Saturday 27th July 2003
Written by Matt (actually by Tony but in Matt's view point):
This
day was the best day travelling in my life! It was so fun! We had an early
start with every person getting picked up at different drop-off points,
wow. The first hour and a half was a whole lot of McSleeping and listening
to CD's. After about an hour, Mr A needed diesel for his car. Callum,
Tony and me saw this as an opportunity to make a mad dash for the toilets.
I wouldn't let Tony dry his hands so he wiped them on my face, grrrr,
I got soap in my mouth. Back on the journey and I was the quiz-master
of the Who Wants To Be A Millionaire car quiz. My sound effects were VERY
VERY poor. I subsequently fell asleep and woke up at Castle Inn. It was
a great crag, lots of cool flame-grillable routes. Me and Callum warmed
up on Route 1 (F5), meanwhile Tony warmed up on a scary route 2 (F6a)!
It rained for ages, so we concluded it to be a GOOD idea to play hacky
sack..in the pouring rain. When it finally stopped, we bashed up some
more quality climbs (me and Callum did the one Tony did as a "warm
up"). Tony pushed the crowd (me and Mr A) to the limit when he onsighted
a school mam (F6b). Guess what? It rained again. After waiting under a
tree, we conquered some more routes. Tony led the final climb today, Route
3 (F6c), equivalent to an easy E4 6a (so the guide book says). It rained
yet again so we packed up our things and went to the Llanberis village.
I can't believe how stupid I am, buying yet another pair of climbing shoes
that I don't even need. After this we went to PETE'S EATS. Definitely
the highlight of the day. Everyone was blissfully happy. When we got back
we unpacked our luggage and went down to make our dinner. Within about
half an hour I blocked up the drainhole with the dishcloth and we wasted
a hundred billion days fixing it. This included the ceremonious flooding
of the kitchen on the nine million six hundred and seventy second eight
hundred and twenty first day. My errors resulted in me getting awarded
the darned dummy of the day. I had a shower and we watched the Leo Houlding
thing. And Tony had already memorized half of his new peak district guide
book. That is all.
Written by Callum
Today
we decided to practice placing gear and setting up belay stances (all new
to me). In order to do this we went to the Dinas Mot Slabs (along with Matt's
dummy of the day)! When we arrived we divided into pairs, Me and Tony and
Matt and Mr A. We set about finding really really easy routes to practice
on. To get extra practice we set up belay stances half way up, making the
climb multi-pitch. Tony led first and managed to get a size 8 nut stuck!
I seconded and then led the second "pitch". It was so easy that
I only had to place two nuts (one of which fell out with a gust of wind)!
When we got back down we embarked on a gear placing competition. Tony and
Matt managed to place about a billion pieces of gear between. I however,
only succeeded in placing two nuts. Tony won by one point. He had 9 points
out of a possible 24 and was closely followed by Matt, who had 8 points
out of 18. I only 5 points, but out of 6 I'm pretty pleased. After lunch
we practiced setting up belay stances on the ground. Matt's was easiest
as he only had to put a sling over a mahooooosive spike! Tony had an awkward
one as he managed to break the rock where he had placed a size 4 nut! He
now only had a limited number of placements. Wherever he put any gear it
made him unbalanced. My area was relatively easy because I had 2 great cracks
either side of the rock I was sitting in. I stuck a cam in one side and
a nut in the other and then joined them up with a McSling. Guess what amazing
event occurred next…..it rained! We embarked on a rather long, slippery
voyage to the Cromlech Boulders. On the way, Tony fell into the river and
soaked himself to his shoulders (ankles actually)! The Boulders were great!
Really fingery! Everything there was extremely sharp and by the end of time
we spent there our fingers had fallen off! Tony did a 6b/c problem after
swearing at it a lot! We then left and when we got back, idiot Matt realized
he'd left his fleece and prussik loops at the boulders. He has now been
pretty much guaranteed the Dummy of the Day tomorrow for the second day
running (haha)! In an attempt to rid himself of the Dummy he tried to make
a deal with Tony. The deal was that Tony did something stupid and Matt would
pay Tony with money. After mixing waffles and peas we went out. We drove
to the Cromlech Boulders so Matt could retrieve his lost jumper and prussik
loops. He found them folded and ironed and washed and cleaned on a rock,
luckily. After this shocking find we made our way to the Vivian quarry.
