Day 11 - I suppose it couldn’t last and finally the weather broke today although not in true Lofoten style I feel since it still only registered ‘a few showers’. This was enough to send us to the steep sport climbing cave of Eggum.

“Alan somehow keeps up a very good image of not trad climbing, I take it this is completely unfair and that actually he’s a complete knarl-meister?” - TobyA here

Well today I set about proving Toby’ s pre-conceived image correct. Armed with the knowledge I gleaned from Sport Climbing +, Mark and I set about Eggum in true sport climber style - a proper 6a warm-up, then a 6b+ to get the blood flowing, and then a quick working of the 7a+ extension. When the redpoint time came, we dispensed with the Brit-style double 9’s and used one 9 on its own, the quickdraws were all in place and the route properly rehearsed (well sort of). With such efficient redpoint tactics, success was inevitable (helped by the fact that the route was probably only 7a).

Eggum does add another dimension to Lofoten albeit mainly for the climber operating at 7a and above. The routes are on perfect rock, are well bolted and give great steep climbing. Just another feather in the cap of this wonderful climbing destination.

Day 12 - It has certainly got a bit colder now although the rain is still holding off. Spent another day at Gandlaf - the first crag we have visited twice - and picked off another couple of classics: Gamel Rev and Gollum. Apart from the two Czech climbers we kept meeting, this was the first occasion where a crag had been a bit ‘busy’. There were some guides practicing their rescue skills plus at least four other teams active. The Norwegian season is supposed to have started yesterday, which might explain it, although most at the crag had been there for a while.

Day 13 - Our final two routes were sport routes at Urdstabben before the long and rather tortuous journey home. I won’t go into too many details except to say that SAS are good, reliable and efficient, but if you do book from the UK, try and avoid the 3-stage flight in favor of the 2-hop one if you get the choice. Three hours driving, three flights and then a train make for a very long day!

Day 8 - One of the great classic routes of Lofoten is Bare Blåbær (only Bilberries - an expression which means the same as ‘piece of cake’ in English). The route is situated in the outstanding valley of Djupfjord, a place which would be World famous and probably developed with chairlifts, campsites and luxury hotels if it was anywhere in the Alps. Here there is nothing but what nature left us. Everything about this route from the walk-in to the first and last move is a pleasure. There is nothing really hard about it, but the length and sustained nature of the climbing mean it is a long and memorable day out. Once again we were joined (by coincidence) by our Czech friends Janek and Camilla, who we had climbed Vestpillaren with on Friday.

Day 9 - Although we had not declared this officially a rest day, it became an official late start day due to slightly dodgy weather, and lethargy. However we managed to pull one route out of the bag - the classic Solens Sonner, a long 4 pitch slab route with cracks and friction climbing. As expected it was another great route although Mark admitted that he has nightmares about holdless slabs, and there are plenty on this. It also throws in a 30m crack that only takes one decent runner at the bottom and then little else.

Day 10 - Today’s chosen route was Puff Crack around by Kalle camping. The crack itself was superb but the upper pitches hadn’t been climbed this year (we don’t think) and gave slightly terrifying slab padding on gritty, lichen-covered rock above a tape runner. Be warned that the Top 50 tag probably only applies when the route is clean which may not be very often, although you can abseil after the crack pitch.

The rest of the day consisted of exploring the Paradise area which is a fascinating jumble of blocks, walls and sea inlets. There is a huge potential for new routes here. The photo shows the idyllic free camping spot at Paradise, complete with bathing Norwegian girls. This lovely location apparently gets a bit crowded and smelly during the busy part of the season which is a great shame.

Day 5 - After yesterday’s excesses, it was hard to get going again today. The weather gave us no let up though and the sun continued to shine brightly. A brief visit to the sport crag of Finnvika was the only climbing activity - good climbs in a beautiful location but not really what you come to Lofoten for.

Day 6 - Lofoten is good at cracks - long ones with great gear in wonderful locations. Store Festvag has them by the bucketload and we managed three, all of them great. The photo shows Skiloperen, but the best and most surprising was Cuckoo Crack which looks E5 from below but gives a magnificent pitch at about HVS (it should be called Cuckoo Flake really since that is what it is).

