which Mark Reeves commented were some of the most exciting climbing videos he’d ever seen?

   The final day we had some bad weather and utilized the excellent Climb rocodromo where Manu showed me how easily he could crack out a load of 1 arm pull ups and Carlos, Alfonso and Luiz were lapping up 1,5,9s on the campus.  I gave another talk at this wall on that night and big up to these super strong guys, Jesus and crew for coming along and giving up part of their evening.  Me, Manu and Luiz went for the biggest burgers in Spain at the ‘Pirates Bar’. I’d been struggling to sleep for much of the week so that last night decided to scroll through the internet looking for the most boring reading I could find, I eventually settled on Nick Bullocks Blog and was out in seconds.
     Aitor had been our main friend/guide of the trip and he had suggested that spending a winter there would be a good idea, if the opportunity arises in a couple of years I’ll certainly endeavour to do this. We didn’t get to one of the major slabs where the brilliant looking Artherencia lies which looks as good a slab as I’ve seen. For climbing a great deal of stunning granite I can’t think of anywhere better in the world. It has a huge number of slabs, faces, corners and cracks, mainly single pitch that are well bolted with a good guidebook for the single pitch routes, unlike Yosemite. Aitor seemed to know of a huge number of stunning looking projects from 8b to 9a scattered around.

      I’d highly recommend it for anyone wanting to improve on granite, improve footwork or just go to hang out in a lovely spot with a friendly atmosphere.
   Big thanks to Manu for looking after me, Jesus for sending me, Aitor for being a legend, Paulo for getting me and Manu into a posh party in Madrid, Pedro for keeping me with Boreal and everyone who came to the presentations given in the worst Spanish imaginable.

Great effort from Mcmanus and Pwiddy on the Secret Passage in Yosemite as well, it sounds a serious outing.

The best in the South West.

 Pembroke, Gogarth and Lundy are the best UK sea cliffs I've climbed on.

Over the 3 visits I’ve had over the last 12 years many memories stand out:

>Looking down from the crux sequence on Watching the Ocean at my last runner and partner Leanne, wishing I’d put in more rather than face a fall down most of the Diamond. That Steve Findlay did the bugger without chalk shows where Hazel got her granite gecko genes.

>Struggling and cursing to clean the green mariners grass off the crux of the Fifth Ace contemplating backing off with Dan freezing on the belay but with the certainty that Littlejohn would no way back off.

>Drinking whisky in the empty lighthouse on a final night on the island with Neil Youth, Simon Tappin and a gang from Bristol with the rain and wind lashing against the windows.

>Having a pint in the Marisco tavern with Pete Hurley and looking out aghast at the ghostly apparition stumbling down the hill towards us, slow, coughing and looking more dead than alive.....it was Neil Kershaw still recovering from a rave in Swanage.

 

 

      I had my first visit in 2003, driving down with Leigh McGinley and Mick Pointon from North Wales we met up with Leanne Callaghan, Wesley Hunter and Adam Wilde in Ilfracombe, bivvying there for the night before getting the ferry the next day to spend a week on Lundy. We ‘partner swapped’ most days and spent a reasonable amount of time getting lost trying to find the correct zawn we wished to climb in often hiking back up steep grass slopes.

    I was pretty taken with the Diamond at the time and can say that for technical and bold climbing it is a world class venue giving climbing which feels akin to routes like Bachar Yerian in Toulomne Meadows. Some of the bolder climbs can feel unnerving when you see a small hole where a bolt used to be, letting you know there may be trouble ahead.

   We took in lots of classics across a spectrum of difficulties including: Satans Slip, Darkpower, Indy 500, Cullinan, Ex-Cathedra, Olympica and most routes on the Diamond. Some of the things that impressed me about Lundy were: the variety of climbing, the number of Gibson routes, Steve Findlay doing Watching the Ocean without chalk and the solo ascents made by Dave Thomas. It was at this time as Nic Sellers completed the hardest climb on the island, Amygdala, being both hard and amazing looking, it unfortunately fell down recently with half the zawn.

   On the final day myself and Mick Pointon were on a belay in the Devils Limekiln to attempt a new line between the 2 existing routes, The Exorcist and the Antichrist. I’d soloed the first and the 2nd had felt quite easy but my vague memory of the new one was that it was serious. Halfway up I called down to Mick a few times as every time the ropes hit the face bits of loose rock seemed to go down and I was concerned he’d been hit. After what felt like an eternity he answered my calls and I continued to the steep grass and the top. I don’t have much desire for this type of climb nowadays as at the time I saw old age as similar to London, a place I’d prefer not to go.

