Five weeks since I last blogged, where does the time go? We left the Cote d’Azure in good order and had an excellent two weeks at Climb France with Ollie and Jess. It was years (and years) since I have last been to the Buis les Baronnies area and it was pleasant surprise - we never drove more than 10 miles for the week that Dave Gregory was there and climbed on a different crag every day.Then it was of to AlpSun another Brit run set-up (Pete and Helen) not far from Briançon, right up in the mountains. The weather has let us know we are back in the hills, we have had rain and snow plus some glorious sunshine. Plenty of good quality cragging and a Via Ferrata or two - recommendable! Chamonix tomorrow.

Had a great week with Dave Gregory - only a bit knackering - I think 21 routes in the first two and a half days was probably overdoing things a bit though! The weather was kinder than on his last visit, and doing 30 odd routes (and at 72 and 3/4) was more than he would have got done in the UK. The biggest shock to the system was a visit to a great looking limestone crag at Chateaudouble - the guide’s 25 minute approach took us over and hour up an interminable scree slope - the climbing was good, but the descent was equally horrible - not sure my knees will ever recover.

Thursday we dropped Dave of at Nice airport and he had an uneventful journey home - jet-setting was never easier. On our return, the fat package in the post box was the brand new Northern England - nice! OK there are a couple of (very minor) caption errors in there - or are they simply Easter Eggs? Either way I am pleased with the way it looks - two years of enjoyable effort.

I have to admit, the older I get and the more places I visit, the more convinced I am that we got the sh1tty end of the stick in the UK when they were dolling out the rock resourses - and don’t get me going on the weather!

We took a ride up to the Gorges de Blavet, about 30 minutes from St Rafael today, to have a wander round. It looks mighty complicated in the new guide, and it is. though a couple of hours spent exploring the area soon had it sorted out in my mind.

I had never heard of the place and I bet 95% of UK climbers haven’t either, 300′ granite walls, a sunny side and a shady side, a downhill approach and heaps of great looking routes many in the upper grades.

There is even a sunny beginners’ cliff a short distance above the road, a bit of something for everyone really! And is it on the circuit - not a chance!

Then there are the many fine limestone cliffs around Toulon, we have pretty much had to ourselves during our weekday visits - they are at least as good as their vaunted counterparts on the Costa Blanca and a lot less polished too. Have we heard and English voice there - of course not!

Colin and Dave Gregory had a reasonable 11 day trip to visit us, seven decent days, in which we got a heap of climbing done, both in the local area and a little further afield, on a fine mixture of granite and limestone cliffs. The weather has been cool and occasionally showery, and views of the big hills to the north have revealed stacks of fresh snow.
Then just as were were fit(-tish) and fired up we got two days near solid rain - probably the wettest spell of weather ever in our many visits down here. Saturday morning I delivered them to Nice airport, and it was still hammering down - the motorway was just like driving in the UK.
By the time we got back to the pad, the sun was out and the forecast is set fair - sorry about that lads!

Colin and Dave Gregory arrive on the first day of the year and we had two busy days on the rock before the rain set in! A couple of damp days gave me chance to crack on with Northern England (not long now!) and check the local Decathlon where I discovered three climbing guides I hadn’t come across before - including one the are right behind the pad. The lads did a bit of local logging to keep the home fires burning.

During a drier spell we tried one of the cliffs, nice red granite, well-bolted and in a sea-side setting - very pleasant. The following day was better again, looks like it is coming good. OK - the weather hasn’t been the best - but I have done almost 30 more routes than I would have if I had stayed in the UK!

A few cold crisp days was enough of an excuse to get away from proofing Trad+, tweaking Northern England and working on Lofoten. Friday was especially nice, myself and DG (Dave Gregory) dumped a car at the Surprise View then drove round to Moscar Top and walked back over Stanage - a gentle seven miler. The day was brilliantly clear but the NE wind had a savage edge to it, mind you it was over our shoulder most of the day, so that was nice!

