Well I was up the wall again training, seems to have become a habit! The usual crew were in there doing routes, as well as a few regular bouldering hound dogs. At the end of the session Al Leary showed us a copy of the New Llanberis Pass Climbing guidebook from the Climbers Club.
The book is available from Joe Brown’s and V12 outdoor, and at a first glance it would appear that the Climbers Club have listens to the critics of there guides of which I have been quite a vocal one. However I’ll try and get a closer look tomorrow and give it a more eye!
I have had a closer look but by no means extensive look and whilst i can say that this is way better than the last Llanberis Pass guide by the Climbers Club, although you would have been hard pressed to make a worse one. The current guide is a much better guide in terms of appearance, however there are several small niggles, and they are small. Some of the obscure crags, are well covered, but despite having a photo of the crag they fail to add any topo lines. Another trick that the Climbers Club seem to have missed is the colour coding of the topo lines, they use three colours that could have been used to show grade bands (easy, moderate and hard) but instead they use them at random.
I do have to say though Don Sergeant has made the guide with his collection of images that feature heavily throughout the guide the Climbers Club certainly owe him a debt of gratitude, as without those images the guide won’t be the visual delight. Similarly they have added in some environmental information through the guide, and Simon’s selected bouldering guide to various bits of the pass will possible open up some of the popular bouldering areas to people who are only aware of the Cromlech boulders.
One thing that has been pointed out to me was that despite some information being provide for various areas (The crag right of the Parsons Nose) by some quite proficient and respected climbers that information appears to have failed to make it into the guide. As a guide though it is certainly one of the best that I have ever seen the Climbers Club produce, and worthy of calling itself a guidebook in the modern idiom. update 6/3/09