Micks car broke down on the journey home and we eventually made it back to Llanberis in a RAC van.

 

  The 2nd trip involved one of the enigmas of British climbing, Neil Dicksen. We set off down in one of the worst vehicles I’ve owned, a small Fiat Panda I’d bought off Jim Hughes. We were overly keen on the journey down and tried to climb at Dinbren where it rained, on to Llanymynych where it also rained and on to Ilfracombe.

   The climbs prior to this trip involving Neil had a similar theme. Neil would go for a lead, take a terrifying fall and end up seconding. This trip was the start of his body catching up with his imagination and in the following years he repeated loads of the hard Lundy routes as well as adding his own, culminating in a very serious lead of Hey Gringo without its 5 bolts giving what sounds like a granite version of Indian Face, Quetzalcoatl, on the serious Black Wall.

    He always made me think about how close to your physical limit you can take it on routes where a fall on much of the climbing would be serious or terminal, possibly the best person I’ve seen at breaching this instinct led gap with Nick Wharton also coming to mind. It is a curious mindset for the more dangerous routes or indeed why people climb them at all, through ignorance, escapism, for acclaim, mental absorption, a tick, a ‘spiritual retreat’, meditation or even just to give death the middle finger when you top out. There is always a fine line between confidence/adventure and arrogance/misadventure, the person who pushed their boundaries and the person who overstepped them.

   A friend was at North Stack Wall on Gogarth a few years ago with a group of handy foreign climbers and the general theme was that they didn’t understand or desire to get on the routes. It made me laugh as John Redhead knew how to keep people from his climbs and although The Bells The Bells is an iconic route it will rarely get climbed each decade. The Black Wall on Lundy is comparable to North Stack seeing more Mariners Grass than climbers. Having minimal impact on the rock face may mean you have to risk making an impact, no pun intended Hazel. It’s worth remembering that it’s not that many years ago when most climbs were comparable with the North Stack climbs for danger, having the odd sling for gear but knowing you should never fall.      

   We didn’t do anything dramatic during the week but had a great time. On the first day after climbing Metamorphosis and Emergency Ward Ten we abbed in to Two Legged Zawn. Neil led the first pitch of Voyage of the Acolyte and I set off up behind being impressed with his lead as conditions weren’t ideal. Nic Sellers and Harry nine toes had joined us in the zawn and had set off up The Dog Bollox, a Nick White and Foster masterpiece.

   The sun beat down on us and having both attempted the 2nd pitch but without the necessary commitment we were back on the belay. I looked down forlornly to our bags which attached to the abseil rope were now wafting about submerged in the sea. The Sellers/Pennels team were having a similarly difficult time, having given up on the original plan we were a blockage to their nearest exit so they traversed leftwards into the next route beyond and I think ended up carrying on going somewhere out left. Once the sun had left the face we continued to the top, impressed with the Dave Pegg and Thomas route. The week continued in a similar vein with the youth making a bold statement by missing out any bolts found on certain pitches and me feeding him out loose if I thought he might struggle seconding. After a good last night celebrating I left him on the island and headed back to North Wales where I learned that chumming on Lundy was poor preparation for the Pedol Peris fell race with Noel Crane. Neil continued his good form when I’d left, climbing the awesome arête high in Two Legged Zawn, naming it The Penitent Man.  The main route I’d wanted to try was still there to go back for, Nick Whites and Dave Thomas’s: The Flying Dutchman.

 

   Roll on 2015 and the most recent trip to Lundy. A ‘Stag week’.

The journey down included a nice variety of UK climbing. Starting on the Diamond in North Wales I blagged a lift with Bransby to the Peak and had a day out on Staff grit doing Painted Rumour and Caesarian with POD and Angeles before heading down to Pembroke with Dan Mcmanus. The highlight of Pembroke was doing a Gary Gibson classic on the outside of the Cauldron, Dreaming Again has 2 exceptional pitches with the top being a crack next to an arête and should be regarded as one of the best in Britain with good protection. We did do a new route on the Green Bridge which though it covers impressive terrain became less and less wholesome as height was gained, like many institutions.

