Turn, turn, turn

Callow Bank, November morning

 

Every year, around now, I take great delight in being a gritstone climber. As August slides into September, the summer ends. Holidays are over, its back to school, to work - another disappointing summer over, and a long winter ahead. For most, a good excuse to moan. For the gritstoner, every chilly morning, every dark evening, the strengthening wind and the first falling leaf - all are reminders of the cold, crisp magic ahead. Come November - not so long now - and a clear sky will freeze the moisture from the air, leaving the Pennines sparkling like crystal under a cold, blue dome. The hills will be full of colour - great swathes of bracken red as a fox, beech leaves twisting copper and gold in the low sun. I can't wait.

In the meantime, things are busy. I've got lots of photography projects going on, including shooting a walking book, and some work on the new RSPB/ NT Eastern Moors partnership. I've also just finished a big article for next month's Climb magazine. New editors Dave Pickford and Ian Parnell have got some exciting ideas and its been great working with them. I'll expand a little more on the piece nearer the time, but its about finding my way to a fulfilling ethic on gritstone.

I'm also still teaching Rope Access - having just set up a new company with an old friend. Access Techniques Ltd will be running regular IRATA rope access courses from next week. Aide and I had both taught regularly for ATS over the years (something of an institution in the Sheffield climbing scene - being the first rope access training venue in town, and next door to the Foundry) and when they ceased trading it seemed like a good opportunity. Our new venue near Bramhall Lane is a much better building than the old ATS warehouse - being bigger, higher and with more interesting steelwork - and I'm looking forward to running some exciting courses there. Whether you're an old hand needing to reval, or just curious to find more about the industry, get in touch with us via the website.

Aide sorting gear down at ATL

Yet despite a busy year, I've somehow managed to keep a reasonable climbing standard. Back in June I managed my first sport 8a - The Ogre on Chee Tor, and in July I managed a clean on-sight of Supersonic at High Tor, which whilst not especially hard has been a long-held ambition. Last week I spent in Mallorca on a Deep Water Solo stag trip. Its not something I've ever been massively drawn to but can highly reccomend it - amazing. I'll post some more later, but here's a taster. Looks shit doesn't it?

Cala Barquez, Mallorca 12m high, sea temp 29 deg.

Midsummer in Wales

Finally I could rest. I wriggled down into my bivvy bag, breathed deep and slow the mountain air, and tried to sleep. It was well after midnight, and late on this solstice night the darkness was almost complete. The patch of sky framed by my sleeping bag was small, and a lone star glowed small in the centre. Below, the skyline was reduced to a black cut-out against the last glimmer of light on the horizon. Bristly ridge, Tryfan, shapes from my childhood - when climbing meant mountains, and long days moving through them. I hadn't been back in a long time.

 Wild Goats, Glyder Fawr

Starting as the last walkers left the hills, I'd climbed Y Gribin to the high plateau of the Glyders, where a tribe of goats relaxed in the evening sunshine. My plan had been for Castell Y Gwynt, but on a whim I turned west and photographed the sunset amongst the little tors and scattered stones of Glyder Fawr. While the sun still lit the summits I worked on the view I'd pre-visualised - the vista of  Yr Wyddfa to the west. As ever, the elements that make the scene sing can rarely be planned, tonight - a great sea of cloud filling the west but held back by the hills, sending long tendrils of vapour along the valleys to the south.

The Snowdon massif from Glyder Fawr

As the sky glowed gently in the minutes after sunset, I made my favourite photograph of the night, facing east along the broad ridge of the Gyderau. I composed it instinctively, trying to simplify the elements and create a gentle balance between land and sky. There aren't many of the rules of compostion being obeyed here, but I'm happy that it works.

Glyder Fach from Glyder Fawr

A long stumble over Glyder Fach in the gloaming led me, finally, to Llyn y Caseg Ffraith, where I had water for my dinner and a plan for the morning. The dawn came slowly. A crimson bleed on the horizon, high clouds first dark then pastel pink, a cold breeze strengthening. The cloud sea had crept up the valley in the night, and spilled like a tide over the bwlch, burning away in the light of the sun. I was cold in my bivvy, and delayed rising too long. The gentle colours of the pre-dawn were far superior to the blast of light as the sun appeared. The air was clear, too clear, with no haze to soften the light, and no cloud to fill in the shadows.