It was really cool there because it was all flooded and we saw Dawes of
Perception. It is a really scary climb, even though there are other harder
climbs in that very same quarry that look easier. Then we came back and
chilled. Peace out.Written by Tony:
Today we woke up and it was really wet so we decided to do maintenance work. We had to dismantle and check up on the zip-wire, and test it out, YAY! When we were taking the zip-wire down, Matt decided it would be cool to slide down the ladder. Because Matt is a born failure, he fell backwards and landed on his bumbum (haha). Then later we got to test it out, YAY! We all went really fast. But we weren't supposed to go really fast on the abseil off. Matt squeezed the lever as hard as he could and shot to the ground and landed on his bumbum (haha). After a few goes each, we did doubles and Matt got his wiener stuck in his leg loop and was shrieking with pain when we got stuck and had to be wrenched back up. After a few more goes we decided it was safe and made the tables for the super-swing. There was lots of sawdust on the floor where we were making the tables, so we decided it would be fun to make small crags out of the compressed sawdust and some shampoo that Matt found. After the maintenance for today was finished we came back to the heinous McClyd and did…nothing, apart from bullying Matt's special friends. The time had flown by. We had late dinner and looked at some old school climbing team photos. And when we came back we cleaned our teeth. Matt however decided to clean his face as well with his new invention…the toothpaste bomb! Then I sat in bed reading my guide book and making squeaky sounds. Like a baboon being beaten up, ohooheohhrohehroheohrehohahaohhaoooha." Then we went to sleep.
By Matt
Today,
we woke up to no rain yay! We had a shower as usual and McSlunk down the
stairs with me explaining the seriousness of something serious, but then…I
tripped, fell and got stuck between the door to the hall and the last step.
When me, Callum and Tony reached the kitchen I thought it looked dull and
that we would be stuck having a maintenance day and no climbing, but NO!
After breakfast, we all jumped into the car and sped away in the direction
of Bus Stop quarry, which was a remarkable coincidence because that's where
we wanted to go! I had my mind set on one thing and one thing only, to do
Fools Gold E1 5b. We got to the crag, and guess who was there… none other
than Russell's Girlfriends (about a million sheep). Tony and Callum got
set up doing Solstice HVS 5a, while me and Mr A doing Fools Gold. After
completing both climbs, it began to rain. One climb is better than none,
so we were happy to do maintenance. Before we started we needed supplies
from both, DMM second shop and the special builder place thingy. Vital supplies
were bought and we started treating the big tables. Me and Callum's job
next was destroying the rotten tables, fun fun fun, actually a lot of falling
over involved, not so fun. Wait here Callum wants an input: Matt fancies
the new instructor, whose name is Gill (haha)! Oh Matt's not coming back,
I'll just carry on! Dinner today consisted of a heinous, billion foot wide,
square pizza, sweetcorn and potatoes. It was extraordinarily nice! As soon
as we arrived in our room we decided it would be a really good idea to sort
the gear, ready for tomorrow. All the friends ended up in one pile and all
the pro-cams in the other!By Callum
Today we woke up and a strange thing happened…there was no obvious rain! However, the forecast said there would be rain, so we decided to go to Tremadog. Matt, Tony and Mr A climbed together and I climbed with two instructors, Anne and the new, less gigantic Dave. Our first route was called Christmas Curry, severe. It was my first ever multi pitch trad route and I thought it was great. I did, however, find it rather easy as all the pitches were 4-something. I had to lead second, clipping into the gear that was already there as well as adding some of my own. At the very bottom of Christmas Curry I found a cam. Unfortunately, though, it was jammed in too tight and not even Dave could get it out! The descent path turned out to be a rather tricky downwards scramble! When we eventually arrived at the ground route we decided to have a bit of lunch. Since we had geared up at the mini-bus, all our belongings were still there. After lunch we left a note for the other group and made our way to grim