   We managed to find the worst possible bivvy on the drive down to the ferry the night before and I received a disappointing txt off one of the organisers of the week who had decided to bale last minute. I forget the main gist of the txt, something about busy being a full time donor of something or other.

   It was a fine little crew who made it down. Adam Long had dragged Bransby along, Lee Roberts and John Orr, Wesley Hunter and the Sheffield contingent of Pete Hurley, Ryan Pasquill, Neil Kershaw and Rob Clifton all fresh from a rave in Swanage. When they were kids I used to pick Pete and Ryan up from Lancashire to do trips to the Peak and Wales and it was obvious none of us had grown up too much.

   However unhealthy I was during the stag week when contrasted to some members who had been to the rave I felt like a fad-diet-yoga-training-health-climber that you find around Sheffield. When Ryan started telling me about his 3 week training plan when he got back to Sheffield I just nodded and drifted away to Ben Eltons revelation of TTO in his book; Stark, about poisoning planet Earth. Ryans foundation before his training appeared to be built around an embodiment of TTO: Total Toxic Overload.    

     On the first day most teams headed down to the Battery, Dan and Wez headed up the Cullinan and I bouldered to warm up and watched proceedings as 2 more teams headed up in a line on the Cullinan. Later on I jumped on The Flying Dutchman keen to get the main event out of the way as my first route of the trip. It didn’t disappoint and the guidebook saying it’s one of the finest hard routes in the south west is no understatement. There are a few pegs which help show the line with good gear to back them up. It’s a better single pitch route than Dalriada and should be on any granite devotees ticklist, though I don’t think it possible for anybody shorter than say...5 foot 3 but theres a gauntlet.

   I think Adam Long would have to get the prize of the most psyched climber, doing classics all over the island with his 2nd generation grit skills coming into play and giving Bransby no respite. Widespread Ocean of Fear and Antiworlds got numerous ascents. Dan did a fine lead on The Dogs Bollocks which again received a few ascents, giving brilliant, sustained and well protected bridging. There was an awful lot of talk about trying the Penitant man from one member of the party but an effort never materialised!

   It never ceases to amaze me how many good hard climbs Gary Gibson put up in both Pembroke and Lundy. The final 2 days involved 2 of them. We climbed American Werewolf on Lundy, a brilliant and positive face climb before heading over for the Fifth Ace in Deep Zawn. Dan did a good lead on a slightly damp and dirty 1st pitch and I led the top pitch after getting over a bout of TDS on the somewhat dirty crux. I was pretty close to backing off but having seen Littlejohn in action on the Lleyn once I knew he’d of gone for it and was determined not to let Testosterone Deficiency Syndrome get the better of me. It feels a bit like a turbo version of Comes the Dervish but on granite, definitely deserving of some traffic.

   The final day me and Wez headed down to the Black cliff and did Intensive Scare before heading over to join Dan on the Battery to try The Flying Dutchman. We finished the trip by doing this again although not without a near miss of replicating Nick Whites big fall at the end of the runout near the top due to ‘being spent’.

Later on the festivities began in the Marisco Tavern. Some of the evening is best forgotten but it did provide a name for our new route on the Green Bridge in Pembroke, Absinthe.

   The following day Adam, Ben, Ryan and Rob climbed Olympica and some of us just spectated.

Some general thoughts on this last day were:

Lundy has a ton of really great climbs.

Paul Harrison did a great job of the guidebook and I can see why he loves Lundy.

Dunne and Birkett have missed a trick as there is a lot of potential for new big lines.

Littlejohn and the clean hands gang were correct, for most routes if they are chalked deduct a grade from the guidebook one, so much easier to read and commit to.

Mariners Grass is very pretty but can be a real pain for finding holds.

Ryan should give his body to an immunology research lab.

I’ll be going back next year.

 

The climber shakes out and looks ahead, feeling fairly fresh and highly confident of success.

“so you don’t use the crack right of the arête”

“No, ye git the big fat f**king pinch, swap feet and lay it on”

The climber laybacks up feeling good and grabbing the slopey fat pinch with his right hand he milks it and eyes up the distant finishing jugs, swapping feet the climber gives it everything, hitting the jugs for a second his left hand holds it..........a moment later the climber is sailing down over Divided Years. On his way down 2 questions were going through the climbers head along with various swear words:

1: Had he been sandbagged.

