A week spent watching the weather hoping and praying that we had at least two dry days, Thursday night came and the forecast was set to be good Friday evening right through to Monday morning. I can deal with the cold just as long as it's not wet, too many times do you find yourself huddled under a steep roof with what seems to be every man and his dog trying your best to climb on some real rock, when in fact the time would have been better spent training indoors. There was a few main places on my hit list; Bowden, Back Bowden and Kyloe In The Woods.
A quick chat to Hession on the Tuesday and we found ourselves assembling a small crew of four of us heading up. Going anywhere with Rich is brilliant he's like taking a walking talking guidebook who has either been and done a problem or if not more than likely watched a video of it in the shop. After some miscommunication it ended up just being Me, Helen and Rich in the van, this is sometimes better as there isn't pressure to climb at a certain place which can happen when there is a few people in a group.
Friday comes and the weather isn't looking great for that day, but I was busy with work in the morning so we couldn't leave until midday anyway, then we hoped for an evening session somewhere but the weather had other plans. Even with the rain Rich being like a child in a sweet shop still manages to find some dry bits of rock and climbs two easy problems at Bowden then got a nice 7a second go. Back to the campsite for tea and a few beers.....
Saturday 12th May
Waking up Saturday to glorious sunshine and clear blue skies, psyched!! The plan was to head back to Bowden then hopefully go round to Back Bowden in the afternoon, double session and checking two venues. We headed down the far end and towards a classic problem called Lightbulb (6a) and wow what a problem, nice little short prow followed by a high right foot to mantle on to the top of this boulder that looks like a lightbulb. As we headed back we picked out the classics and even scared ourselves with a few highballs, unfortunately the roof section i had a list of problems i wanted to try was in the middle of a lake, a large deep puddle had formed at the bottom which wrote all them problems off.
I have a personal goal of trying to climb a new 7a every time i go out. So time to try one, the one i had in mind was Transformer Direct (7a) a variation on a classic 6a+, which involved a long reach from a good hold with a solid right toe hook to drop into an undercut, slap round to a sloper then big move to a break, match the break and rock over to a slopey crimp match a break and finish. Class problem and really psyched to get it third go!
We decided to finish off at Bowden and move round to Back Bowden where there was a huge film crew with some of The North Face athletes, this was a bit of a pain but i got to see Hazel Findlay! Deffo one for the DFBWGC!!!!
Arriving here i was made up to see that the majority of problems where situated in a very steep roof, now i know why Steve built the triple roof in the crypt! Felt like perfect training for this venue. Rich pointed me towards Low and Hard (7b) this started on two incut undercuts and a goos foot rail, pulling on i quickly realised my biceps would be getting a work out as the first move felt desperate. Luckily i was pleased to pull on after this hard move and do the top section first go, this meant i had one move and i could do the whole problem, i pulled on again and felt a lot stronger. I was probably just warming into the move, as the next go i nailed the intermediate hold and slapped again to the right hand edge, kept my feet on, pulled around and i was at the boss, matching this i felt i can't blow it now sorted my feet out and rocked around up to the top hold and wooped with joy!
Not only had a done a 7b in very quick succession but it was also my first for over a year!!!
Sunday 13th May
We awoke again to dry weather but also with a hallowing gale that was bitter, after a bacon butty to start the day the plans came to head up to Hepburn, up to the classic that was The Northern Soul (7a+). Upon arrival we were all a bit dubious about whether we would actually be out of the wind, after wrestling some pads onto our back we headed up and to our surprise even the boulders quite high were slightly out of the wind. A few easy problems nailed and we were slightly warmed up so headed over to find the main reason we went. I'll be totally honest when saying after arriving at the Northern Soul boulder i was intimidated, but damn it looks like someone paid to have Cuvier moved over to the North. As goes to show though Rich pulled some fantastic climbing out the bag and after a few goes walked up the problem and to be perfectly honest it looks amazing and will be one to go back for!
With our move came the bitterly cold wind so we decided to move on to Kyloe In The Woods, I had a couple of things i had looked at in the guide i had my eye on so was keen for this change, only thing was there wasn't much easy stuff for Helen to try. After a sketchy walk in through a pine forest with high winds and very very creeky trees we arrived at the crag and i was pretty surprised i thought it would a bit more aesthetic. But one major thing the quality of the problems did not disappoint , we started off on a couple of the easier 6a's down the left hand end, i've had to try hard on 6a before but this is a new level!!
All feeling pretty tired and cold we jumped on the harder things, Rich being the nice guy he is trying to show me the beta for Monty Python's but with him struggling i decided to give it a miss and try the classic Jocks and Geordies (6c) getting into the last move on the flash and flapping it i was a bit frustrated, got on and jumped to the final sloper and i had done it! Walking down t discover the rest of the crag we found it was greener than Kermit the frog!! But we found on slightly dry problem called Flying Scotsman (7a) through a huge roof it looked amazing and Rich destroyed in a few goes. On the walk back i decided i would try the sitter to Jocks and Geordies which goes at 7a i know it easy to add an extension to a problem to grab the grade but after watching the Ginger struggle then actually finding a completely different sequence I decide it would go and it did second go!! BOOM 3 sevens in 2 days!! Best trip ever!
So far!
Monday 14th May
With the wind we were all a bit dubious on where to head today so after some deliberation we ended up coming up with a slight plan of heading to Shaftoe so even with the bad forecast if we got rained off we could head down to either Climb Newcastle or The Depot. Arriving in dry weather we walked up to the spread out problems which in fact where on a lot more course grain sandstone than we expected, so with 2 day old skin we felt it it pretty hard pretty quick. We decided with the forecasta quick hit up of Slapper (7a) and for Rich a look at Purely Belter (8a) *Strokes chin* and a flash of Surprising Solution we were done and headed home!
All in all a very good weekend and in all honesty probably my best short trip within the UK.
Keep peeled for a video.
And well done to Shauna Coxsey in Innsbruck.... BEASTIO!!!
