Well I was working for Plas Y brenin again this weekend on a moving outside for the indoor climber course, and thankfully the group brought the weather with them, so we basked in the sun and climbed on both days. Here are a few snaps from Upper Tier at tremadog today, in the sun. We stayed at the top of the crag so got a lovely cooling breeze, that meant we didn’t know how burnt we were getting.
I would like to point out that the smoking soloist wasn’t a member of my group!
In The Times today was a supplement looking at the twenty best walks in Britain as chosen by some random journalists with an interest in walking, who had at some point in their life probably walked near the routes selected. I saw this feature advertised on the TV last night, and the majority of people in the advert were thoroughly ill equipped for a proper walk up a mountain. However the majority of the walks were mere strolls around the lowlands.
In at number nine though, mainly due to the order of where it was in the UK, rather than quality was Snowdon via the PYG track, which at first I was delighted to see because it is good to encourage tourist to the area. However, I was caught twixt the devil and the deep blue sea, as whilst I would encourage people that Snowdon can make an awesome walk, it has killed 5 people this year, and last bank holiday monday (5 days ago) the local rescue team came to the assistance of 5 people in separate incidents in just one day.
So where in the Times best walks in the UK guide to Snowdon via the PYG track is the necessary safety information. In fact I really couldn’t find any in the supplement as a whole. Snowdon is a dangerous mountain for the ill equipped and inexperience. In fact David Aaronovitch the routes ‘author’ appears not to have been up their since the age of 13 in 1967, if he had done it recently or looked at a map he’d know the route actually was up the Miner’s track and down the pyg track, and that it is a nicer walk the other way around! They use ‘walking worlds‘ description of the route. This really is poor journalism, and potentially very dangerous. It doesn’t even mention that the PYG track is so named after the Pen Y Gwryd, where they advise people to stay.
If you know the area the Pen y Gwryd is an isolated pub/hotel, whereas come to Llanberis at the foot of Snowdon, there are plenty of places to stay within view of the mountain, as rather than fight to find parking and get ticketed like over twenty people today, you can get a sherpa bus/park and ride from the village to Pen Y Pass, making the day even simpler!
This is on par with Trail describing Crib Coch as an easy walk! I am sure that someone form Llanberis Mountain Rescue team will raise the issue.
It is a shame as I am sure if they asked the team, they would have provide the necessary safety advice, in fact I am sure that you can find it on their website. So whilst the Times did Snowdonia a great service in advertising it as a great destination, I do fear that their complete lack of safety advice may backfire, and seeing that I am one of the team of volunteers that have to step in and pick up the pieces my concern is that it will lead to an even greater number of call outs, we are already around 40 incidents on Snowdon this year.
Whilst well conceived a thorough shite piece of journalism by the Times.
Well I was about to blog that absolutely bugger all happen to me today. The blogging equivalent of paint drying, but then I remembered that this blog is about my life in the vertical, and although it had seemed like nothing to me, ticking two and a half routes at Tremadog as part of the 9 to 5 drudgery was actually more exciting than any peoples day in the office. Whilst the majority of people will earn more than me the view from my office is priceless!
Today I started up Valeries Rib a classic Hard Severe, before abseiling down at nipping up Gilljo, a rather nasty VDiff with no gear till 40ft, but fine if you have a few grades in hand. It is the first pitch of Valeries rib, that I have avoided for many years. I usually walk into the start of the classic traverse of pitch two. The reason is because many years ago before I was an instructor I tried to impress a lass by taking her up the route, she feel off hand jamming, and complained of a sore hand for the rest of the day. It turned out she hand broken her hand!
Anyway no breakages were had today, we finished up the first two pitches of Christmas Curry before time got the better of us and we had to head back to the Van. I was tempted to gun it for the top, however there was an in situ climbing on the micah finish above me. It turned out when I got back to the van that it was a visiting instructor whose client had become a little gripped, as she had been seconding the pitch for over an hour! What was even funnier (for me at least!), was that he left her at the top of the cliff, having said that ‘you can make your own way down’ to her.
Whilst I might find it funny I doubt the client did! In fact it was totally unprofessional, whatever qualification that guy had he doesn’t deserve it, and should give me a wide birth, as I might have to question his suitability for the job if he can’t a) choose a suitable route for his client or b) be arsed to get his client back to the car safely, the descent is rather gnarly if you haven’t done it before. I wish I could name and shame him but I didn’t get his company name, as he is giving instructors a bad name.
Anyway as you can see I did nothing interesting today, other than work and go for an evening run, which after setting a personal best of 41 minutes on the Llyn Padarn run thought I would take it easy, as Llion set a 38 minute lap, and the competition was getting stupid. So I was back at 45 minute chilled lap!
Stevie Haston has long been an amazing climber, however he disappeared from the limelight a bit in favour of enjoying being a grandfather and the French/Spanish sun. However he re-ignited interest in his climbing when he made an ascent of a F8c+ at age 52. Now for anyone this is an amazing achievement. In an article in Climb magazine he advises us to Eat less, train more and try harder.
Now I know that Stevie the man who has trained by doing thousands of pulls up, press ups and sit up during a ‘training day’, so he sure knows about proper training however those three simple words are probably a very best advice anyone could offer someone who wanted to start training.
Eat Less, Train More and Try Harder….
…..and if your lucky your climbing like a grandad!