2. Did he deserve it.

   I’d been looking forward to the main trip of the year for some time, partly to visit a new venue and partly because it was a good team. Ryan Pasquil and Ray Wood are akin to the George Best and James Hunt of climbing, Ryan being full of talent, drink and drugs and Ray offering the other attributes you’d associate with the pair. Ryan had broken his ribs 6 weeks prior to the trip and was uncertain he’d make it having replaced oxygen with alcohol for much of his recovery phase. He’d certainly seen better days, with a rough beard, clothes and missing a tooth he reminded me of a hobo, somewhat offset by his Arcteryx jacket. DMM were helping with the trip and there was a high probability of shit weather but I was confident of formulating an exciting report about the best pubs and cafes in the vicinity with a little bit about how hard we found the E2s when we managed to get onto dry rock.

   We all scrambled into my Almera having just enough room for Rays big bags full of hairspray. The ferry from Holyhead to Dublin takes in the brilliant view of Gogarth and arriving on the other side we drove North for 2 hours to stay at Meelbeg Cottage near Newcastle in the heart of the Mournes.

   The first morning after pulling Ray away from the wifi connection we drove the 20 minutes through the Mournes to park in the Little Carrock area before setting off walking towards the Buzzards Roost passing the Mourne Wall. I’d put my walking boots on and took the lead chuckling quietly while Ryan and Ray followed in approach shoes as I led them the most boggy way I could find to the cliff. Nearing the cliff we took in the awesome line of Divided Years, a huge ships prow which was full of in-situ kit and quickdraws. We did the classic 1st pitch of Spirit level into Plumbline before doing the classic E4 Twist of Fate.

The venue was considerably better than I expected giving excellent climbing on high quality granite. Getting in touch with Ricky Bell that evening he offered to come up and get the in-situ kit out and was keen to get some footage. I couldn't believe our luck as the route was in a bit of a shit state and would of been a bit grim from lichen on some holds.

 The next day we warmed up doing War Music whilst Ricky very kindly stripped Divided Years and put chalk on the key holds as well as divulging lots of good info. I climbed up to the key pecker where the hard climbing begins and downclimbed as Ricky recommended. Ryan did the same.

 Soon after I gave it a proper go, not getting the kneebar in very well I reached something shit, started to pull out and promptly fell off. Ryan goes up next slapping through my highpoint he lays it on for a load more moves, his body was quivering with surprise and I looked on in amazement. If his body didn’t explode maybe he’d top it out? If he did blow up what would be the alcoholic % of his remnants?

The surprise eventually caught up with him and he gave the pecker a good testing. It was a fine image and if I was a marketing genius I would have got a picture with a caption "Define Masculine".

  Next go up I milked the kneebar and reaching up higher my fingers closed on a fingerjug sidepull, I was both elated at grabbing it and gutted at missing it earlier. Pulling right the hard wire placement felt fine along with the crux moves to gain the shakeout. I felt instantly recovered and knew I was in with a good chance. What followed was the best sandbag I’ve had. The hardest moves on this top section are leaving the shakeout, these felt ok and arriving at the open pinch I’d been recommended I committed to the dynamic 6c move which would be one of the hardest on the climb. Not quite hanging the jugs my right arm was decimated from the pinch and even after a rest day it felt kod.

  A rest day was required and I’ve never been that keen on them but this one was truly horrible. Ryan had cooked up a big curry the night before and the gap toothed troll sat all day on my sofa bed farting. The only good bit of the day was Ryan losing cards for washing up.

  We returned after a rest day and the crack right of the fat pinch held a good hold and a static 5c move led to jugs. We both did it 1st go that day having left most of the gear from our 1st day on it. It is one of the best climbs I’ve done and it was great to do it with Ryan but looking back on this bugger I was a bit disappointed with my effort in general as it had a farcical element about it. It is also a bit of a shame it doesn’t finish with the chuck off the fat pinch as it would be a hell of a finish.

 Ricky pulled out a very good lead on a knew climb with some hairy looking moves and runouts going on to create a contender for the hardest climb on the Roost, Peacetime.