Wall, VS. As we approached the climb we realized something was amiss. Once we got closer we realized what the problem was…the other group were already climbing our route! We waited for them to get up the first pitch and then began our ascent. Dave lead first and when it got round to my turn I realized there were very little placements remaining. In the end I only succeeded in placing two nuts, one of which fell out when I climbed past it. The second pitch turned out to be the hardest, although I found it easier than both Dave and Anne, probably because I am smaller than both of them. Having completed our route, we descended via the descent path and joined the other team back at the minibus
Tony and Matt's entry
We
walked up to the crag with all our stuff and set off to climb Merlin Direct
HVS. But on the way the most amazing thing happened. We saw THE Johnny
Dawes in his smashed up vehicle, speeding .It was really wet on the first
pitch and the second pith was bone dry. So obviously I punched Matt until
he gave up and did the first waterfall, I mean pitch. The first pitch
was wet and wild, wildly overgrown. But luckily there was a small blackberry
bush so Matt had a small snack just before the crux. Then I came up and
led through. The last pitch (the crux pitch) was amazing. It had a heinous
hand traverse and a dodgy top out run out. Nothing really special though,
which explained why I felt extremely confident and not wetting myself
like normal. Then we came down the dodgy descent path. In the guidebook
it is graded Mod. To get to our next climb, Meshach HVS. Mr A was coming
down from the top of this route so me and Matt had to carry all our stuff
and Mr A's stuff as well down through the wet woods, over the stream,
across 100ft of road and back up through the wet woods again. When we
got there we had lunch. Matt led the first pitch and I think he enjoyed
it. The second pitch was the tricky bit though. It was dripping with water
literally. It was so wet in fact the I couldn't grip on anything so I
had to come down. This does NOT mean I am a chicken boy. I was advised
to come down by Mr A. So me and Matt were stranded half way up Tremadog
searching for gear. We found about….NOTHING! Mr A soon came back and we
abseiled off. Then went back to the car park and waited for the others.
When we got back we had dinner and I was being "immature" at
the dinner table so I had to go outside for half an hour. This was meant
to be a punishment but I set some brick hard problems. And I got out of
the washing up. Then we came back and watched 2 episodes of The league
of gentlemen, series 1. McYAY!!!
Thursday 31st July
By McMatt
Rain
again. When will this stop? Well, according to radio 4 there is a mini
heat wave coming on Saturday and lasting the rest of the week (yay hard
climbing). But anyway, today was raining and we planned to go to Ogwen
to climb at a place called the Idwal Slabs (the Cheese slabs known to
us English folk). Same groups as yesterday, that's me, Tony and Mr A and
Anne, Callum and Dave the not so gigantic giant. We set off to do a climb
called Hope VDiff (E9 in pouring rain which created water fall). It was
about a half hour dive and then about a half hour walking. The walking
was pretty tough but mildly fun. We finally reached the bottom of hope
and soon began climbing. The first pitch was the crux pitch so I wanted
to do it. I began climbing this water fall with scary walking boots on
and a bag and began I got to a big ledge and Mr A told me to stop there
and make a stance to bring up Tony. I did so and all was well. But then
Sir said that the next bit was the crux and I stopped in the wrong place
so I would lead the crux and that we would treat it as a separate pitch.
The crux was OK but the waterfall and big boots made it ten times more
difficult as it was on sears and a big reach to a ledge in the middle
of a waterfall, so if in doubt dyno! I thought it looked really good but
Tony says it was rubbish (just jealous of how amazing my Leo Houlding
impression of his 9ft dyno). Anyway we got to third pitch and Tony was
leading, nothing special but his scary run out was cool. However, seconding
was, apart from removing gear I did the whole climb no handed yay! Tony
led the fourth pitch and I couldn't remember much because I was so cold
my brain got temporally frozen. The last thing I remember is Tony shouting
"YES, YES, YES I'VE DONE IT! I'VE FOUND A SIZE THREE NUT YAY!!!"
and that's about it.