Back at base the rest of the team had left leaving just Mark and myself. We settled into an evening routine of beer on our terrace overlooking Vagakallen, a plate of grub and (expensive can of beer*), then settle down in the camping reception to watch the football and get a decent internet connection.

*Price of beer - first day we arrived, walking around the supermarket we spotted the beer, 25 NOK a six pack (we thought). Got outside, did the maths and realised that it was 25 NOK per can (= £15 a six pack!) Finances weren’t helped by then leaving a six pack in the fridge of the first camping we stopped at.

Day 7 - Thorbjørn didn’t want a photo of the Goat on the cover on the guide, despite the fact we had rather a good new one (see Goat chapter). I can see why - the Goat is Svolvær and associated with old-skool Lofoten, the new wave are centered on Henningsvæ, Presten and Gandalf. We still wanted to climb the thing since it is an essential route when in Lofoten. It didn’t disappoint. Mucking around the horns in particularly exciting and unique. We didn’t do the jump but even so the situation is just superb.

There are many things which make a route special - line, position, continuity, exposure, rock quality, history, location and climbing quality. It is rare that all of these come together in one route to such great effect as they do with Vestpillaren. The route has a perfect line up the most striking rock feature in the area, the rock is of immaculate quality, the pitches are all around the same difficulty, the position and outlook are majestic and the climbing absorbing throughout. The upper section has a few pitches that take the only lines of cracks and grooves up an otherwise blank sea of rock - all natural and little fixed gear.

We were also blessed with perfect weather for our ascent and, like the side-bar advert I set up over a month ago, I have now experienced a story I’ll be telling my grandchildren. I won’t go on about it since the ascent was pretty straightforward, just make sure that if you have any ambitions for big rock routes in Europe, you put this one on the list.

Here are some more pictures (click for bigger versions):

Five days in and we still haven’t seen any rain, and the forecast is still good for the next few. Lofoten is certainly an amazing place in these conditions.

Day 1 - Long drive up through so much impressive rock scenery that we banned the comment “I wonder if there is anything up that?” We stopped at one of the many superb little campsites that Norway specialises in with a camping cabin. First evening was spent witnessing my first ever midnight sun - an amazing and disorienting experience.

Day 2 - A quick ferry onto the Island (although you can get there by road now but it is a long drive) and we met up with Chris, Sherri and Colin. Afternoon was spent at the accessible and sheltered Gandalfveggen. There was a wicked cooling wind blowing that must have chilled the teams we saw up on Vestpillaren. Two great routes done - Gandalf and Tromso Express.

Day 3 - Cloudy but no wind. More classic ticks on the accessible Pianokrakken. Light and Shade and Apple Cake Arete. The big news though was that the guidebooks stock has arrived in Henningsvaer so the launch party on Friday is on! The photo shows the guidebook selection available at Thorbjorn’s shop currently (well he has some others on another shelf).

I had promised Sam a ‘lads trip’ to Wales - his sister had gone with Henriette to Berlin last year and, although the trade may not seem a fair one, Sam seemed happy enough with it. So it was with increasing frustration as we woke up every day during half term to be faced with rain, drizzle and dodgy forecast. Then suddenly, and rather surprisingly, a good weather window appeared at just the right moment. Bags were packed and the lads set off on Friday afternoon heading for Ogwen and one of the beautiful campsites below Tryfan.

The intention of choosing one of these campsites was that they are too far from pubs to attract the drunken middle of the night chatter problem keeping everyone awake until all hours. Of course that doesn’t stop people bringing their own ‘pubs’ with them to the site, which is exactly what happened. It is amazing how ignorant and unsociable some people are. At the end of the weekend I ended up wondering why on earth these people had bothered coming all the way to Wales for their ‘campin’ weekend since they never actually left the campsite after arriving despite the beautiful weather and clear tops.

