What a weekend

It will probably be obvious to you, if you regularly read this blog, that a fortnight or so ago when I started climbing again I realised that there were certain issues within my climbing that I needed to address, the most important (despite not being emphasised enough) is that I DON'T spend enough time actually climbing.

Due to this and with the words of Sensai bonjoy running through my mind I started hatching a plan for this weekend gone.

Friday night up to visit my folks after picking Nat up from work, free meal. Sat carry on up to Bowden, put Nat on the problems that I think she should be trying before returning to my folks, free meal.
Leave on Sun morning stopping off via Yorkshire, free packed lunch. The weather looked fair enough for this plan to actually work and it wasn't long before I was running out of the flat, forgetting almost everything on the way to pick up Nat from work.

It was great to see my folks on Friday night and much merriment was had before I hit the sack with sweating tips. The drive up to Bowden took less time than I remembered and some of the speed cameras have been taken away and others now have flashing signs in front of them. Great. We arrived at a windswept Bowden early ish and only a handful of cars were parked off the road. This we later found out must be due to the insane wind gusting all over the place. Durham university club were the only people to be found on the crag, it was I'm afraid to say, a fresher's meet. However, the club were conducting themselves perfectly.

We warmed up at the far end after which I pointed Nat at Childs play. She got to the crux looking absolutely terrified before being blown off and completely overshooting the mat. I poo-pah'd her claims of a force 9 death wind and quested off, after all it's not longer as hard as it used to be, Childs play in fact. Minutes later I understood what she meant. In between gusts I balanced my way up to the top, declaring it to be E9 (or should that be 6b+ x?). Nat got stuck into another problem and I continued to warm up. All the cave routes went down as per usual, followed by a favourite eliminate of mine. After this I had a dabble on sprung but felt cold. Staggered, captain haddock, poverty and the other things in this area were next. The wind had died down a lot by this time so I urged Nat to try CP again. 5 or so goes later she was past the crux looking terrified and resorting to beginner beaching tactics at the top, I managed to coax her out of this line of attack and once she re-committed to some technique she cruised on over the top. She was psyched out of her mind (as was I) as this is her first 6b. It was fantastic to see her climbing like this after so little time and bodes well for her Christmas ambitions.

Next I went on something out of my comfort zone, lippy bastard, but unfortunately I kept getting hit by gusts at bad moments so I left it. The crack was suffering from similar conditions. A harsh 2 min downpour then struck leaving us all huddled beneath the cave routes for the next 15 mins or so. When it passed I went for Vienna, an eternally changing problem, and then back on Sprung. I felt like a bit of a twat running around as there were a number of onlookers but so be it. My earlier guess at not being warmed up was confirmed as I climbed it straight away, comfortably in fact.
The day was going well and after flicking through the new (appalling) guide, I'd singled out another line, The Growlers, crimpy, vertical, 8a wall. I stepped up, and after a few hard rock over moves on dirty dirty little holds I was eyeing up a larger, decent crimpy hold. I gave it my all, my fingers crept over the edge of the hold, the razor like crimp bit in deep across my tips and I was suddenly aware of very sore skin. Back on the pad I was gutted and extremely sore. A few more goes ended only in backward progress as the smallest hold turned progressively warmer. Saving skin for the next day we packed up and headed to 'the woods'. I really wanted Nat to try Bad Company (now given 6a), a fantastic problem in an even better setting. On arrival conditions were amazing, old timer locals (Bob Smith?) confirmed this. I re-warmed up on Jocks and then Monty Pythons and then demo'd the problem for Nat. I hadn't realised it but her tips were worse than mine and after a few goes we both decided that if we were to climb on Sunday we needed to stop.
Back home, and once again plenty of food and loads of wine.
On Sunday weather reports (courtesy of Stubbs from UKB) showed Caley to be in poor nick. Instead we opted for the ever gusty cliff. On arrival we met Joe Brown who informed us that the good doctor would be arriving shortly. Warming up was hard and sore and I inwardly kicked myself for being a bit silly the previous day. Joe pointed me at underhand which I'd never heard of. It took a while but I worked out quite a neat sequence. Fatigue or a lack of length meant it didn't resemble Foleys sequence one bit however it was efficient. Further floundering later I decided to change out of my floppy Velcro's and into dragons. One minute later it was done. I worked the extension but didn't feel it was worth risking the skin as I want to climb sometime this week. Nat proceeded to crush the left hand roof problem which again, is a good effort for her.
I took my boots off and packed everything away, for a split second Martin(bringing purple back in style, holy sh*t kind of strong) Smith tempted me towards Stu's roof. It didn't take long for the small crimps to persuade me to take them back off.
We stopped off via Headingly to see her brother and chuck down a gallon of warming tea.
A text from Foley later on in the day informs me that he fell floundering around with the end slots of underhand. Next time beast.
Now I fully understand that this weekend hasn't pushed me out of my comfort zone as far as possible (wait to see what I've got planned next weekend!) and as ever comments are welcome (yes you as well Bonjoy, I promise I won't get upset). However, I did spend both days outside, and this resulted in new ticks which can only be a good thing., non?
For the first time in ages I felt like I was climbing well this weekend...It's a great feeling.
Currently on UKB there is the start of another debacle albeit at a lesser scale (although thinking about it probably not). The fact that my name has now been mentioned directly (not in a malicious manner thankfully) leads me to feel that I have to at least offer some kind of stance as a reply. I'm not quite sure how to go about this and really I should be doing more productive things. I'll give it some thought and no doubt produce another controversial blog post at some point, or maybe I'll decide it's not worth it. At best, I've managed to stay away from my keyboard and avoid some rather obvious baiting.