Seriously Sloe

I thought I'd finally collared a belayer for the spider later last week but he escaped at the last minute leaving me as another tag along to the Cornice. I've never really trained stamina and never really felt the need to as it seems to come quite quickly at the start of the sport climbing season proper after a few frustrating sessions of flailing.
Having now learnt how to climb at the Cornice a little better and having the numbers on almost anything that could be classed as a warmup I've been well poised to get a bit fitter by ticking routes I've never been on and getting them wired so when it does become the time to get stuck in I'll be ready.
That time is vastly approaching. Tues I spent at the Cornice, twice. I'd agreed to go out in the evening with somebody and then a better offer came a long for an early start to mid afternoon. I took both which resulted in doing 10 laps up and down. Some of those were doubles but not all and led me to believe I was getting a little fitter.

Random old photo of Nemesis to break up this mass of jibber jabber. Taken Sept '05!!!.

August is rapidly approaching and I'm aware that another good weekend of weather (although the forecast wasn't that way) was lost to sorting the last bits and bobs on the van. Apart from one 'maybe' task, its done and I have to say a big thanks to everyone thats lent a hand and for abuse of Nats' parents hospitality and tool'age. Worryingly enough it seems like far too long since I required my nuts, I'd rather have my head in the right place before our two weeks begin rather than feeling I lose a few days getting into the groove. We have 16 days, I wonder how much climbing we'll get in? (My mind has been thinking of viable backup alternatives should the UK ressist with a wet fortnight).
Yesterday was meant to be the cornice again but an achey belayer bailed on me. It was probably a good thing too as tonight I went and felt a little creaky. Maybe I'm not 'quite' as fit as I was hoping. Nat joined me tonight after work and got stuck into War Memorial (after a few cams were placed for the ending spice). She frustrated me greatly by putting in a valiant effort, flailing at the bulge and then walking up to the belay and then, not getting back on? Much bickering ensued, mostly from my side. Although, she has developed a new style of belaying. I like to refer to it as emotional belaying. I won't go into detail, but its not ideal.
I did a few routes but annoyingly couldn't seem to get on the ONE route I was hoping for. There was a serious man in-situ, not very talkitive and who broke out his protein post redpoint. Laughably another less serious man chose to break out the Sloe Gin. As ever my wishlist is expanding at an unstoppable rate. This can only be a good thing right? It is an indicator of psych. The main issue will be when I have to pick something meaty (oh look at that, pick on vegans Friday already?). I've got a few more excuses (this is the river and the other line into it) for staying away from the burl or the tech but they won't last long, a couple of sessions at best (worst?). Then I'm lost:

Unleashing looks fantastic.
K3 - tempting but every man and his dog seems to be on this one route, queing isn't fun
RnP - supposedly better?
and the big one...
Monumental - it looks fantastic

Other things on the list are:
Spider
Lockless - hopefully a quick affair?
HFC - this should be done and is grating away at me

I wouldn't mind swinging around the main roof at Kilnsey either, if only for an onsight blast as I'm sure the frigging will get tiring in more than a few ways. The chances of me getting on, let alone completing all of these routes is slim to none. The spider can wait until later in the season and HFC will be avoided until I know for certain it'll get done instantly, another day spent on that and I will lose the will to live. BUT, the Cornice needs full appreciation while its in condition.

Being a complete amateur, my boots are now well and truly ruined. I've got one pair of ok ish dragons, a new pair and an ill fitting pair of verde's. This needs rectifying in some way between now and holiday.

Right better go, funnily enough I'm at the Cornice tomorrow.

Van Conv.

Can't be bothered to insert all of the tags for the recent conversion pics. If you're interested they're here:

http://bit.ly/bN48l4

Got offered a years secondmant today in Stuttgart. Anyone know of the climbing situation Jura/Pfalz both two hours away?

Monumental Failure

Last Tues should have been spent out, not in. However, Nat had made other arrangements that left me without transportation and with a million and one things to sort out so I was doomed to a sweaty evening at the works. Actually there was quite a good scene and I climbed surprisngly well given my lack of indoor activities over the last few months (novel I know).

Later on in the week 'she' left for the North East as it seems this is the only place in which her office has any work and I used my time alone to make the flat look as if I am indeed a bachelor by not tidying up after myself, batch cooking and drinking solo. I cobbled together a last minute plan to get out on Fri although I struggled to find other daytime warriors and finally used UKB's hookup forum to get out and about.

When Friday came the destination had been agreed as Cheedale cornice. Why not? Its not as if its dry often and at least it should be quiet. 'Nai' and I enjoyed the place to ourselves warming up on something incredibly filthy (not in the good way) and being generally blind to fixed gear I ended up making it more bold than it needed to be.