Callum's entry
Today
I was given a second opportunity to climb with Anne and Dave the not so
gigantic giant. We decided to climb a VDiff called charity. It was incredibly
wet and I fell off about 15 feet up the first pitch. I ended up about
a foot from the floor! Anne decided it was best if I led the first pitch
with a toprope as well, just to be on the safe side! I still had to clip
into the pre-placed and add some of my own, but the toprope added a sense
of security. This time I didn't fall off and when I reached the top of
the pitch, Dave made me set up my own belay stance. I placed all the anchors
but Dave helped me tie into it. I belayed Anne up the route and when she
reached the top she showed me how to tie her off. The second pitch was
slightly easier and I was able to lead this one without a toprope. It
was really good but the rain had drenched it and climbing it in walking
boots made it even harder! However, I made it and was told to set up a
stance on the next ledge. This time I was able to do it without any help
and I was also able to tie Dave off when he reached the ledge. The third
pitch was uneventful, except from the part when we ate lunch half way
up a mountain, with a great view of the surrounding countryside. Not much
happened on the fourth pitch but on the fifth pitch I was finally allowed
to lead without any pre-placed gear. This also meant I was left alone
at the top to set up my own stance. Fortunately for me, Mr A was already
at the top with Matt and Tony. He was able to point me in the direction
of a huge boulder, over which I was able to put a couple of slings. I
belayed Anne and Dave up the final pitch and we set off in the vague direction
of the bottom (although I thought we seemed to be heading upwards). After
a few minutes walking, we arrived at a sheer drop. Anne and Dave came
to the conclusion that it was best to abseil from the top. Finally, a
chance to use my prussic loops! The top of the abseil was really, really,
REALLY slimy and I slipped on it. However, as I got over the overhang,
things began to dry up and it was easy going. I reached the bottom and,
once Anne had soloed a rather tricky descent route, we set off back to
the minibus On the way we saw a huge rainbow, which went from one side
of the valley to the other and over a lake. We got back to the mountain
centre and began on dinner, which today consisted of fish, chips and luxury
peas with a rice pudding desert thingy! It was heinous! When we got back
to the Clyd we collected up all our wet belongings and hung them in the
welly boot room to dry. Matt, Tony and Mr A are currently mucking around
with the movie- makers on their cameras. It seems to be rather funny.
I will leave you now because they want to show me a movie.
Tony's entry:
I
woke up late again this morning and I was last for the shower and late for
breakfast but oh well, at least I got food. Then Mr A said the daily tradition,
"Day 7 in the Kent Mountain Centre" in Big Brother style. He then
said the other tradition, the weather forecast. Today was meant to rain
a tad in the morning and clear up in the afternoon. So we decided to finish
our maintenance. We painted the tables and finished off the barrier and
had our lunch. Soon after finishing our lunch we set off to the Bus Stop
Quarry. When we got there we realized that we had forgotten one of our ropes
so we had one rope between three climbers, not a very good mix. Especially
when Matt refused to belay. I finally convinced him to belay after about
half hour of arguing. It was my turn to climb first so I climbed the reason
why I had chosen to go to this crag, Fools Gold (E1 5c). This was actually
really easy compared to what my imagination had left me with from last year.
Then Callum climbed Equinox (VS 4c) he zoomed up this as if it was an ascent
path, very cool indeed. Then it was Matt's go at a climb. He chose to do
Gnat Attack (E1 5b), then I did it too, and so did Callum. Then Callum did
Solstice (HVS 5a). Whilst I was down at the bottom I projecting 1000 tons
of chicken s**t. When I had no fingers left Matt had a go. After a few attempts
he did it, leaving me trying to do all of my tasks with my thumbs only.
We got back to the KMC and had a Roast dinner. It was very nice and we discussed
ideas for the weekend to come. I also reserved the leftovers for my sandwiches
for tomorrow…YUMMY! We then had a fun action packed evening, we watched
Matt failing at doing circus tricks. He nearly broke his toe doing a handstand.
The highlight of the night was watching 2 episodes of The League of Gentlemen.