   After celebrating Ryans birthday and our ascent the following day we had perfect weather and hiked up onto the ‘abundant tors’ on Sleive Binnian, joined . We did Electra, a brilliant E1, some bouldering and a rather unique E7 called We’re All Learning in the sun which offers 20 metres of burly E3 into 5 metres of gritesque technicalities. Later that day Nathan Lee did a fine lead on the bold Tolerance, whilst belaying I was eyeing up a flightpath to take in slack in the event of a fall. This area is well worth a visit, giving ace climbing with unbelievable views.

   With a poor forecast for Fairhead we decided to stay in the Mournes, after watching Ricky Bells brilliant short movie, In The Middle we were both inspired by the look of the Peaceline, a route of Rickys up the arête left of Divided Years.

 With a poor forecast we set off walking having ditched Ray somewhere. The forecast was poor and after 30 minutes I questioned Ryan asking him what he thought. He said he was keen to give it a go and admiring his enthusiasm I made a mental note to do the thinking for both of us, later confirmed whilst playing cards under an overhang on the Roost, sheltering from the rain. We had a quick session in the Tollymore Wall that afternoon and I was interested to see how Ryan would be after treating his body like a bottle recylcling bin. I feel obliged to put in a good word for him with the female contingent in Sheffield, he didn’t look too bad at all and once he fixes his gap tooth he’ll look very similar to a member of one of those boy bands, 1 Direction etc.

  The following day was our last for climbing. We walked in and thought to warm up climbing up and down the start of Peaceline. After we both did this Ryan took off for a proper go. I’d warned him a few times with dark humour that if he fell off the crux he would gain enough velocity to knock the rest of his teeth out like seen in the old Roadrunner cartoons. The footage I’d seen of Rciky on it had made me sweat thinking about being up there. Not dicking about at the crux Ryan slapped the arête and crucifixed bundled his feet right before trying to slap into an undercut.

    Parting company with the face I was thankful we’d borrowed Oli grounsels ropes as Ryan plummeted back in, landing well. It was pretty obvious that a good landing poise was necessary to avoid being battered by the fall back into the face. I climbed back up and getting near Ryans highpoint I put in a rather inadequate wire, eyed up the big move to the arête and reversed again, not feeling like taking the all too likely plunge when fully lanked in the crucifix.

   Ryan went up again and went full throttle again, dropping off I waited for the shit wire to rip and the bugger held. My last go up I’d mentally committed to hitting the arête and managed to get through, with Ryans pushiness rubbing off along with our silent agreement of me placing the gear and Ryan testing it.

  We went into Newcastle for some Guinness to top the trip off. Our thoughts drifted to people who hadn’t made it out and we drank to missing friends. Calum, before he got into adventure modelling. Pete, who will never leave Parisellas cave again. Jack, who had pissed off to France with all the other softies.  Bransby, who is just plain useless. The list went on.

   Did I deserve a sandbag? What do you think.

 For anyone heading out to the Mournes with Divided Years in mind I’d offer the same advice I was given for that final hard move:

“Ye git the big fat f**king pinch, swap feet and lay it on”


Big thanks to DMM for supporting the trip, especially Kat Dunbar and obviously Ricky Bell & Michelle O'Loughlin

   The spring so far has felt like going through various stages of British climbing history. Going from Dawes’ slate masterpieces, Arrans Pembroke classics, Liveseys early frighteners onto attempting Moffats tribute to LPT Liquid Ambar.

   After having a few years off sport climbing I started the year with a trip to Spain which reignited the ‘sport desire’ and made me realise I’d been pretty unfit for 3 years. Getting back down LPT the start of the season I had forgotten how good the venue is. It’s got some of the best sport climbs in Britain across a large spectrum of difficulties. Night Glue, Bad Bad Boy, Statement of Youth, Over the Moon and Youthanasia being some of my top choices.

   In 2011 I had my first 2 month period of my life of taking sport climbing seriously with it always taking a backseat to trad. This same year 2 friends, Neil Dyer and Pete Robins were vying for the 1st ascent of the direct on the Walking Mussel which became one of the areas hardest sport climbs, Megalopa, Dyer got it first but I regard it as both theirs. Being hard 8b to a poor shakeout before a short fingery 8a+ it’s all about recovery on poor rests. Myself and Oli Grounsel climbed this early season before a great weekend in Pembroke.