Now, the Cornice and I have a strange relationship. The first place I ever climbed on Peak lime was Cheedale Cornice. After being at uni for a matter of minutes I posted over on UKC (note the difference) for someone to climb with. I'd spent the summer working my way through many of the trade routes at Kilnsey and had topped off my season with my hardest every redpoint and basically I was overly confident (hopefully not equally arrogant), coming from a small climbing scene I imagined that I in fact was much stronger than in reality.
Who answered my post? None other than UKB's insect overlord the Shark. I popped over to his that evening for a quick drink, met his mad collie and heard how a freindly local student had kicked his wing mirror off (I think?) after an evening on the sauce.
The day of reckoning came later that week as I stood outside ranmoor waiting for my lift. It came in the form of a 330d estate and I don't think I'll ever forget a foolish comment made by another passenger at the time which resulted in more rapid progress throught the peak district than I anticipated.
We parked at wormhill and I spent the next 20 mins sliding around on my arse as skate shoes clearly weren't up to that muddy approach. When we arrived at the Cornice every one else seemed plenty happy enough but not me. Having spent most of the summer at Kilnsey with the odd trip here and there to Malham or Gordale I was seriously unimpressed. I was assured the climbing was great and the various teams started warming up. Clarion Call was the first order of the day and begun my Peak limestone education with a big fat slap back to reality. I can't even remember if I got to the top, most likely yes but not by much.
I lowered off and Shark went on K3. Powerplant was my chosen route (fool) and I spent the next 30 mins suspended from the bolt by the undercuts perplexed. One thing that its worth noting is that back then, power was something I didn't have. Currently when I go back on one of the routes I enjoyed that summer at Kilnsey its blatantly obvious just how much weaker I was. My sequences involve deviances that I wouldn't even think about currently. If you haven't seen it yet, the irony here is that aged 18 I actually identified this as a weakness and delt with it accordingly, it took until I turned 25 to see that I didn't ever stop in this pursuit.
After yet another schooling on powerplant I moved on, this time to climb with Mark on 3rd reich I believe, a thin 7c ish (?) thing on the right hand side. Again the holds were tiny, the climbing tenuous and I had recieved another harsh lesson on the white stuff.
Fast forward a few years and i was back again, this time my Curly haired belayer and I arrived and I knew exactly what to do; avoid clarion call. Inspired by a picture of Ru footless I decided to dog up Nemesis. The climbing was good and I sorted the moves individually (no doubt swearing they were/are easier than clarion call) and lowered off to take over belaying duty. When it was again my turn to climb I put in a valiant effort which ended on the Sika'd hold, pumped out of my mind with little chance of recovery that day. I picked off something in the center of the wall at a much more ameanable grade before leaving.
Now back to Fri; Having only had one day of sport so far this year (which went 'kinda' ok) I wasn't sure what to expect. I haven't trained in a while and outside I've been plodding. My forearms were still a little tender from the weeks earlier session. I decided after looking at a particular route that any chance of a hard route was out and that I should try and enjoy some onsighting. The warmup was done (as above) and we moved onto clarion call.
From here on out I climbed the worst I've climbed for quite some time. I couldn't pin point what was wrong for the simple fact that everything was wrong. Sloppy footwork, poor reading, no arms, no fingers, no stamina. Thankfully one thing was with me, no fear (well only a little bit. Beal Joker 9.1mm + GriGri + Featherweight + New belayer leaves a few nerves here and there) and it was a good job too as everything and anything from here on I fell off. Redpointing 7a's was soul destroying and I couldn't really find a reason to cling onto. Pritch turned up and didn't seem to believe how poorly I was climbing until he witnessed it with his own eyes. I was all ready to right this blog as an admission of my poor performance without excuses however my body has obviously created a highly developed self defence mechanism wherby dobbin esque levels of neurosis are converted into actual ailments; in this way as Fri progressed so too did 'Man Flu'...

The weekend was spent stranded in Watford making final adjustments to the van and drinking too much at the family BBQ. It wasn't fun and as I was doing very little (stitching) I couldn't force the workers to speed up. Another weekend is required to finish the last little bits and I don't really want to sacrifice any more good weather for this.

Later on this week a Cornice re-match... maybe.

I have now booked two weeks off starting in Aug which I hoped to spend puntering around throughout some UK venues. The list is long and I have to say, after Fri the confidence is slightly dented.

Dream of White Horses (fancy a spot of riding?)

Very tired today after having a monster weekend at Gogarth. We left Sheffield at 10pm on Fri night after sorting plenty of last minute van things (including a stove). We arrived later at the South Stack lighthouse to see nought but fog and a beam of light cutting through it. I tried to capture this but failed miserably (repeat after me; manual focus).

Lighthouse, Gogarth, South Stack from Bennp2000 on Vimeo.

I also spent a small age trying to figure out how to use rear curtain sync to take a photo of Nat with a slow burn and then flash her in. Again I failed as canon doesn't offer that off-camera apparently?