It was a heinous night and Matt is begging for a new bed cover because he
made his one smelly poo.Saturday 2nd August
By matt
I
can't think of an opening, they have all been taken, so anyway it's now
open. Today we went sea level traversing, yay! But first we went to do
some climbing, this was in the form of toproping smog monster E3 5a and
the two slightly harder lines to the right and left. Then the most amazing
thing happened, I was walking back to the top after belaying Callum and
I saw some gear in nut form, I gave it a hard tug and it didn't move,
so I clipped a crab to it and pulled it with all my might. It came out
I had got my first bit of gear! I shouted up to the others that I had
some gear and Callum shouted "me too"! So day 8 at the KMC and
everyone had found a bit of gear, amazing! (unlike Russ who found nothing
but a face brush). Having pocketed our gear, we proceeded back to the
car, grabbed our lunch boxes and ate a small amount of our lunch on a
nearby bench. We geared-up and set off. Almost immediately we got to a
hard bit and rock-hard Mr A fell in. He checked if his camera was OK but
his water proof bag became un-water proofed, oh pooey! Don't worry folks
its OK We did loads of traversing and then found a jump and busted loads
of tricks (Tony wants me to put this). Tony did a 180 front flip. We got
back to the car and had the rest of our lunch but Tony didn't eat he just
stared at some crazy girl, and now he wont stop going on about her, Tony
is in love with some scary girl. We all went to the town and bought stuff
followed by an amazing meal at Pete's Eats. Now we are bracing ourselves
for the final episode of The League of Gentlemen yay!
Sunday 3rd August
By Callum
Today
was our last day at the Mountain Centre for the time being. We will be
leaving to go to the Cottage tomorrow and we will be staying there for
four nights. As a direct result of this we had to go shopping to buy supplies
for our meals. This meant we could only climb in the morning. Since we
didn't have much time, we decided it was a good idea to do some hardcore
Bouldering. A great place for this is the Pine Tree Boulders. Everything
there is really sharp and crimpy! Me and Matt managed to do a couple of
6bs and Tony did the same plus a 6c. We sat down and ate lunch in the
only area of ground that wasn't shaded. Just after we finished, Mr A decided
it would be amusing to pull Tony's beanie over his eyes so he couldn't
see anything. Matt threw a couple of sticks at him, causing him to become
angry. Tony saw this as an excuse to chase Matt (even though he couldn't
see much. Matt climbed all over boulders with Tony surprisingly close
behind. Eventually Matt reached the floor again and started running. Tony
tried to follow him but he tripped over a rather large boulder (haha)!
After the escapades of lunch we decided to leave. As it was on the way
back, we stopped off at Yellow Wall. All the routes here were rather tricky
(6a and above) but we all completed a few. The highlight of the day came
when we saw a tiger (cow) poke its horned head around a corner! Tony tried
to walk up to it, but he turned back round as he got closer. We all resumed
our climbing, during which the tiger walked behind us, closely followed
by another, and the carried on. A few minutes later we left and headed
in the direction of Caenarfon to buy our supplies. Sadly we were forced
to go to Task! Matt offered to push the trolley and me and Tony had to
go off to get items that were required. After a while we left and went
back to the centre to store our supplies. Dinner today was a chicken kiev
each along with some chips and peas. Whilst we were eating a group of
brussel sprouts (scouts) appeared through the dining room door! There
was also a family group, who happen to be staying in the room next to
us! After dinner we went to Dali's Hole. Tony climbed Holy Holy Holy E2
5c, Matt climbed The cost of a rope E1 5a and I climbed Zambesi VS 4c.
Matt was intending to climb Holy Holy Holy but we ran out of time. On
the way back to the car we were attacked by a couple of dogs! However,
we all survived the experience and are here to tell the tale. Tony, as
usual is currently sitting on his bed reading his new peak guide and Matt
is psyching himself up to do Cenotaph Corner! If you have been reading
this all the time, then I have some bad news for you. As we will be at
the Cottage we will not be able to put the next five days on the Internet
until Friday (sorry)!
Monday 4th August
Written by Tony
Today
we woke up and there were a load of chavs in the dinning hall. It was
so annoying because they were laughing at my dummy when we had our breakfast.
