Still snowy?

I've been on a few winter-sun sport climbing trips to Spain in the last few years, always to Catalunya, always in November or December.  By the end of a week I always come home feeling keen and confident, ready to tear up the local crags, only to remember that it's mid-winter in the Highlands and you just have to take what you can get.  So, this time Nick and I booked a holiday to Chulilla in Valencia in late March, in the hope that our return would coincide with the start of Spring and the pre-midge trad season.  The success of this plan is yet to be seen, as our arrival home has been greeted with continued cold weather, morning frosts, and more snow in the forecast, but we did manage a great short trip.  I've climbed with Nick a few times at home, mainly at our local suntrap of Moy, and knew that we climbed at a similar standard, so it was great to go out with someone who was going to be keen to try the same routes.

Chulilla itself is a wee Valencian village tucked into a hillside above a huge meandering limestone gorge.  Back in the 70s and 80s it was a real destination in the European sport scene, providing loads of long, technical wall climbs, but for one reason or another it fell out of favour and people stopped going.  Perhaps peoples tastes changed for shorter, steeper routes?  Regardless, in the last few years it's had a renaissance, with locals equipping loads of new routes and re-equipping the old ones, and the gorge is starting to echo with the clamour of climbers from across Europe again.

The view from the refugio

Our mates Rich and Lee were already out when we arrived so they were able to give us the lowdown on crags to visit and routes to try (or avoid - the new guide still uses the old school grades for the old school crags, beware!).  Like us, they were staying in one-time World Bouldering Champ Pedro Pons' nice new refugio El Altico, which is stunningly situated, looking out across the gorge.  Nick and I spent most of out time trying to onsight and flash routes, with a couple of specific projecting sessions thrown in, and ended up climbing almost exclusively at the three sectors called El Oasis, Pared de Enfrente and Sex Shop (not sure why it's called that...).  I think, for once, my attempted preparation for the trip paid off a little, as I seemed to be climbing better than I have done before - perhaps the long pitches are quite forgiving for the grade?  Regardless, it felt great to have the confidence to just step up to routes and try them, rather than going through the regular mental turmoil.  Highlights for me were the long 6c crack El Diagonal, the horrid-looking but amazing climbing 6c Presiscrack, flashing the lovely techy 7as Plan Z and Top of the Rock, onsighting the 7a Super Furry Animal, which has it's tough tufa crux right at the end, and redpointing the superb 7b Dale Duro Negro.  Nick did this last route on his first redpoint, but I had to plump for second go after falling from the very last move of it's 35m length on my first go.  Punter!

Nick's arse emerging from a resting hole on El Diagonal.

A very small-looking Lee on a very long looking El Ramaller, 7c+

A week has already passed since we got back, and between work, the cold and family commitments I've not been able to make use of my Spanish stamina.  However, a very early start this morning saw me at the Ruthven boulder as the sun came up and I finally dispatched the horrid grovel-fest that is Barry Manilow, the 7A+ mantel that I've been trying on and off for ages, and I was home by eight o'clock and ready for a day of family fun.  Result...

Time Slips By

It seems that the tunnel-visioned focus of the winter rock season is starting to blur.  After months of obsessing over Malc's Arete - constantly failing on that final move and trying to work out how I can train for it (be better, be stronger, be longer, jump higher) - my attention is waning.  Don't get me wrong, I'm still after the prize and am still trying every so often, but as the Spring approaches it's not as high up the list of priorities.

As the season advanced I made minuscule increments of progress - having the start wired, jumping, hitting the lip, twisting and bending the knee, even holding the top for a millisecond - and I dared to dream that perhaps it might happen.  Then it started to go backwards, or at least the progress stopped and I was still hitting the pads.  My hopes were dashed and I felt cheated.  One particular day I went in a cold wind and could hardly keep my pads down and got pretty pissed off - with conditions, and with myself.  Then, the very next day I went to a different boulder, under a blue sky and snowy mountains and out of the obsessive project bubble.  I had a great day, possibly the highlight of the season, climbing new problems on perfect rock. As perspective returned I felt my spirits lift and the dark shadows pass.  I felt like I'd been passing through the stages of grief - Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and now, finally, Acceptance.  I realised again that it's all just a game.  It really doesn't matter. If I ever do Malc's I'll be thrilled, overjoyed. But if I don't, I'll still relish the challenge of trying.