Anyway we weren’t going to let it spoil our time. Acting on a hot tip from Jack Geldard, Sam and I headed off to Carnedd y Filiast aiming for Left Edge. Jack’s 40 minute walk-in turned out to be 60 minutes steep grind up hill for 11 year old legs - a fact which will probably guarantee this buttress remains a beautiful and quiet place - but the route looked good when we got there. A brief explanation to Sam of how multi-pitching works and I was off. Now one of those lessons that you tend to only learn as an after thought is that people on their first multi-pitch climb quite like decent-sized stances to break up the route - it gives them a chance to get things together in their minds and also offers a break from the exposure. Unfortunately Left Edge stance can only be described as small, smaller and smallest (well a foothold actually). Luckily though the climbing is dead straightforward and the position is superb. Four pitches later we were at the top and ready to make our way back down. Sam had enjoyed the climbing but didn’t much like the lonely waits on the tiny stances as I disappeared up the slab above.

The rest of the weekend went well. We joined the crowds for an evening session on Little Tryfan - perhaps a better place to learn a bit of multi-pitching! Next day an early start ensured us peace and quiet on Milestone Buttress Direct and a very different sort of VDiff to the previous day. In terms of technical climbing I’d say there was at least three grades between MB and Left Edge - the former surely being worth HVD or even Severe, the latter having no move which would get more than Mod on a Peak edge. However, I think VDiff for Left Edge is ok - the gear is a little thin and the situation remote with some of the trappings of a more serious mountain crag.

All in all a fine weekend.

.. and everyone was there! Climbers on boulders and routes, walkers by the hundred and loads of paragliders - I even saw two teams busy on Count’s Buttress! It makes you realise why some issue on Stanage crops up at most BMC Peak Area meetings and why the place needs its own Access Forum.

We were just out for a family walk - a loop starting near the High Neb parking, dropping down in the general direction of North Lees farm but cutting back up towards the Plantation and onto the top of the Edge. From there the loop is easily closed down the Causeway and across by the Buckstone back to the car. Earlier in the day we had seen loads of people walking around in shorts and t-shirts but this means very little for Brits who will go out wearing next to nothing in any weather, especially on Friday nights! So we ignored the signs and the kid’s (Dutch) mother pre-prepared them in all sorts of coats, hats, gloves and scarves which of course all ended up hanging from my backpack by the time we got to the Plantation boulders. I felt like a right packhorse (as usual).

But it was worth it since the views were stunning.

One of the best known routes in the Blanca is the magnificent ridge of Espolón Central on the Puig. The fact that you can see it from the motorway as you drive up and down the coast means that virtually every climber who comes here has contemplated climbing this feature at some stage or another.

I first included it in a guidebook in 1996 in the original Costa Blanca, Mallorca, El Chorro guide. Chris Craggs had already written it up in his Blanca guide from 1990. Since then I have put it in two further editions of the three-area guide, Chris included it in his second Costa Blanca guide from 1997 and finally we both included it in the joint 2005 dedicated Costa Blanca Rockfax. That’s 6 books in all.So it was a bit of a shock when in December last year I realised that neither Chris nor I had actually climbed this major route. Chris’s original description had been written up by Dave Gregory, my information had come from Rowland Edwards, and the 2005 description was written by Mark Glaister. The information in the 6 books was always good, although the 1996, 1998 and 2001 Rockfax guides tended to confuse the route by describing too many alternatives and extensions.

February this year I was in the Blanca with Mick Ryan. We were staying at the Orange House and had a good weather forecast for the next day - the only decent day of our week trip as it turned out. Well the ascent went without real incident, we got up and down in plenty of time and were soon supping beers in a warm satisfied glow of the early evening sun - a magnificent route ticked in magnificent conditions - the stuff that great memories are made of!I decided to write up my own description for what is almost certainly the best version of the route. There are variations that try and tackle the full ridge from low on the left, and the full ridge in the centre of the face, but the direct start leads to a good and logical direct route up the pillar and adding harder variation pitches, or trying to mess with the line, seem to miss the point really.

Download the Espolon Central MicroGUIDE. It contains virtually the same information as the 2005 Rockfax guidebook but with a slightly different description and a different photo-topo. It is also extremely light and easy to carry!