We had to leave straight after breakfast for the cottage. We gathered
our things and set off. When we got there, Matt and Callum were complaining
about the poor hygiene of the mouldy shower. Soon after we came The Geologists
woke up and we ran away to go climbing at Ogwen. Matt decided it would
brilliant idea to bring the bouldering mats up the mountain. As you can
guess, it wasn’t. It as the most awkward thing I have ever done. But sure
enough, we got there in the end and we had a cool day at the crag. Matt
and Callum led Rocking Chair VS 4c. Meanwhile I led Playtime HVS 4b, 4c
and Mr A seconded it. It was like a jungle, really overgrown, but the
second pitch was cool. It had a no-footed hand traverse at the beginning
and after 2 pieces of OK gear, it was a huge run out. It was dodgy but
very amusing. Then we all decided to go and do a really small cave thingy
called Monolith Crack which was VERY small. Matt wasn’t scared of the
run outs, he was scared of getting stuck! We abseiled off and went bouldering.
Callum and I sat out because our bodies hurt, but Matt did some short
mantelshelves and what not. We walked back through the bog and I didn’t
have to carry the bouldering mat, YAY! We had pizza for dinner and LOTS
of fruit salad for pudding. YAY! Now Matt and Garry (The Geologist with
big sideburns) are having a mouse catching competition.
Tuesday 5th August
By Matt
Our
first night in the cottage (barn) and everyone slept well. We got woken
up as usual and it felt like Christmas, as I remembered my mousetraps.
I jumped out of bed and frantically checked my mousetraps: No luck, so
I checked Garry’s mousetrap: No luck, life sucked again at the smelly
cottage. We were talking last night about where to climb and we decided
at Clogwyn y Grochan. After me stealing all the breakfast and wasting
milk like there is no tomorrow. We set off for the climbing place with
the long name. We arrived at The Pass. A few minutes past and we were
at the climbing place with a long name. I decided (with Mr A’s advice)
to do Kaisergebirge Wall HVS 5b (deserves its grade), and Callum chose
to do Brant Direct HVS 5a (also deserved its grade). Callum definitely
had his gear finding glasses on and subsequently he found: a size 4 wire,
a DMM sling, a hex, a 1.5 Clog friend and a 2.5 forged friend. However,
Callum managed to remove, let’s see, NONE! Callum is the best gear remover
in the land and if he couldn’t get it, no-one can! Two routes had been
ticked off and we stopped for a spot of lunch. I ate my Tesco pear, which
looked like a bum. We climbed on with Callum doing the route I did first
and Tony doing Hangover E1 5b. As we began, so did the wind. In fact,
by the time we were half way up our routes, we were practically being
blown off them. Eventually, though, we made it to our first stance, a
hanging one! Tony led the entire route, resulting in him having to lead
the crux pitch. The guide book says many people have epics on this pitch.
Tony stood at the base of the route saying “who’d have an epic on a 5b?
(laughing)”. However, when he eventually reached the crux, a few rather
loud grunting noises along with numerous rude words could be heard coming
from his direction! Praise should be awarded to him, though, as it was
a tricky little number. He also managed to accumulate quite a crowd, although
most of them were watching Callum on Kaisegebirge Wall. I even saw a few
camera flashes. When Callum finished his route he had to abseil off. At
one point he collided with Tony and was asked to act as a runner for him.
Sadly he declined and came crashing down on top of me at my hanging stance.
I wanted to talk to him but he had to go to the bottom. After we finished
our routes we went to Pete’s eats for a drink, I also wanted a mouse trap!
So I went in about 5 different shops looking for one. I ended up buying
a dummy, a penknife and finally a mouse trap. Now I can beat Garry at
the mouse catching competition. Back at the barn Tony started on his guide
book for the small bouldering around the back of the barn. We also had
Kedgeree for dinner. YAY!
Wednesday 6th August
Explained by Callum
Today
was supposed to be the hottest day in Wales EVER! We decided to go to
Dinas Mot as it has a northerly aspect (in other words, it is shaded).