So, the focus has started to shift to routes and fitness.  I'm off to Chulilla in Spain next week so I've been trying to prepare for that, and hope that in turn it'll prepare me for the Highland spring. We've been fairly lucky with the weather up here and trips to the reliable weather-proof options of the Am Fasgadh Sunday scene and Moy and a sunny weekend at Goat Crag have kept me on my toes (and arms).

Am Fasgadh Sundays:
Andy Wilby on Black Sox Direct, 8a+.  After some determined sessions Andy did it this season. Effort!

Besides doing Am Fasgadh's The Shield in January, a few fruitful battles have set the wheels in motion for what could be a good year. First were Fidgey Muckers, a 7a at Goat that I'd failed on last Autumn during a period when I'd hardly done any climbing, and then The Combo, the 7a+ that links Mighty Atom into Too Old to be Famous.  At Moy I surprised myself by doing The Seer second go.  It's gained a pebble-hole on the crux span since I did it last winter so think going down to 7a+ is fair.  Oddly, it probably makes it a better route - less cruxy and more sustained at the same level.  Retro-flashing Constant Flux afterwards was a good reminder in hanging on and working things out when pumped - the aim for Spain.

Am Fasgadh Sundays:Tess off The Shield, 7b

Yesterday me and Sarah had a quick hit to Am Fasgadh while the sun still shone in the West and I had my best ever goes on Primo (or more specifically, The Curving Crack, the 7b+ first part of Primo).  I first tried this back in 2010 but it had never seemed like a reality until this year when I worked out how to do the last hard moves.  For a weakling like me it's a pure power endurance route, short and hard with no real respite.  There's a miserable semi-rest at what's known as the quartz 'jug'.  Jug!  Ha! I can do the route in overlapping halves to and from the jug but the redpoint crux is moving off it into a crozzly pinch.  For the first time I managed that twice yesterday, peeling off just afterwards, but there's a bit of me that thinks that if I can stick the next move it might just be do-able.  Where's that fingerboard?

The Farrletter Debate

I heard through the jungle drums a few weeks ago that Farrletter Crag in Strathspey had been retro-bolted, or at least, some of it had been.  I went down for a look at the crag today, and it's true.  It's something that has been discussed over the years, not least on a couple of UKC threads, with strong feelings on both sides of the argument.  Now it's been done and the argument is pretty much over.

I'll start by saying I no longer live in Strathspey so accept that my opinions probably hold little weight, and that this post is just that - my opinion.  I don't want to implicate anyone else or piss anyone off, but I do think it's something that should be discussed and that people should know about - you might even want to go and do the routes yourself.

Farrletter is an odd little place - a steep, North-facing wall of very compact schist, similar to sections of nearby Creag Dubh.  It's very close to the road so easy to access for a summer evening's cragging (if the midges don't get you!).  It's got a handful of routes from E1 to E6, and the nature of the rock means they're often fairly bold (some rely on pegs) and pretty strenuous - again, similar to it's much more famous neighbour.  Some of the routes are fine though, including a very safe E4 crack.  The routes were developed in the 80s and 90s by locals, mainly from Glenmore Lodge.  Being short and close to the road, it seems it's always been treated as a training venue rather than a normal trad crag - as far as I'm aware most people top-rope the routes and they are rarely led, even rarer onsight. I guess this style of route isn't very popular nowadays, especially if you're just after a few laps to keep fit on a sunny evening.  As such, the idea of bolting it to create a sport crag has been mooted on more than one occasion.

As far as I'm aware, arguments put forward by others (taken from my own discussions and UKC 'discussions') in favour of bolting are:

• To stop wear and tear to trees used as anchors for top-roping.
• To provide a safe training venue for Strathspey climbers.
• To make the crag more popular - it's a small, insignificant crag with only local interest as a harder trad venue, plus Creag Dubh, a haven for this style of climbing, is nearby.
• The safety of old pegs is unknown - better to replace them with 100% safe bolts.

The right hand section of Farrletter, where 3 lines have been bolted. These are roughly the lines of Master Farrter (E5 6c), Yet so Farther (E5 6b), and The Art of Course Climbing (E5 6b).

When I first went there in 2009 I think I saw the crag quite differently to the locals.  Sure, there are some pretty bold looking E5s, a few E1s, E2s and E3s with spaced kit, and a smattering of dubious old pegs, but it just looked like a normal crag to me (all be it not a very pretty one).

