Christmas Meet

Well, here I am sat in the office pondering a fantastic weekend at High Moss in Dunnerdale. Brilliant, as the famous Fast Show character would say.

The weather was much better than could have been hoped, ice cold, with mostly blue skies and fairly gentle winds. Just enough to give a proper winter mountaineering feel to things, without too much pain! It would seem that Sca Fell and Scafell Pike were the most popular destination for most of the teams, except for those pesky mountain bikers. Many made it out on Friday as well as Saturday and so it has been a successful weekend for all.

It was great to see everyone in one place and there was plenty of the young bloods there, although it has to be said us old 'ens would seem to have far more staying power when it came to the jovialities of the evening!

Saturday was an early start for myself and Ralph, we left High Moss at around 7:45; don’t get me wrong this isn’t early by Alpine standards but it is after hitting the sack at 2:30am! We headed off to Wasdale with the intention of bagging the first winter route of the year by climbing Deep Gill on Sca Fell. A couple of club members had noticed it seemed to be in nick, from what they had seen from the top.

The drive over was fairly uneventful, though very slippery, and leaving the warmth of the car was something of a shock. The number of the dashboard told us the temperature was -1, and being a Volvo it’s bound to be right about colder climates! However, the walk up to Brown Tongue was pleasant enough and the views were great, especially looking out towards the Isle of Man. The snow was thinner that we expected but there was plenty of ice around, and forming ice climbs falls were visible on the northerly facing Scafell crag. Given a few more days of cold weather it would seem that there is going to be plenty of fun to be had up there!

When Lord’s Rake came into view it wasn’t possible to see how far the ‘good nick’ extended down Deep Gill and so we decided to opt for Long Gully on Pikes Crag, which seemed to be filled with snow from top to bottom. The walk up was much easier than it would have been to Deep Gill and if it turned out to be rubbish, there might have been time to head over to Long Gully after, though this would have been a much, much longer day.

We were beaten to the bottom of Long Gully by a team of four and were closely followed by a rather chatty and pleasant local couple. It became clear that the team of four were a guide and three clients, who started up, kicking steps into near perfect neve, only to stop a few meters further up to put on crampons, giving us an opportunity to pass them. We’d made the decision to not bring any climbing gear, so gearing up only meant sticking on our crampons, taking the axes off our sack and getting stuck in.

The whole gully was filled with untouched neve! I’m not sure it could have been any better. It’s only a grade I route, but there were several opportunities to tackle small stapes of ice, nothing too taxing but easier on the calves than front pointing all the way up. The whole route was sadly over too soon, though the exit at the top of the gulley was possibly the best bit, which opened up into a wide fan of pristine, untouched snow. Perhaps it could have been a bit more frozen but who cares it was great fun!

Having topped out we had a quick break for a slug of hot Vimto (much better then tea!) and a sandwich and then headed up to the top of England’s highest point to be greeted by a veritable throng of people! After a quick chat with some very cold looking, frost encrusted, but equally happy people we headed down to Lingmell Col and the route back to the car.

As Alex Lowe said, “The best climber is the one having the most fun”, and this is what it’s all about. There will be opportunity for more challenging routes and moments of “what the f*ck are you doing this again for” later in the year and early 2011. But it was a great day out with a great climbing buddy, an opportunity to be a grumpy old man with a huge smile on my face.

The only ruiner for the day was the every present cloud of the “speech”, oh god the speech. As club president it’s traditional to deliver a cutting and hugely comic discourse on the activities of the year, whilst facing a bear pit of harassment and heckling. No pressure there then. Even several beers, a multitude of deep breaths and trips for a quick fag failed to clam the nerves. In fact I almost couldn’t eat my gorgeous sticky Christmas pudding, only nearly couldn’t mind!

Now, it would seem that I did a good job; there were a few laughs, perhaps Graham thought I was picking on him (I wasn’t much) and only a little bit of heckling. Everyone was complimentary, but then again in such polite company its unlikely that anyone was going to walk up, put a gentle hand on my shoulder and say “what a load of shi*e that was; you’re a t*at!” are they? Hopefully not!

The rest of the evening is something of a blur of French Lager, Lapfroaig and joviality. I got to see the Milky Way, managed to do the “rope swing challenge” (see I told you I could do it Dr Paul!) and essentially had a fantastic time with fantastic people.

There’s much, much more to say but that will do for now.

welcome!

Hello!

We thought we'd open this blog to tell the world about the mad, bad and dangerous stuff we get up! Only joking.
Its all about what we've been doing and where we've been. Hopefully we can help inspire not just our members but anyone reading this to get out there and enjoy the mountains and crags here and abroad.
We meet every Tuesday night for a spot of climbing and usually a swift beer in a suitably located pub.
In the winter we can be found at Awesome Walls in Stockport or Warrington and then in the summer (if we ever get one!) at a variety of crags in the Peak.
Anyway, watch this space for more info!