As a consequence it was freezing at the foot of the crag and it was also
extremely windy. Matt had decided to do a route called diagonal HVS and
I had to second him. His first stance was really awkward and it took him
about fifteen minutes to set up. My teeth were chattering reasonably loudly
whilst I was waiting! Tony was leading an E1 called Superdirect. His first
pitch crossed over Matt’s first pitch and the ropes became crossed. This
turned out to be really annoying as Tony was leading with double ropes.
When I reached the stance on Matt’s route I found out why it had taken
so long to construct. There were two main reasons for this. Firstly there
were about a billion clove hitches going to various different points and
secondly Matt was desperate for the toilet! This caused him to do a lot
of fancy dancing on the ledge. The second pitch of this route proved to
be rather uneventful, that is until Matt and I were both standing at the
top of the second pitch. An old man waved at Matt, making him laugh and
I also said something comical as I emerged over the top of the pitch.
These two factors caused a liquid to appear on Matt’s shorts, which later
began to run down his legs. That’s right, you guessed it, Matt had managed
to wet himself halfway up a multi-pitch route. Not because he was scared
though, just because he needed the toilet! At the top of our route we
met Tony and Mr A. We abseiled off the top of the crag and sat down at
the bottom to eat our lunch. After a while we began our second routes.
Matt led an HVS called Lorraine whilst I led a VS called Western Slabs.
When I reached the last pitch of my route I decided to take a detour in
the hope that something harder would materialise. However, a finger crack
and a few mahooosive ledges led me to think this variation only deserved
Severe! Again we abseiled from the top of the crag, but this time we didn’t
use our French Prussic, we only used our belay devices. On the route back
to the car we came across some tourists who clearly didn’t have a clue
what they were doing as they were walking through water that reached their
ankles! Today me and Tony out voted Matt in the bid for dinner, resulting
in us having curry as opposed to Bolognese. I was given the much sought
after task of helping Mr A prepare the food. My main task was to stir
the curry. This proved to be immensely tricky because the curry decide
to attack me with small balls of boiling sauce! In the long run, though,
the food did taste very nice. Me, Matt and Tony have been trying to make
a guide book for the climbs in and around the barn. Today we decided to
set routes up the front wall of it. This turned out to be nothing but
a thirty minute battle with a relentless swarm of midges (ouch)!
Thursday 7th August
Written by Tony
I
woke up today and I was quite excited because it is about a week until
my 14th birthday. It was even harder to get out of bed this morning than
ever before, the walk to the shower seems to get longer and we wake up
earlier everyday. In the long run it is better that we do get up earlier
because it means we get longer to climb and more options as we get to
the crags before anyone else has even brushed their teeth. I guess you
get the idea that I like to have lay-ins in the morning. Anyway, we had
our breakfast and set off to Dinas Cromlech. On the way to the crag, a
really stupid “skinny sheep” decided to run in front of Mr A’s car and
laugh I the face of death. It soon cowered off into the mountains. It
was mine and Callum’s turn to lead something. Callum led Sabre Cut VS
4c and I chose Cemetery Gates E1 5b. I was really scared to set off for
this climb because of all the bad thing I have heard about it, but with
little trouble I set off up the best route of my life so far. I was shocked
when I got to the crux and there was jugs everywhere and had been since
I left the ground. I was actually more scared on the belay stance than
the actual climb itself (I made a boo-boo of the stance). Because of this
HUGE boo-boo me and Matt spent about 15 minutes trying to untangle the
ropes. We got most of the tangles out but decided I might as well just
go for the last pitch and hope I don’t die. Good for me, I didn’t die.