Over the four years I lived in Aviemore I visited the crag a couple of times a year, onsighting most of the E1- E3s.  I attempted to onsight the very safe E4 Too Farr for the Bear but took the lob from the top and took it again on the second ground-up attempt a week or so later.  I've not been back on it.  I also dabbled in headpointing while it was briefly fashionable with a few locals in 2009, climbing the E5 The Art of Course Climbing after top-rope practice. A friend, who is a far better climber than me, then climbed this route ground-up after falling onto the peg on the onsight attempt.  During this time a new E6 start to one of the older E5s was climbed by Steve Johnston.  All these routes were spicy little challenges, requiring as much mental endeavor as physical to do them - the essence of trad climbing.   The point I'm trying to make is that to me, it's just another trad crag, with hard routes that I won't touch, and easier routes I'm happy to attempt onsight.  Just like Stanage, or the Shelterstone or Sheigra. There are hard or dangerous routes all over the place and if I don't feel up to leading them, I don't.  Perhaps I'm an ethical elitist, perhaps I'm an idiot.

Headpointing The Art of Course Climbing in 2009 - is that trad gear?

My rebuttlal to some of the points put forward above would be:

• Fair enough, bolted anchors will put an end to damaging the trees at the top of the crag, but so will stopping top-roping!
• It's not for nature to provide crags as safe training venues for local climbers.  To be honest, Farrletter would be a pretty crap training venue - between winter cold, summer midges and year round wetness you'd be better off a) building a board in your garage and buying a fingerboard,  b) going to the climbing wall, c) going to some of the reliable year-round sport venues we already have (Moy, The Camel, Am Fasgadh, Goat Crag etc, or d) go bouldering, there's some good stuff nearby, honest.
• Trying to make a crag more popular by making routes safer is all well and good, if you find the crag and develop it yourself.  But if a crag is initially developed as a bold trad crag, that's what it is.  If people don't go there because they choose not to climb hard or bold routes, that's OK. A crag is just a lump of rock sticking out of the earth, it doesn't have to be popular.  Even if the people that first developed it are no longer as bold as they once were and would prefer to see it made safer, others might be up for the challenge   Should they have their scary routes denied them?  There's a reason we all go on holiday to Spain to sport climb, not Strathspey.  Spain has a prevailing ethic of bolted protection, Farrletter is (was) a trad crag.
• I'll grant you the old pegs vs new bolts argument is a tricky one, but to my mind a peg is temporary and can easily be removed or replaced.  A bolt is permanent and instantly changes the nature of a route.  In this case I would rather all the pegs were removed, making it an even bolder trad crag, than it was bolted and turned into a safe sport crag.

So, personally, I think Farrletter is an already established trad climbing venue and shouldn't be retro-bolted. By not seeing it as a training venue but as a normal trad crag it has provided me with some great climbing experiences - spicy and serious but memorable and rewarding.  As a sport crag it will provide some pretty mediocre 10-15 metre long wall climbs on a north-facing, dark, dank crag.   But I guess that's pogress. 

A New Day

After my soul searching day in Torridon I went out to a nice wee boulder I'd visited once before above Achnashellach in Strathcarron, gave it a wee scrub, tried hard on some lovely rock and had a jolly old time.  Funny how perspective can change so fast.

When I first went there a few weeks ago I couldn't for the life of me work out how to do one move on an otherwise really cool and obvious problem..  This time, however, I came up with a very peculiar and painful knee/shin bar, using an old tea towel taped to my leg as a makeshift pad.  I think it might be the future of hard bouldering.

In the past I'd be keen to shout from the rooftops about finding a new boulder and doing new problems, but this time I'm just happy to have been to such a cool place and to have my own wee tussle.  I put together this little film of the problems, and bolted on the thing I did in Torridon on Sunday.

Winter Exploration from Gareth Marshall on Vimeo.

Torridon Diaries #7

I passed up the chance to have a sociable day swinging from bolts at Am Fasgadh to go to Torridon on my own.  Malc's isn't going to climb itself.  But even before I left the house I knew nothing had changed and that conditions weren't likley to be great.  The seeds of doubt have started to sprout into seedlings and saplings.  I went anyway.  Between weather and other things I'd not been out to the Glen for three weeks. I've had a few quick blitzes on Rich's board and at Alien 2 in Edinburgh, and a few deadhang sessions in the brief spells back at home, but doing more days in the field at work and the lack of contact with rock left me feeling sluggish.

So, arrival at the Ship. A cold, strong Easterly is determined to steal my tarp before I can pin it down with rocks and pads.  I've tried to warm up but the wind robs any heat straight away.  I have a few goes but it feels terrible.  I feel terrible.  The head games change up a gear.

