Adventures in Kansas and Nova Scotia

Well I’m now in Dublin airport again waiting for a flight to Chicago. Has been an enjoyable, and slightly more relaxing week. Now I’ve started travelling I just want to be back in Kansas but I still have about 20 hours to go. 🙁 Anyway…

On the Sunday I got back to my parents an old school friend, his better half and their child visited me in Clacton. Was good to catch up and thankfully the weather stayed reasonably dry for their visit. Went and got fish and chips in a restaurant in town – I definitely miss good English fish and chips! Nothing much else interesting happened and as he’s not a climber I can’t even bore you all with the routes I did…

Monday and Tuesday were spent relaxing with my parents. Tuesday afternoon I got my dad to drop me off and did a 6 mile hike back to their house, somehow without getting rained on. That part of Essex is as flat as the flattest parts of Kansas – I doubt my total height gain reached ten metres! That said it was reasonably enjoyable and it was good to get some exercise done. Photos are here.

My parents and I went and visited my brother and sister-in-law on Wednesday evening and we all eat rather too much Indian food. Was good to catch up even if my sister-in-law was not on best form due to a needle stick, a barely concious patient who could not consent and the drugs she was consequently on. Nothing much has changed in their lives since Christmas so there’s nothing much interesting I can write here.

As Thursday was my last day at my parents I took them out for lunch before packing in the evening for a early start on Friday. Friday we were all up early and my parents and I went to my graduation in Manchester, where I got to wear incredibly stupid robes (photos). Was pleased I went and thankfully it was more enjoyable than my first graduation as it was over quicker and I could understand it all (half my graduation for my Bachelors was in Welsh). My parents dropped my off at a car hire place where I somehow managed to get a Audi A4 despite ordering a Group A car. They clearly wanted the Audi back at the airport!

Having somehow finally managed to get hold of Hugh I popped in and some him for an hour in his new house before heading back to Jen’s for the night. This had not been my original plan but due to some enforced changes in friend’s plans it now made most sense. I get to Jen’s quite late so we stayed in and both drunk a little bit too much wine! After a slow start the next morning due to a slight hangover and enforced changes in plans I finally managed to arrange climbing with Adam at Stanage.

Believe it or not the weather at Stanage was actually OK for most of the time until we got rained off a few hours later. In that time, however, we managed to get 5 routes done between us. My second of the last route wasn’t exactly clean but as the rock was quite wet by then and I was having to pull on slopey friction holds I had no problem with falling off a route I knew I could normally do. Having been rained off we headed back into Sheffield and a bunch of us all met up in a pub for food, and in many cases (including mine) a little bit too much beer.

Yesterday I had arranged to meet several friends at Outside cafe at 10. Unsurprisingly movement onward was not quick – getting climbers to move from the cafe was compared to herding cats – but we eventually managed to get everyone to the same bit of Frogatt. I had previous with a HS that I’d taken rests on before so I get back on it. This time I got up it quite quickly and wondered why I had made such a fuss in the pass. Hopefully this is a sign of me getting better.

Shortly thereafter I top-roped a HVS 5a. This has previously been backed off by Adam with several comments about it being rather undergraded. Several others had also top-roped and said similar and having done it I’ve got to agree. By the end of the mass top roping session eight of us, all of whom had done several HVS 5as before, had done the route. All of us agreed that it was undergraded. Most thought it was stiff for 5a but every last one of us said there was no way it HVS. HVS 5a should not have crux moves several metres off the floor with absolutely no useful gear!

Next up on my hit list was CMC slab – another climb I had previous with as I’d backed off it until the rather easier climb next door before. This time I got it but not before a fall where I totally managed to fail to spot the good hold which was only slightly higher than where I was trying to put my foot. D’oh! Having seconded Colin up Three Pebble Slab I next tried Tody’s Wall. The less said about that the better. It involved a rather inglorious retreat and Colin trying to tie up the entire crag while attempting to set up an abseil to retrieve his gear. As Colin then had to leave and everyone else was in the pub I then also headed to the pub for dinner and drink before heading to my hotel in preparation for the early (5am) start today.

Well I did try to go climbing that Saturday afternoon but without much success. Jen and I headed to Curbar to meet up with Adam and as we were walking along the crag to find him the heavens open. Having met up with Adam we promptly decided to run away. After having walked about half way back to the car it decided to stop raining and we managed to get a few boulder problems in before the heavens opened again – this time more permanently. Having given up on climbing we all ended up round Adam and Kate’s for dinner, and at least in my case, a bit too much alcohol.

The next day promised some nicer weather in North Wales so after a bit of a slow start Jen and I headed over to Tremadog. Having not led much recently I was looking for something easier to lead but as there were already people on it I ended up deciding to do One Step in the Clouds, a VS I’d done years earlier but couldn’t remember. Turned out to be a good choice – the second pitch is some of the most enjoyable climbing I’ve ever done. The first pitch was nothing special – not helped by some route finding errors on my part which meant it took me longer than it should have – but the second pitch more than makes up for it. As we were walking off it started to rain so we decided not to try to squeeze in another climb so we headed to Llanberis for a very nice curry.