Day 1 (or Saturday as its more commonly reffered to) was spent at Wen Zawn and the nearby areas. For the popularity of our first route we were (pleasantly) surprised to be the first people on the crag and the only team that appeared later went on Wen anyway. As everyone surely does, we viewed the Zawn from the promontory which somehow managaes to offer a viewpoint that reveals none of the obvious bedding planes you can see instantly from the ab. I'd advise gearing up somewhere other than the top of the ab itself, the approach and scramble down is atmospheric to say the least.

Dream itself is fantastic, the final pitch crosses territory that it really shouldn't (at the grade) and set the tone for the remainder of the routes (and moreover the weekend). Later on we headed to the Britomartis area and did a few routes here. A route finding accident left me on slightly harder territory at one point but apart from knowing I was in the wrong place I was fairly happy.

Not a terrible photo given you can't tell what you're taking using our horrendous little Fujifilm, the lack of viewfinder makes it impossible to know what you're taking a picture of when you're outside. It is however, waterproof should it go for a swim (I felt like testing this at more that one point).

Some helpful sole asked to use our ab rope which of course was not an issue until later that day when I came to take it up and found they'd left a nice big overhand knot in the bottom of it. Of course it got stuck and I got pretty angry.

The weather on Day 1 was fantastic (as above) with little wind. However Day 2, was somewhat contrasting. Despite the sky and ocean being stupendously blue, the wind made the whole Zawn a lot colder and a trifle more intimidating. The wind literally emptied my chalkbag as a gust came through the arch and straight upwards, showering the top of the crag in superchalk. I could see on a colder day with stormier sea's that these areas could get rather intimidating to say the least.

As Nat decided that The Flytrap (despite my best persuasion techniques i.e. Bitburger) wasn't one for her after our slightly harder route finding fail the day before we opted to do another route on the Zawn. Concrete chimney. Again this takes a line through territory that looks rather unlikely at the ameanable grade that it gets and it felt fairly exposed on the lower arete with the wind doing its best to try and unerve us both. It failed with me (medal?) but mightily pissed me off as I found I had to place a cam to keep what should have been a bomber sling in place! Nat was a little unnerved and below the final pitch we had a quick chat to check she was ok continuing (instead if slinking off onto Dream). It wasn't wholly clear if she was entirely happy but I couldn't be arsed waiting for it to clear anyway. I'm glad we didn't slink off as crossing through another unlikely set of overlapping slabs and roofs is one of the finest pitches I've ever done. Afterwards we called it quits and headed back Sheffside exhausted, the van having served us perfectly over the weekend.

More more more.

Week in Photos

Not really in the mood to write a lot. Mon - Tues was spent in North Wales with Reeve on the slate. Anything hard was his, anything easy was mine.

No doubt some will view that as ruining the onsight on some classics but it was a good few days and there are plenty left.

One nu-skool classics we went on was the Wow Wow, great fun but there was plenty of loose rock on the 2nd pitch (my pitch), which I wasn't happy about.

The van has progressed nicely:
Aux input
Underseat sub
Metal Frame
Wooden boarding
Foam

Now all that needs doing is covering the foam and sorting out some curtains or thermo-mats. I'm getting a little bored of sourcing ancillaries however its nearly done. Its a tad painful as with the van conversion, the van itself and upgrading my (or our) rack:

(add to that a Beal Joker and we're away!)

...we seem to be spending at an unsustainable rate.

The van is supposed to facilitate more climbing. It'll be good when thats the case.

Electric 6ix

The fusebox was a bit messy so it was time to tidy it up:

Barely visible:

Also got the back window tinted.

Seem to have found a little problem; the aerial or the headunit won't pick up radio very well (thankfully in Sheffield its ok!). I can't really work out if its the unit or the aerial, I did however notice that the headlining has been peeled away slightly by the aerial connection (its in the screen btw). The connection doesn't seem broken and technical prodding hasn't made much difference (if anybody has any idea pipe up!).

Got measured up for the rear frame. I'm going box tube with welded connections to keep the structure as shallow as possible. A few plates aligned to the heavy load points turns it into a bolt in bolt out feature.

After that, there's curtains and trimming the foam and then its ready. I really want to fit an underseat sub and an ipod lead but talking to various ICE shops it seems more money than I want to spend.

Hmmm

Furry Fingers

This weekend was spent almost entirely inside the caddy with carpet and glue. Lots of glue.
First the wiring was done, then removal of the panels. Then finally carpeting of the metalwork, panels and headlining (with the installation of four LED spots).

Results (which I'm proud of and spent most of this evenings sessions showing off):

I spent most of Sunday evening picking carpet fur from my fingernails which had been stuck with high temperature contact adhesive.

Tommorrow I am going to discuss a bed/platform options for the back. Get the rear tinted and visit a few audio specialists to discuss my 'needs'.

Tonight I went to the works, it'd taken about a week for my finger swelling to go down so the muggy heat worked to my advantage keeping me off anything vaguely tricky. It was boring and sweat but with my finger mummified in tape it was also pain free.

Nat and I decided that we'd sort the van as quickly as possible to save missing the summer. So far thats going well and now its in a completely usable state. Can't wait to finish it off.