Why am I here?  What am I trying to prove, and to whom?  This piece of rock is clearly way beyond me.  Always has been, always will be.  Frustration. But I'm not sure where it comes from.  Is it not being able to do it? Or is it for kidding myself that I thought I might?  Injustice.  What do I need to do?  Haven't I tried enough?  I feel like I've spent enough days and enough day dreams on this.

I pack up and move off.  There's a huge list of things that I'd like to do in Torridon, some new, most old, but it's always felt like I'm missing the point if I concentrate on them before doing Malc's.  Maybe now it's time to move on. Before I start to head up the hill Ann and Nigel arrive.  They've both been working on their own projects for months and are obviously psyched for another day of battle.  Their motivation brings shame to my self-obsessed pity.

It turned out to be a pretty good day in the end, doing a cool new (?) problem up on the Stokes Croft level, and finding lots of stuff to come back to.  On arrival back at the car there was a note under my windscreen wiper from Ann and Nigel.  As I read it, the motivation started to return...

Snow Week aka Torridon Diaries #5 & 6

Rich's garage on Sunday morning, cup of tea steaming, fending off Bronwen the dog who's after the socks I thought I'd hidden in my trainers.  It's sleeting outside. My hot breath hangs in the cold chalky air.  Black undercut to yellow crimp, grey crimp, step through, paste the feet, push to take the shift in weight, launch, miss, fall.  Just another session on the board.

My phone buzzes into my attention, it's the boss.  Do I fancy taking the week off - lieing snow is going to make surveying deer dung pretty tricky?  I scan a few forecasts.  Cold, high pressure, blue skies, sunshine.  Yes please!

Monday: A wet day before the good stuff arrives.  Admin in town, drink coffee, buy a shoe rack, build a shoe rack.  Head to the wall in the evening with Sarah.  Another day of the dream. 

Tuesday: Rich has taken the day off.  Will the forecast deliver?  The initial plan is a tour of the Coire nan Arr boulders, below towering Sgurr na Choarachain in Applecross. Everywhere else is cloudless blue, but here a band of cloud hangs round the hills.  Arrival at the first on the list, The Universal block, tells us that it must have rained last night as this north-facing beast is still damp.  I slide off the warm-up a few times before it succombs while Rich does laps. The next dry thing turns out to be a cracking little problem, somehow pulling into and out of a corner.  It's actually not that hard but it takes me ages to work out, especially when I watch Rich do one move that I have to do in about four.  Typical bouldering.  I eventually beach myself on the top and we sack it off to Torridon where it's sunnier.
Despite the sun, the breeze has picked up and it's baltic, but the grips on Malc's feel sticky so I set myself up again: tarp, pads, brush.  Is this it?  No, of course it's not.  Still, another small improvement as I actually manage to hit the top and hold myself for a split second a couple of times, before pirouetting off.  It's enough to keep the flame of hope alive.

Wednesday: Am Fasgadh.  The other project for this winter is The Shield, the 7b route at the winter sport crag du jour.  I had two quick sessions on it before going to Spain in November and it felt do-able, but since then it's been wet.  Weekly texts from Ian and Tess have kept me updated with the state of the seepage on the headwall. The seemingly endless mild dampness made me start to doubt that I'd ever get back on it this winter, but then came this cold dry snap.  I got the shout from Andrew that a team were going over so jumped aboard, fingers crossed.  Snow flurries on the road sparked the fear of the dribbles, but on arrival it was plain to see: game on.

My first go on The Shield back in October (Photo: Ian Taylor)

Last week, doubting that I'd be on the route in the near future, I wrote down my sequence for the crux on the back of a receipt.  On re-acquaintance I was amazed how well I had remembered it, despite not trying it for two months.  It felt reassuring to see the configuration of holds: the sharp ear-shape crimp, the wiered finger-lock that I can just reach into, the little edge out right that unlocks the move to the final crozzly crimp.
It was cold.  No sun and a light breeze meant for a real struggle to keep warm all day, let alone warm enough to pull on small holds.  Fortunately, The Shield has a ledge at half height where you can stop and take off both hands and get the blood flowing again.  Mid-redpoint hot-aches is a new experience, but I guess that's the price of winter rock climbing. 
First redpoint I blagged my way into the crux having dogged past to get the clips in earlier.  I knew what to do but didn't have the holds well enough to shift rightwards and pop for the last crimp.  Second go, the left thumb on the last sidepull was the difference and I felt tight and strong as my right foot moved out and I went for the crozzly crimp, adjusted on it, pushed with the right foot to move the left higher up the crack and reached for the jug and success.  Another project dissolves into happy memories.