   The Easter weekend in Pembroke is often like Glastonbury in the campsite field near St Govans Inn. Over the weekend climbing with Dan Mcmanus we did a few great climbs, most of the harder ones belonging to John Arran, at least in their free forms. Three E7s which come highly recommended from the trip were Horizontal Pleasures (a Yosemite 5.12b), Roof of the World and Monster in a Box. Very different propositions but offering great, safe routes at the grades.   Another route very worth doing from the trip is an Oxley/Waddy route called Outfoxed, giving good protection to high up but with a tricky bit at and above the roof but giving a 3 star E6/7. Interestingly over the weekend we came closest to falling on an E5 so don’t let the grades deter a go at the harder ones.

A few days after I was walking past Watford Gap with Pete Robins and Ray Wood to the view overlooking Twll Mawr, where the Quarryman lies and some key scenes from the Stone Monkey video. I’d abbed down Couer De Lion a couple of times to clean and check the moves and the gear and the opportunity to try it with Pete had arrived.

   On my first abseil I arrived at the crux and was scratching my head for a few minutes, it appeared pretty blank but I knew I’d done the moves a decade or more before when looking at the Meltdown. I worked out each hard move on the crux and was pretty impressed by how insecure they were.

  On the day of the ascent I’d stayed off the coffee and was feeling nervous waiting to go down, partly because of a near bust tip and because the main pitch is so insecure and the day felt warm and too still.

We abbed in over the horrible slate choss pile to the base and having warmed up at home and a solo I set off. After a few metres of 6b climbing you get to the most serious bit of the climb, a weird 6b move above a poor landing, 6 more metres of bold 6a leads to the bolt beneath the crux. Even knowing the moves it’s hard to make yourself commit to them because there are a few of them which are so insecure it would be really easy to fluff any of them and to make them work requires some speed to stop the feet rolling. After a couple of 7a moves one more 6c wild layback and lunge gives access to a rest before the final slippery e6 6c section to the belay. Pete came up and the next e6 6c pitch felt easy after the first pitch and the final one up the arête pillar a pleasure. We topped out just in time and went down with Ray to the Gallt Y Glyn ripping yarns about Dawes. It was the best day out I’ve had this year where everything went like clockwork but with plenty of potential of getting shut down with a friend I've climbed with a lot over the last 15 years.

   I spoke with Johnny many years ago about him grading it e6 7a and he said he was pissed off with getting stick about giving stuff big grades. I suppose there just weren’t many comparable routes about then. In 1987 this was a remarkable ascent which would have been at the cutting edge of adventure trad at the time. It’s worth sampling some of his routes from this era to get a feel for where he was at.

   Pete Livesey is a man my dad would talk about a great deal when I was getting into climbing. He left a big legacy in the Lake District with routes such as; Bitter Oasis, Footloose Crow, Dry Grasp and Nagasaki Grooves to name a few.   He sounded a dry humoured character and anyone wanting an insight into him can read the excellent book Fast and Free. His and Ron Fawcetts approach to climbing and the climbs themselves are things I relate to heavily, going for quality and quantity.

 I’ve done a lot of his climbs over the years and they’ve always held an air of quality and often boldness, much like Whillance ones. As part of trying to finish extreme rock in the next couple of years I went to climb Jenny Wren and Deliverance in Gordale Scar. Being put up in 1974 and given a lowish grade I expected a gift for E5 and was a bit gobsmacked. Leading the first 2 in one I thought the 2nd pitch could warrant e6, giving hard 5c moves on sometimes loose rock with duff gear a long way down to your right, certainly a bigger lead than Lord of the Flies. Deliverance although giving harder (more lichenous) moves was a much easier lead. Livesey gave his climbs very minimal inspection, a precursor to the likes of Dawes, Redhead, Dixon and Haston amongst afew others.

 

 

Livesey disparaged the bolting ‘revolution’ somewhat as it was occurring in Britain, thinking it took away the character and adventure of climbing.

    “sport climbing is simply mastering moves. I haven’t the remotest inclination to join this band of climbers nor have I anything against what they are doing.”

    I don’t know quite what he’d make of much of the climbing scene nowadays where lots of people talk about training indoors, resting, recovering and of course getting a selfie with a smile in said indoor environment #inspiring#restdaysarethebestdays?. Perhaps when the club huts ‘die out’ they’ll be bought up and made into climbing walls where one can hire a ‘mind-full performance climbing coach’ who doesn’t climb but has a background in kayaking, learning styles and training paradigms. Looking out of the windows of the huts they may sometimes ponder why anyone would climb on the cliffs, let alone the names of some of the climbs nor the history and characters behind them.
 