Having spent the night in the Ogwen CC hut our plan was to go for a longish hike taking in some of the Welsh 3000 footers. However when we woke up it was raining and the cloud base was considerably below 3000ft so we headed back to Sheffield and a late afternoon indoor session at Foundry. Climbing at a wall I’d previously climbed at gave me a good indication of how I was climbing and what I thought was the case seemed to be the case. Technically I’m climbing well but I still haven’t got all my strength and stamina back.

Tuesday brought another damp day but I thought some shower dodging might have resulted in some climbing. Jen was less impressed by this idea and as everyone else was working I headed out to do some soloing. I mostly ended up looking in shops while it was raining! Did end up squeezing one damp route in but I didn’t fancy soloing anything else when I was by myself and the routes were all damp. I headed back to Sheffield, picked up Jen and headed to the Works for some bouldering with her, Richard and Adam, where once again Adam pointed me at hard (for me) problems and I stupidly tried them – with more success than I was expecting.

Wednesday I went and saw Sarah, an ex-colleague from my MoD days, and her two children. The youngest was only 7 months so had obviously changed quite a lot since I’d last seen her 6 months ago. She seemed such a happy and undemanding baby, unlike her sister. Then again I think the older one has never really liked me so I probably have a view biased by her unhappiness at seeing me. I mentioned this to my parents and they said that my brother and I were similar, with the oldest being more demanding and generally less happy. Not sure I liked being told that given that I was the oldest! I had hoped to meet up with my old Wednesday climbing crowd that evening but it turned out that for one reason or another none of them were actually climbing. So instead I headed out to Windgether soloing. Took a while to get back into trusting myself on the grit but I got ten solos in before it once again rained. Was pleased to solo Right Triplet Crack as this was something I’d backed off a few times. It’s a single move over an over hang and it looks like my efforts to work on my core muscle strength are having some effect as I found it much easier this time.

Not too much to say about Thursday daytime. Attempts to find WiFi to do some work were not massively successful and I only got a little bit of work done. That evening Jen and I tried climbing at Horseshoe Quarry. I managed one route before a thunderstorm dropped a lot of rain – Jen didn’t even get a chance to second. So once again I found myself heading back to Jen’s for food having been rained off climbing. Friday daytime was spent at Manchester uni discussing finishing off the work I’d started there, which was productive if not very exciting! That evening I headed up to see Mark in Cowling. Had some very nice home-cooked food from his wife and had an enjoyable evening before heading back to the Frogatt CC hut.

Saturday was spent at the family camp of my old Scout group. As both I and most of my Sheffield friends had non-climbing plans we predicted it would be a nice sunny day and so it turned out to be! I was a bit uncertain about how it would all go but once I was there that went away and I just got on with helping with the canoeing. I hadn’t canoed in years and years so was rather surprised at not finding it too difficult, although I didn’t get to do it for long and it was on a perfectly flat and rather small lake. I then hung around a bit more, including chatting with Gareth who happened to be volunteering at the camp site that day, before heading back to my parents. All in all an enjoyable day which made me realise quite how much I had been missing Scouting. I must be mad!

All in all an enjoyable week visiting friends. I’m now back at my parents for a few days which will hopefully be nice and relaxing and give me a chance to do some work so that I have to take less holiday time for my trip.

If anyone wants to comment on any of my posts then sign up for an account (on the right) and you should be able to once I authorised the account. As I only really want friends commenting this seemed the easiest way to avoid spam. Meant to tell you all this ages ago!

Well I went climbing at Warsaw. Turned out to be a lot of driving for not much climbing. I led the 5.9 that I’d previously done on top rope twice before and also led another 5.9 where I thought the crux was nails for 5.9. Took me quite a while to work out the crux, got myself tired and had to take a rest before committing to it. The whole route was slabby and technical and had lots of interesting side ways moves in it. Lovely route – the best route I’ve done at Warsaw to date – and one which I’ll have to do clean if I go back again.

On the Thursday I made the trip to Dublin for SMBE 2012. On the whole the trip went well and I liked the short, 6 hour, transatlantic flight. Was glad it was so short given that there was a larger person in the seat next to me. Not stupidly large but definitely enough to intrude on my space. Turns out that Ireland, like England, appears to have forgotten what summer is and it was wet and miserable when I arrived. My hotel let me into my room when I arrived so sleep soon over took me.