Well the weekend is nearly upon us and there is only one real place to be and that is the Tremadog Festival, organised by local BMC representative Mike Raine with the support of the BMC. The concept of the festival is to come and climb tooled up with a piece of gardening garden equipment, and clean one route of fresh shoots of bramble’s, dandelions and ivy, and you will be instantly part of the festival. Which will entitle you to one raffle ticket, some of the free local beer and a great time.
The event has been support by many local companies Joe browns, V12, Ground Up, DMM, Climber Club, Pete Eats and the Local Pub the Brodnant Arms.
On the saturday night just after you have had another ale to help your heckling skills, local mountain guide and Plas Y Brenin instructor Tim Neil, possibly the most psyched climber in the world will give a multimedia show about his recent month long stay in Patagonia where he climbed Five (yes five) routes!
I would say I look forward to see you there, but unless I can convince my basic climbing course that cleaning a crag is the best thing for them, then I will have to be working!
For more information visit the tremadog wiki.
…put’em in your mouth and suck’em…
Probably one of the greatest tunes to come out of a cartoon.
Anyway the balls I am referring to are my tasty Italian meat balls, the recipe is below:
Take some Onion and Garlic, enough to season the meat balls, roughly one large onion and a few gloves of garlic. Dice the onion and garlic finely and fry off with a little chilli to taste. This makes sure the onion in the meat balls is cooked.
In a large mixing bowl, add two crustless slices of bread, and pour on a little milk until the bread has absorbed it, then add 800 grammes of lean beef mince, two eggs, the fried onions, salt, pepper and some basil/italian type mixed herbs. Mix this together until it is well blended.
Wet your hands and roll the mix into small (4cm) balls and place in a oven dish, you might get up to 18 balls out of the mix. Place in the oven at full heat.
Now make a basic Italian tomator sauce, so fry off onions and garlic again, add some chilli to taste, once the onion is cooked add two tins of chopped tomatoes and add more mixed/Italian herbs. One the sauce is simmering pour over the meat balls, and return to the oven for 30 to 40 minutes.
Spread some grated cheese over the balls after ten minutes and leave.
Ten minutes before serving, boil up some pasta, to serve it with.
I have just read the opening post of this thread on UKC, I have to say the ‘climbers wear your helmets’ part nearly reduced me to tears!
Maybe I should stop watching Berry & Furher’s Snuff Box!
About a week ago when the last issue of Climber was released, the one with a shit picture of A-nother sports climber of A piece of rock in the sun. To me it had little going for it in terms of the iconic image, please see an earlier blog on the covers of climbing magazines past, for a series of iconic climbing covers(Also see the crags and moutnain review parts of the gallery). Anyway if the cover wasn’t bad enough, then the contents page really took the biscuit. I know magazines need to watch the financial bottom line, but simply using a picture of the consultant editors wife’s arse on yet A-nother sports climb seemed totally unimaginative.
I can’t say that visually Kate’s last climber was a swan song, but more an ear bleeding cacophony. She even taunted me with after I made an issue with the over use of photos of Seamstress slab, when a few months back they used about 5 photos of the same route, and then again this month there was yet another photo of seamstress. Please Andy McCue for the love of God give it a few months before you use a shot of Seamstress, and whilst you might be saving money using Bernard’s photos, please ask if he can take some good ones!
Anyway I hope that Climber takes off again it used to be a good mag. If my googling is correct then Andy McCue has made a name for himself on online journalism, although I didn’t dig too deeply. The report on UKC says that he climbs up to VS competently, but is pushing HVS. Which got me thinking in my industry it is far easier to turn a climber into an instructor, than turn an instructor into a climber. By that I mean you need to be a climber to do the job I do, guiding and instructing on a multi-pitched routes the qualification I have only insists on climbing VS, which in this day and age is ridiculously easy.
My question is whether the same is true of climbing magazine editors, is it easier to turn a climber into and editor or an editor into a climber? As VS is an extremely, well lets just say modest grade! I don’t wish to be elitist but I really do feel that some who climbs VS pushing HVS and fancies a crack at big walling in Yosemite is heading for a bit of rapid a realisation! Anyway it is good to hear that they have found someone to replace Kate after she cut and run from the climbing journalism business.
However maybe, just maybe Andy with his internet background might have something to offer us, maybe an alternate UKC? I look forward to seeing his first crack of the whip, when is the next mag out?
Well today I have been teaching people on a walking group leader qualification, at Plas Y Brenin, we went for a stroll around Carreg Y foel Gron, a nice if a little esoteric single pitch venue above Bleaneau Ffestinog. The day was nice, however I have a 8pm session, so I am hanging about in the Plas Y Brenin bar, which on any other day would have a stunning view. It always makes me think about being high onn the Snowdon Horseshoe when I look out, and right now I am thinking about the poor individual who is currently ‘cragfast’ or stuck on Crib Coch, with the Llanberis Mountain Team making their way up to him/them?
I guess it is a bit surreal, and one reason I really don’t want top start twitter, as the delay involved in blogging allows a slight modification and addition of morality to arguments. In fact a report suggested that sites like twitter do not allow us to morally process life, or some such nonsense.
After my blog yesterday I was worried that some of the people on UKC might take over arguing who was to blame, rather than just accepting that accidents can and do happen, and that all I was doing was highlighting how you can potentially avoid that. Given that many of those people might be reading this blog now I thought I would like back to another blog/article on how to stay safe when climbing.
It was nice to see that at least 2000 climbers have read my blog on the quickdraw incident, and even better that UKC have added to the resources available with a short video.
I also put another little article on What is coaching over on unsurprisingly my coaching blog, if you get over there I hope you enjoy it!