First light on Tryfan 

I took the long way back to the car by way of Cwm Cneifon, hunting amongst the rocks of Clogwyn Ddu for the Snowdon Lily. It was perhaps a little late, and I found none. It was a treat to see the cliff decked in alpine flowers though - Stonecrops, Roseroot, Starry Saxifrage and Navelwort. As I walked down cloud boiled over the ridge and played with the light, conjuring pillars and gullies from the crags. All was silent, save for the dry ringing of my footsteps in the scree, and a Ring Ouzel's piping song echoing around the Cwm.

Life and Death at Donington

 

To the north, the fields and farms of the Midlands stretched away to the Ashbourne hills and the start of the Pennines. Closer, the parkland sloped downhill to the deer fence bordering the woods, through which the sparkling reflections of the lowering sun betrayed the River Trent. A little upstream, two swans turned gracefully on the current, silhouetted black on shimmering gold. Water from much of the English Midlands flows gently past this point on its passage to the sea. To the west tributaries fan out to drain the Black Country, the Potteries, and the southern Peak. Just downstream they are joined by the Derwent, bringing both the acid waters from the high moors of the Peak, and the warm, hard waters that rise from the caves and springs of Buxton and Matlock. Together they turn and flow slowly north across the drained fens of Lincolnshire, to a muddy confluence with the Ouse in the broad valley of the Humber.

Running east along the ridge was the broad tree-studded grassland of classic English deer park, on which my companion, Guy, was conducting a bat survey for English Nature. Mentioned in the Domesday book, it has been been parkland as long as records have been kept. Strictly private too, with a concomitant style of gentle management that can disregard concerns of public safety, liability, and tidiness. Here perhaps a third of the great Oaks are classed as 'veterans' - some 250 in all - often huge, always gnarled, and left to grow into a state of majestic decay that would be deemed dangerous elsewhere. It is not a unique site, but certainly significant - the famous ancient pollard Oaks, or 'Dodders', of Windsor Park number barely 100.

The younger trees are typical oaks, with a neatly deer-browsed base supporting the full canopy that the open setting allows. As they settle in to old age - and great age it is, according to the old rhyme 'Three centuries he grows, and three more he stays, Supreme in state, and in three more decays'  - parts of the trunk begin to die, and the tree seems to slowly collapse in on itself. Trunks become great barrels, often hollow, whilst upper limbs typically die first, creating the classic 'stag-headed' Oak - bare, pale branches reaching up from a shrinking canopy. With the gradual decline comes great character. No two veteran trees are alike. Their charisma is impossible to resist, deeply individual but always with the same qualities of stately, regal bearing combined with a deep, aboriginal wildness. I climbed a little way up one, and it unnerved me. The thickened, ancient bark felt light and weak, and poorly bonded to the dry trunk that groaned hollowly beneath. It was as if the tree had gone, leaving only the husk.

Quietly approaching a huge oak with a great almond-shaped cavity high in its trunk, a pale shape resolved blinking amidst the darkness. Before I could raise my binoculars it was out; the sandy back and silent, buoyant flight of a Barn Owl. I smile at the presumption of our name in this ancient setting - trees like this would have been their homes long before barns were even an idea. Its flight takes it past another Oak, this one long dead, its barkless, bleached limbs reaching upwards still into the dusk, frozen in life like a figure struck by lightning. It was from such a tree, perhaps, that Herne, the great hunter and keeper of Windsor forest, hung himself in a tale that was old whilst this tree was young. As the last rays of the sun left its branches a perfect full moon rose pink in the east.

Our transect takes us back to the woods above the river, and a sudden scuffling in the undergrowth. The striped head of a badger nods as he squints at us. He seems unable to convince himself that we are not just deer, and dashes noisily away only to return once, then twice, to stare, snort and rush off again. By the woods the bat detector chirrups constantly - the steady chip-chip-chip of a Noctule, then the staccato rush of a feeding Pipistrelle. Earlier their dashing, twirling flight was visible against the sky, often close enough to touch, but here by the woods the darkness has collected, thickened and now they fly beyond our senses.

Website move

My main website, www.adamlong.co.uk, will be down for a few hours today whilst I switch host servers.

The new servers have much more potential, and will help me expand the site and its functionality. I'm looking into hosting the blog there too, or I might host a photography blog on there, and keep this just as a climbing blog... any preferences?