I was thinking back to 2001 the other day after hearing news of Mike Robertson’s Deep Water Rockfax winning of the Mountain Exposition Award at the Banff Book Festival.

2001 was the year that Chris Craggs and I teamed up to publish Peak Gritstone East - just another guidebook for most people now, but for Rockfax and many other UK guidebook producers, PGE has become a significant watershed. For those who may not know, or remember, Peak Gritstone East was published amid a furore of debate and discussion and even threats of legal action (summarised below or in the ‘rest of entry’ link). Now so many guidebooks are in full-colour, using many of the layout and publishing ideas we had in PGE, it seems so strange to think that there were people at the time who tried very hard to prevent it from being published. The resulting stress gave me more sleepless nights than I care to remember; that combined with the birth of our third child Lydia (a happy event but not one that tends to lighten the stress load) plus 9/11 four days after her birth, make me think of late 2001 with mixed emotions.

The photo shows the guidebook launch in Rock+ Run Sheffield, in December 2001.

I have subsequently discovered that all the debate that had gone on across various BMC committees in the latter few months of 2001 had been very close to agreeing to the BMC taking legal action against Rockfax and only the sensible behaviour of some at the BMC prevented it.

So what if they had taken legal action? Well, the point of law in question was so big and untested that it was never a case that tiny entities like the BMC and Rockfax were going to achieve anything with. The result of the legal action would have just been to cost the BMC a lot of money and me more money than I had. Hence, PGE would probably not have been published and Rockfax would probably not exist any more. There would have been no useful precedent established apart from scaring off competition from all new private guidebook producers for many years, probably on a nationwide basis - every time a new guidebook was proposed that was unwanted by the BMC and Club establishment, they would have been able to trot out this saga to prevent publication. At that time the BMC had already taken on Niall Grimes as full-time guidebook co-ordinator, so this positive development had nothing to do with the debate.

The more I have thought about it the more I think what a pointless and expensive waste of time this whole episode was, something which is even more apparent now that both the BMC and Rockfax are winning World awards for their guidebooks. This is in contrast to the guidebook debate Rockfax caused in 1995, where Ken Wilson led the discussion against the Pembroke Rockfax. Whilst this 1995 debate also left unresolved issues, it was a good debate to have, and one that had a positive effect on both parties in the long run, and tended to steer clear of legal issues. I certainly was given food for thought and modified my behavior because of it. The same is not true of the 2001 saga which still leaves a very bitter taste.

As it is, common sense prevailed, PGE was published and Rockfax guidebooks have gone from strength to strength. The BMC guidebooks are now superb publications which, although influenced by the style of PGE, are very much in their own mould. Other producers like Ground-Up are publishing great books, the traditional club producers like the FRCC in particular have updated their formats to make best use of the production techniques possible with modern dtp technology. The influence of British guidebooks is becoming apparent in almost every publication that appears around the World and we are even winning awards!

As a footnote I would like to add that the BMC of 2007 is a very different organisation to the BMC of 2001 and none of the issues from the 2001 guidebook saga are applicable today.

UKClimbing.com discussion thread

(more…)

Well I’m not, but maybe you are?

There was some discussion on the forums today about Mallorca and it seems people are heading out there once again for the winter sun climbing fix. One of the problems in the past with Mallorca has always been finding sufficient lower grade routes. The locals have never really bothered too much with bolting easier stuff and it is certainly true that the best of the climbing is in the higher grades. However for most climbers operating at around VS and above there will still be a week or two’s worth of climbing if you seek out the good destinations. Places like Puig de Garrafa, S’estret, Creveta and Cala Magraner have plenty of routes to choose from.

Rockfax Mallorca Route Database

One route not to miss is the magnificent Albahida. A full day’s outing for most including a summit tick and a long descent. Unusually it is a trad route but only a small rack is required so no need to blow your ever-diminishing luggage allowance.

One thing you may not want to carry up the route with you is the guidebook. So now you can save a bit of weight by downloading the Albahida MicroGUIDE which has all the info included in the book.