A mixed bag

The conditions in South Wales havent lived up to their expectations based on the last big freeze. Firstly sunday we got to llanbradach only to find that the water was still running freely down the vegetated steps much to our disgust. So that day got bagged and we went home dejected.

Keen not to repeat this i held off going out again until we'd had a good freeze-thaw cycle. So instead went and picked up my skis from a mates house. Now considering they cost me £15, i used my climbing boots and i cant ski i think it went quite well. According to my mate "they are a special set up only for me" which i think means they're completely fucked to anyone who knows anything about skiing but by the end of the couple of hours i hit the streets / parks / hills of Cardiff i was able to stop-ish, turn-ish and go off jumps that were about waist hig, getting around 6ft jumps that went on for 6m. Was a good laugh,and not as steep a learning curve as i expected.

AirBourne off one of the larger jumps

After my brief ski fun went to Boulders climbing wall, its shite so i wont post much. Did a few routes, and am now called the 'northern fairy'. Nice.

Today however went slightly better on the climbing front. After getting up at 7 and waiting for Bob in the cold for 45mins we headed back to Llanbradach, picking up a guy called Ken on the way. On arrival it was surprisingly mild, considering it was -2 in Cardiff, nevertheless we headed to the crag, but lowe behold it was sopping wet, possibly even more than on sunday. Dejected we walked around the crag looking for something to scratch up. We did actually find a non-summer route corner groove thing that had mud and some frozen bits on it so headed up that. Bob give it grade 5 but hes a hard bastard. Felt hard is all i know.

Llanbradach in the Snow. Normal falls come in on the left of the crag.

The Corner crack. We stepped left onto the triangular wall toward the top

Despite it feeling hard, it would have felt harder had i not fixed my crampons to be monos. Now this is something i have avoided doing for 4years now mostly through laziness and being scared they wont climb as well. But they do, they didnt rotate off holds like i thought they would and i was able to stand on much smaller holds more stably.

After we finished scrathing around on this route, we headed off getting in the car off to the Climbing Station, Bob commenting "that guy can talk" referring to Ken who hadnt stopped since we saw him first 2hours ago. The climbing station is pretty good, is only bouldering but thats made up for in the fact that they are good, there is a good variety and the staff arent cunts like at the Boulders wall. If im able to get to it, im definately going to be going to the station from now on. Rest day tomorrow, well might do some skiing but rest for my skin, they hurt now.

Fail...on the ice front anyway

The title says it all really. Having managed to get out of the city and head up toward Llanbradach we were disappointed to say the least to see that only one poor thaw cycle had come through and so the ice was non-existant. I would put pictures up but they would only be depressing.

Instead me and Bob went up past Taffs well main to find some drytooling hole. Which we did, it was bolted but is in no guide books and the routes were shite anyway. Might get into troube for this especially after the Millstone debacle but meh, we only did one route with just axes and torqued in thin cracks most of the way, was probably about F6b/6b+ route so not bad on our parts considering it was our first drytooling routes. The second route we did was just in our boots without axes, this would have been nigh on impossible with sharps as the holds were rounded. Had the most painful screamin' barfies ever though, thought i was actually gonna chunder. As time moved on we got bored and the routes we could climb in mountain boots in -3degC temperatures decreased, we ran away to asda and bought reduced bakery stuffs (reduced to 9p!). All in a days....frivolity.

To the 'Diff

Having left sheffield yesturday travelling to Cardiff i couldnt carry all my stuff that i wanted. The first items to be lef twere my skis. Now before i get judged they were £15 from a charity shop including poles and a bag. Bargain!

Anyway, over night and throughout the day snow has fallen on south wales, a foot of it to be exact. I woke up wishing i had them to play in the proper deep powder. Thankfully i have a mate driving down this way tomorrow, so i should be able to get them asap. Then the fun will begin. Its all training afterall. Theres a project in the pipeline that will need me to be able to ski! Nothing is done without prior thought :)

New mixed routes are also to be checked out asap, probably sunday, give the roads time to clear and get the morons out the way.