We got to the top and I had officially become an E1 climber. The Tony-logic
behind me becoming an E1 climber is that the guide book said, “Leaders
trying to push their standard frequently have epics on it.” and as I didn’t
have an epic at all it meant I wasn’t pushing my standard so therefore
I am an E1 climber. After we rendezvoused at the top of Right Wall Area
we abseiled down and had our lunch. It was then Matt’s turn to lead something
hard. After much “psyching up” he finally decided to lead Cenotaph Corner
E1 5c. Me and Mr A raced up Flying Buttress V Diff. We were in such a
hurry to get some pictures of Matt on Cenotaph Corner that there was only
1 piece of gear for the whole 4 pitches (that we squeezed into 2 pitches)
but still there was about 4,000,000 tons of rope drag. We were very surprised
to find Matt on the top of Cenotaph Corner and Callum half way up. He
must have been very fast but it was fun practically soloing a V Diff in
about 2 minutes. When we got to the bottom of the crag we decided to descend
the deadly scree and drive to Pete’s Eates and Joe Brown. In the New Route
Book at Pete’s Eates, it says that the youngest ascent of Lord of the
Flies E6 6a is Leo Houlding at the age of 15. I plan to break that record.
Mr A said he would take me up next year and belay me on it because he
says I can do it if I work at it. At Joe Brown I bought my new climbing
shoes and they are really nice and clean. I also bought a 1, 3, 5, 7,
9 nut set to complete mine and Matt’s gear rack. Matt has a 2, 4, 6, 8,
10 nut set. We then came back to the cottage, ate some dinner and “chilled
out.” I am also planning to get a Geology lesson from Garry (its just
an excuse to hit things with his big hammer). This is our last night in
the cottage so we have our fingers crossed that Matt catches a mouse to
be his best friend.
Friday 8th August
By Matt
I
woke up to a woodpecker pecking my head but it was actually Mr A knocking
my head to wake me up. Over breakfast we decided to go to Gogarth (aaaahhh,
I was terrified of Gogarth after the stories I've herd, basically whoever
goes to Gogarth dies!) we had one main route that we wanted to do, a dream
of white horses HVS 4c. We were planning to do this as a three and as
a big adventure. We set off for Gogarth and I was trying to reassure myself
by thinking its only HVS but it didn't work didn't work it was at Gogarth.
We finally arrived at Gogarth. On the way I decided that I would be a
girl pants for just one day and middleman the whole thing. We set of after
gearing-up and Tony soon started on the first pitch and left me and Callum
to spot seals. Soon me and Tony were very close, a little too close for
comfort on the dodgiest hanging belay stances in the world! I was seriously
thinking about cutting Callum's rope so we didn't share the stance with
one more person but the gear exchange was quick and Callum was soon gone.
And be for I knew it Tony was leading the crux pitch and did. I middle
manned it and it was so fun! YAY, I climbed at Gogarth and didn't die!
We had lunch and went back to the barn packed and raced to the Kent Mountain
Centre for tea of burger and swirly chips. Anne was really kind and gave
us a chalk ball each and a magazine each yay! We sorted out some washing
and are just about to have a well earned TV session. BYE DIARY!
By Callum
Today
we realized we still had a small amount of maintenance to do. We scoffed
our breakfast and headed out to the equipment store to sort out our jobs.
My first job involved whacking large staples into big chunks of wood, Yay!
My second, along with Matt was to climb up really high into a tree and spray
WD40 onto some bolts. It went everywhere and both me and Matt ended up covered
in brown sticky stuff! Having completed all our maintenance for this trip,
we headed off to the kitchen for some well earned lunch. Matt was really
selfish and he stole two white rolls when we were only allowed one. This
meant someone had to have two brown rolls. After lunch we set off toward
serengeti to do some climbing. Matt and Tony both wanted to climb Seams
the same E1 5b, whilst I was quite content with just climbing Seamstress
VS 4c. I was offered the opportunity to try Seams the same but I was really
tired. While I was round the corner doing a spot of Bouldering, Mr A put
a toprope on Slug Club Special E4 6a. Again I really couldn't be bothered
to try it, but Matt and Tony both completed it. On the way back we decided
to visit California and Twll Mawr. We saw The Quarryman (very scared)! Since
all the groups had left the centre and we didn't want to cook, we decided
to eat at Pete's Eats! There was a strange girl there who kept staring at
Matt (probably because he was wearing the dummy. He was awarded this sacred
prize because he had spent all his money and he needed some to pay for the
00 wire that we lost at Gogarth). Today we are going to watch Eddie Izzard,
Yay!