   Getting back to Wales from the wknd in Yorkshire I went back down to LPT where Ben Moon had made his Statement of Youth in 1984 and Jerry Moffat put up Liquid Ambar in 1990. I’m not sure if many people clocked the level of progression which occurred during this period.

 Ben Moon made a super quick repeat of LA in 1993 and in 2009 my friend Pete Robins made a repeat. A week or 2 before his successful ascent we went to Yorkshire together with the idea to climb 3 classic 8a+s in a wknd, The Groove, Urgent Action and Supercool. It rained for 48 hours solid so after the groove we had to find other 8s to do. After climbing Grooved Arete at Kilnsey Pete was about to warm down by onsighting The Ashes at Kilnsey. When he got his top off I stared aghast at how thin and ripped he was even after forcing a few pints down him on our trip. Up until that year we had always been beer drinking trad ledge shufflers. He’d done a very hard Boulder problem in Parisellas cave (V13/14) just before starting on LA and he told me he had to do some fingerboarding for LA as his fingers weren’t strong enough.

   This is just setting the tone for Liqiud Ambar

   I’d been on it in 2012, quickly done it in 2, but having a tweaky shoulder on a move high up I directed attention to the less steep Meltdown. I’d love to climb this route and the Sea of Tranquility which are the 2 hard ones I have left down there. I knew this one would suit me less well than the others because there are no shakeouts to recover on at all, unlike most other routes. It’s super finger strength and core intensive, being soft 8b to a clip at 2/3rds height then with no rest the crux sequence gives a V9/10 being comparable to the Lotus and Corridors of Power in the Pass.

I got on it in mid April and in early May got high on a few goes before the weather went cold and damp which meant numbing out and getting lower. Oli Grounsel should definitely have polished it off before he went to Ireland as he only weighs 7 stone and was looking very good on it, he obviously didn’t want it enough?

    It is a tough climb to do and in 1990 this must have been one of the toughest physical testpieces out there. Fairplay to Moffat, this is an incredible climb. I’ve not been on a sport climb like it and am amazed it went from routes like Statement in 1984 to LA in 1990, only a 6 year gap where Statement went from being cutting edge to feeling like an easy warm down at the end of a session after being on LA. A remarkable increase in standards showed the training and sports climbing effects coming through. It didn’t increase much through the 90s in Britain or indeed rarely in the 00s.

   It’s not too surprising then that Ben Moon steps back into the game and climbed Rainshadow. He mentions in an interview that he is 15% weaker than in the early 90s. Watching him make the V11 crux sequence look piss on it gives a bit of an insight of how strong he was back in the 90s.

  A shit thing about hard sport projects is that you don’t do much climbing. You spend most of your time resting. Having gone trad climbing for a day doing a couple of easier angled E7s I got on LA the day after and couldn’t do 3 moves. To try it I need to have 2 rest days before hand.

    Another shit point concerning sport climbing is the power to weight effect. The difference for me between climbing 8b, 8c and 9a= 10 stone, 9.5 stone and ~9 stone. As someone with a fairly sweet tooth this is probably the worst facet of sport climbing, if you see me at a cliff this summer and I’m looking hungrily at you don’t be disturbed.

 Ryan Pasquill did the fastest ascent of a 9a by a Brit in Siurana a few years ago, he did it in 3 sessions, nearly 2. He had similar specs to Ondra at the time but Ondra was still 1 stone lighter making climbing hard sport routes considerably easier. If that’s not a boring aspect of what differentiates how hard someone can climb I don’t know what is.

   I’ll try and get Liquid Ambar done sometime this summer between trad shuffling and trying not to eat cakes, I just hope I don’t need to make any sacrifices too large, like Stannis in GofT, although as I stare across at my partner I do wonder what lengths Chris Doyle would go to.

   Next up is a trip to Ireland with my friend ‘the moron’ and Ray Wood. The Moron nearly did Rainshadow earlier this year but broke his ribs pissed up riding a bike in Sheffield. He has been in a state of ‘recovery’ since so I look forward to climbing with him in Ireland. We were hoping Ben Bransby would be joining us but he’s very busy recovering from 2 weeks work he did in 2011.