Thursday:  Being not very good means I have a huge list of boulders and routes that I still want to do - more than I could ever have time for.  On top of this is a list of new places I want to go to and develop.  Finding time to visit these is even harder as they take much more effort.  So, a week of brilliant weather, feeling tired but happy after two good days, I thought I'd head to a boulder I'd seen last year when out hillwalking.  I won't go into too many details yet - it's a work in progress, and normally I show my new toys to my friends and they do them before me.  In the end, an 'easy day' turned into a full day working a problem that I still didn't manage (it requires some body geometry that I couldn't fathom).  I did one good problem (pic below) and the stand-up version of the one I couldn't do. Brilliant rock and a lovely forest location.  Looking forward to a rematch.

A new thing in the woods

Friday: So much for a rest yesterday.  Despite the rest of the UK floundering under snow, the North West is in glorious sun again.  It's too good to miss so I head back to Torridon, hoping that the Malc's obsession might be nearing an end.  A few text exchanges tell me it's really windy, but I can't think of any good excuses not to try so keep going. 
Arriving in the glen I begin the see their point.  The fire-stunted pines by the road are rocking in the roaring gale.  I warm up doing a new thing on the left edge of Angel Walls, the rock feels amazing.  I don't.  I head to the Ship and sort my kit out, pegging down the tarp and standing on my mats to stop them blowing away.  It feels like hard work, and I can already tell that it's not going to be a good day.  A few goes confirm this.  Tired arms, sore skin.  Boo hoo.  I'm joined by a couple of guys that had slept through their alarm to go winter climbing (sounds sensible).  I'd met one before, John McCune, and show them some stuff on the Ship and they try Malc's.  I decide that I'm better cutting my losses for today so head up to Another Level which is out of the wind.  I've still not done Rich's Worry Bomb - a plumb vertical wall on small holds.  After John show's the way on the long top reach I take a while losing skin on the sit start but eventually get it, holding it together for the top out.  A good consolation prize. 

Later, home and showered, I look at my grazed hands and pink fingertips.  I can feel the building tightness in my left quad after too much heel hooking.  I can feel the red wind-blasted glow of my face and my heavy eyelids wanting to close.

Rest day tomorrow...

Torridon Diaries # 4

This wasn't my fourth trip to Torridon this season. It's more like the 5th or 6th, but the last few just involved sitting in the car watching the rain, sitting in the cafe watching the rain, walking round the boulders in the rain and driving home in the rain.

This time was different, for a nice change.  Freezing fog in Inverness eventually petered out on the Strathbran Autobahn near Achnasheen, giving way to a blue sky punctuated with whisps of high cloud. Sarah dropped me at the boulders then went off for a run from Diabeg.  Walking to the Ship I could feel the dry crispness in the air - that perfect combination of atmospheric and human factors aligning, being here, now.

I warmed up at Angel Walls and on North Wall on the Ship, taking my time, enjoying it.   I then went up to a lovely slab of Mike Lee's called Straition Slab.  I'd seen it on a wet walk back in December and got all excited about a hard looking slab problem (something fairly lacking in Torridon) only to discover Mike had done it and given it Font 4.  After a few joyous smeary laps I guess he's about right.  A few degrees steeper and it would be a different kettle of fish all together.

Naturally, it was only a matter of time until I was down at Malc's for the usual ritual: laying out the tarp, weighing down the corners with pebbles from under Squelch, aligning the pads, brushing the holds.  On my first go I popped off the right hand crimp scar but every go after that was solid to the slopy rail.  Of course, that bit's not the problem, it's what comes next.  The move.  Ann took the photo below of one of my better goes of the day, my fingers curling over the top before the momentum from my right foot coming off rips me backwards.

Ready for another rapid dismount... Photo by Ann Falconer

As far as I can work out one of two things needs to happen for me to hold this move. Either my right toe stays on,meaning I'm more in control and can get away without catching the hold perfectly (this isn't likely unless I grow a bit, but I could work towards it with a mega strong core), or I catch the top perfectly in true mint conditions, meaning I can cut loose and stay on.  The latter option seems more likely, at least I can work on the jump, on my core, on my contact strength.  The thing is though, I could honestly imagine trying this move forever and still not getting it.  I guess that's why I do it.