Golden Feet

I've been climbing a lot recently with Neil 'Nige' Kershaw, a man memorably described by Si Wilson as the 'beady-eyed, self-proclaimed cock-of-Lancaster'. We've got a lot in common in terms of size and climbing style, and a habit of regularly climbing with The Best without quite making the grade ourselves. Kind of Premier League reservists, if you will.

Nige

The last few weeks, though, have seen Nige step it up a gear and hit a real run of form involving onsights and ground-ups of many sought after routes. As a result I've written a bit of a profile on his achievements (in what you have to remember is his second sport - his sports teacher thought he was god's gift to cricket...) over on UKC. On here I can cut to the chase, and instead of sober listings look at who he's burned off. Recently that has included all comers. Not just consistently myself (no big feat), the likes of P Whiddy but even Caff himself, a feat Pete Robins calls 'the best feeling in climbing'.

After I blew my car up checking on the Ring Ouzels last week, I was stuck without transport amidst perfect blue skies. Frustrating, but Nige was on hand in the evenings, so he provided the transport and by default therefore got to choose the crags. Tuesday night saw us up at Burbage South freezing our arses off. Its never easy judging your clothing on an April evening with a northerly breeze, but I was cold. Too cold to climb, so I settled for belaying Nige and getting some fresh air.

 Nige cruising Ramshaw Crack at the weekend

After a swift warm-up on Goliath, Nige got onto Braille Trail, sporting a bizarre rack of gear Pete had lent him. In the first slot, reached from the floor, went a bracket pinched from the gear display in Outside's rock room. Above is another slot, for which Nige had two allen keys finger-taped together, then a sort of metal spatula, again sporting a taped on quickdraw, which was presumably for the slot further out. Strange thing was, it seemed to be a better fit here. But surely the allen keys wouldn't go in further out? Turned out that they didn't, and neither did any of his sliders. Somewhere amidst this, rapidly chilling, something popped and he was off. Round two went a bit better, this time the allen keys went high and the spatula went in the slot. It looked terrible. Then onto the crux, desperately smearing out right, he threw his right foot out high onto the arete and started rocking. And he was off, the spatula came straight out, and he ended upside down, hatless, in a tangle of ropes. It was nearly dark, so we bailed.

Twenty-two hours later, we're back and the conditions are great. Warm in the sun, cool in the shade and the breeze has lost its edge. Ryan has come along for the ride, freeing me up from belay detail so I can take photos. We warm up on a few classics, then a couple of obscure slabs that are perfect training - Bath House Pink and Mad Llehctim. Then its back on with the programme. Nige is fannying about and I'm struggling to subdue my enthusiasm. Nige gets the hint, a coin is produced, tossed, and I lose. Balls. With painful thoroughness, he ties on and squeaks his boots. I fidget with my camera.

We've got a better gear selection this time - I've dug out a few of my Dad's old mild steel pegs and a couple of the BD micro-cams. There are no hitches as Nige gets out to the slot, places one of the BD cams and continues. The foot goes back out to the arete, and he's out there. Looks scary. A couple of false starts and then he starts rocking up, right where everyone falls off in the videos... but he doesn't, and runs it out up the flutings to the top.

 probably the physical crux - gaining the arete

Now my turn. I get tied on, step on and fiddle with the pegs. They're okay, but I'm on edge, my heart is racing and head woolly. I step back down, deep breath and try to focus. Back on, and I nail the entry foot swap pefectly and click into the zone. Step out, down to the pocket, reseat the cam and glide out to the arete in a state of flow. Now I'm really committed. Twenty years climbing, thousands of hours on the ropes, and I've got my cheek on the rock telling myself not to look down. The sidepull is a stretch, and poor. The foothold is similar. Hmmm. Deep breath. Stretch again, I catch an slight positivity and seat my middle finger into it. My right hand finds an undercut pinch and I'm stepping up, reaching through... and its a jug! Its over. Just a stretch to the next fluting and a romp to the top; I expected to be gripped stupid but am already celebrating.

 initiating the rockover (pics by Nige)

I really can't believe that in twenty-six years no one has climbed this route in good style before - surely someone has? Its a pretty sad indictment of the local hard grit scene if it hasn't, and I include myself in that. Its not hard for the grade, you can pretty much see what to do, and its absolutely classic. I guess the gear may be a problem as it was for Nige, so for everyone else - here's the rack; leave your allen keys at home. Our ascents are there to be improved upon.