I took a few photos of the ‘water-holes’ carved in the boulder above the northern end of the cliff - done to provide water for the grouse apparently, over a hundred years ago. It looks like there are 33 of them - they are all numbered, but quite a few are no longer visible, doubtless they have become overgrown. They are beautifully carved with elegant curved channels carrying the water into the central ‘basin’ one day I am going to try and find them all - I might even draw a map!

Heading past Higgar Tor we encountered a couple of folks with five BIG dogs, three Rotweilers and two Alsatians, roaming back and forth, we mentioned the presence of sheep on the moor - but, as ever, they assured us that ‘their’ dogs didn’t chase sheep

Sunday was a bit greyer, but Colin and Mark were down from North Yorkshire, and decided on Burbage North, which as it turned out was a good choice, what with the wind still nagging out of the north west.

I never cease to be amazed how busy the Peak is at weekends, a cold grey day in November and I ended up parking over near Higgar Tor! The climbing was good if a little chilly, certainly way better than being indoors - and the valley was buzzing - walkers, climbers, boulders, bikers - all out making the most of the Sunday.

I watched with dismay as a dog chased sheep down in the valley bottom (so maybe some do!) before heading back to the car, where to my surprise the thermometer showed a chilly 3.5 degrees - amazing we got anything at all done really!

I was up at the Wainstones at the weekend (and glorious it was too) doing a bit of finally checking for my new Northern England guide, due out in January. Ambling back down the hill at the end of the day my mind rolled back down the years, to my first visit to the North York Moors. Back in 1966 I persuaded my long suffering father to take three of us (all mid-teenages and mad keen for it!) over to Scugdale so we could bivi there for a couple of nights and do lots (and lots) of climbing.We humped our gear up to the crag (mostly consisting of tinned food) and set up home in a small cave. After an afternoon cracking routes off the rain started, and continued all night - by mid-morning things had turned squalid, and eventually we had to admit defeat, I trekked to the farm to ask if I could use the phone (and got a bollocking for ‘camping’ at the crag) - and my father duly turned up and carted us off home.

It didn’t take long to dry out (though most of the tins had lost their labels) and by early evening the sun was out and it was glorious. From our house I could see the distant hills bathed in sunshine - it all seemed so unfair!

It was a lesson learnt though - on a recent visit to Northumberland with Alan we drove through pouring rain heading for Callerhues, we were pretty close to sacking it when I retold this tale, we pressed on just a little further - and almost inevitably the sun came out and we spent a glorious day.

Clink on the link below to take you to a down-loadable version of the full index of the Eastern Grit RockFax. It is in full colour (grade bands) and includes all 2952 routes

The original index only included the starred routes because of the constraints of space.

EASTERN GRIT - the FULL Index

With Dave Gregory still in the USA and Colin tramping around in the fog in the Lakes as DoE support, it was left to the ‘old team’ to make the most of a lovely autumn Sunday on Stanage. For the first week in October the place was really busy, so we headed for Stanage End, and even there plenty of folks were mooching around. Crow Chin was smothered by the t-r brigade but End Slab and the Crab Crawl area had a few gaps. I got the chance to test my birthday present (to myself a Leica DLux 3) and even did two routes I hadn’t done before - that makes 963!

Photo: Colin on Tom’s Peeping VS 5a (or E1 6a?).

Deadlines, the weather, partners, home-life, other jobs - some juggling was needed as the autumn rapidly approaches and so does the printing date for Northern England.
A cast of thousands was assembled to get the final few shots and do some last minute checking.
In the event (and as ever) it fell to myself, Alan and Colin to spend a couple of frantic days. Day 1 was Scugdale, Park Nab and the Wainstones, completed just as the cloud motored in and the temperature plummeted. We bumped into a Cleveland MC meet and discussed the guide/photos/which cliffs were in an out etc, all in an amicable fashion, which was nice.
Day 2 and we drove through heavy rain to emerge in bright sunshine just south of Bellingham (the Craggs’ weather genie was at work), the day was spent on Callerhues getting trashed - the grades were as anomalous as we expected - and more so in some cases - all will be revealed in the new guide.
Then it was off to Causey Quarry to catch the last rays of the sun at the lads zipped up The Mauler (HVS 5b - or Severe 4a on Callerhues!) before heading for home - straight back into the rain!