Andy K

This time last year i saw andy kirkpatrick for the first time (tickets were going cheap), i wasnt massively up for going as he seems a bit like someone who attempts things (Harlin onthe Eiger solo for example) for the media attention and stuff to talk about in his lectures rather than actually being a climber. Sat there listening to him rabbit on about kayaking after Ian Parnell had finished his talk (it was a double) only confirmed my ideas more.

Last night however i got a ticket (cheap as someone couldnt make it) and was pleasantly surprised. This wasnt the Andy kirkpatrick i remembered or imagined. He was actually funny and jsut talked about climbing (thank god). He also went into more detail about some of his el cap exploits, many of which i hadnt heard before. So this post is for andt, thanks man for changing my view on you. Your not a prick after all.

(this is a link to his blog which has a sick steve house and Marko Preljzikisk video on it:-

http://www.andy-kirkpatrick.com/blog )

More Peak winter.

Got out again yesturday for a bit of semi frozen chossy fun.

Headed to mam tor after being woken up at 8 (quite late) to say i was already late for my lift. Grabbing my stuff and drinking a bowl of porridge i ran the mile to the shops where my lift was waiting and raring to go.

Walking into Mam Tor is quite special, ive never been underneath it before and despite being reasonably small, it looks very Eigerish. Cant imagine how amazing the actualy Eiger looks. Getting to the foot of the gully at around 930am me and a friend (Paul) who id text the night before to see if he was keen, geared up and ran up the gully as a warm up / to have finally done it. We then moved onto the Central Rib (III, 4) thinking it was a grade II/III. It wasnt in brilliant condition, with the turf being semi frozen or muddy and ripping as you placed your feet and axes on the clods. I wish i had some pictures to show how brown the whole place looked during the ascent.

Reaching the top of the rib was nice as we had, had no decent gear for the length of the route (3 full pitches) a peg and a sketch nut being the sole contents of our routes gear. I think paul was a bit chastened, this was after all his 4th winter route. His comment of 'Well that was a bit different' and then declining the opportunity to do another route summed up his feelings toward the day. I enjoyed it though, it wasnt even type 2 fun, mostly type 1. Good shit.

Winter hath cometh in the PEAK

Its a bit mental but its late November and ive been able to go out in half decent conditions an climb Back Tor via 2 routes today.

There was a sprinkling of snow dusting the peaks and with temperatures dropping after a semi-thaw (-1/0degC) me and a few others headed out to Back Tor to see what was going down in Peak land. Getting up at 530 is never my idea of a good beginning to a day, but on days such as these, it has to be done. So getting out of the house and in the car by 7am we were able to be first on the route by 8am getting the first ascent for the season! So early!

Running up the thing in about 20minutes me and Sam were able to walk back around and do another route, soloing near each other both times. As the sun started licking the ridge opposite you could feel the temperature fight its way out of the depths of the thermometre. Not much else aside what we climbed was 'in' really (the turf was frozen but it feels wrong winter climbing without at least some snow) so had a wander up and over Mam Tor. Eased back into the winter of 10/11 we headed home, coffe was drunk, smiles were smiled. Now back to the work i should have been doing.

Sam at the top of Back Tor Gully after its first 2 ascents this winter

Back Tor Condition

Its been a while...

Its been a while since i last post. Mostly through laziness and a rapid increase in my work load.

For the last two months ive ben able to get out consistently on the grit, which to be honest has been a god send. As after Pembroke i realised my head had completely gone from the lack of use over the summer. So i got back on it like a keeno. Starting again at S and working back up is demoralising but there are worse places than Stanage to do every VS and HVS you can lay your tired, rash covered hand on.
Building up the confidence is a slow process but now in November im back doing E2s and the odd E3 consistently again which is slightly better than before. Solid base and all that. It feels good to have finally done the classics i was too ego driven to glance at last time. Pushing the grade has also become a more pleasureable experience as has days soloing 25-30routes.

Anyway, the snows have come so i guess its bouldering season (mid-psyce level) and of course SCOTLAND!! (uber psyce!). Ive got not a lift up north for this weekend but am heading to Back Tor tomorrow so will post about the conditions tomorrow eve after ive recovered from my 530am start....