Saturday I went to the bouldering wall in Dublin. Not up to the Works but definitely not a bad bouldering wall and I could certainly feel it after an hour and a half. The rest of the day was spent doing some work and registering for the conference. Sunday and Monday were largely spent at the conference so there’s not much exciting to report. Watched the football (if any Americans are reading – soccer) on Sunday which was sadly predictable. England lose in a penalty shoot out, no, that’s never happened before…

Tuesday was again the conference but I missed the morning session of boredom and instead practised my talk for the afternoon. My talk seemed to go down well – no pregnant pauses after “any questions?” which was nice and apparently it had some positive tweets. Was glad to see the end of the conference although it went better than I was expecting and it allowed me to catch up with some of the Manchester crowd.

My parents flew out to Dublin on Wednesday and we went to see the Wicklow mountains. I liked Glendalough and would like to go back and do some more serious walking in the area. The old religious settlement was also pretty cool. On the way back to Dublin we also went past a cool waterfall. Wasn’t a straight drop but rather was water flowing down a rather high slab. Maybe not quite as impressive as a long straight drop but I enjoyed it for its difference. My parents were distinctly less impressed by it all. Photos are here

Thursday we looked round Dublin and this time I would agree with my parents, it was shit. Unless you want to get drunk I would recommend you don’t go to Dublin. Maybe that’s why so much drinking does happen, there’s nothing else worth doing. The castle isn’t really a castle. There’s a single tower that’s the remains of a proper castle but that’s had much newer buildings attached to it so isn’t very noticeable. I’m sure it has some historical significance – my parent’s aren’t into museums so didn’t find out – but it certainly doesn’t look very impressive.

Having decided Dublin was a bit shit we went back to the car and ended up in Dún Laoghaire. For a ferry port this seemed a very nice little town and they had not let the port dominate it. Probably not worth seeing unless you’re travelling through it but it killed some time before we headed back to the airport and England. Photos from this day are here.

I’m now in Sheffield bemoaning the British weather. Not sure what the plans are for the next few days. There should be a climbing attempt this afternoon…

Well nothing too exciting has happened since I last posted here. The most exciting thing to happen was going to Warsaw again a couple of Sundays ago. I’d definitely improved a lot since my last visit in February. I cleanly top-roped one of the 5.9s I’d found a bit difficult in February and led the 5.10a I’d done on second and which I thought I should be able to lead. Unfortunately the middle of the day was quite wet and that led to some excitement. I’d done the 5.9 “walrus” move on a trad route when it started to rain. Now the move was protected by a bolt but the way I’d done it had required some technical squirming and I had no desire to do it again so I tried to push on. Turns out that wet limestone does not have the best friction. Who would’ve thought? Took one smallish fall onto gear, tried again got a bit further took a much larger fall, tried one last time and bottled out before I got to my last high point so took another small fall on gear. Lowered off, waited for it to dry and then got it in one push although I did leave the gear clipped. Really pleased I took an OK lead fall as I often find that after a break from leading I need to talk a reasonable lead fall to remind myself that actually they’re not so bad and to get my confidence back, which it seems to have done. I hope so as I’m off to Warsaw again tomorrow.

Otherwise I’ve continued to climb indoors on a Tuesday and Thursday. Carol went off on a last-minute two week backpacking trip with a Venture Scout crew – have I mentioned she’s mad? A three day camp was normally enough for me, although I suppose they were younger and without a long backpack to focus the mind. Anyway apart from making sorting car shares that little more interesting it’s not made things too difficult as I know enough Tuesday/Thursday regulars that I don’t have any real problems finding someone to belay me.

Last weekend I went for a hike the Konza Prairie Trails, a 6-mile circular hike (at least the version I did). Was probably my favourite hike in Kansas to date but apart from that there’s not a lot to say. Photos here.

The next couple of weeks promise to be quite busy. As I say above I’m off climbing tomorrow and then I’m off to Dublin on Thursday for a conference before heading to the UK for a mad couple of weeks trying to visit everyone. I would imagine I may have slightly more to post here!

Well, as I predicted, there is definitely more to say in this post… probably lots more!

When I last posted I was about to head to DC for four days, mainly for work. I flew out Friday afternoon, checked in to the youth hostel, got food and went to bed all without much excitement. It was a little weird being back in the DC area again after a six year break but other than that there’s not much to say. The next day I first went to the National Museum of the American Indian. I’d first tried visiting several years ago but the queue was around the block as it had only just opened and so we went elsewhere – Wikipedia tells me it must have been in 2004. The museum was smaller than I was expecting and covered the same ground as many other museums I’ve been too but it was still interesting and I still learnt some stuff. The thing I found most interesting was how the four cardinal compass directions and a colour associated with each of them seem to form a common part of so many Native American cultures. Having finished at the Native American museum I headed to the Postal Museum. Many, many, many years ago (probably about 22 years) I was briefly a stamp collector and so was intrigued to see what it was all about. The bit on stamps was interesting but was only a small proportion of the museum with the rest being filled with the history of the USPS which, frankly, was rather less interesting.

Having finished being a tourist I headed to a work meeting and dinner. Nothing interesting to say there! The next day promised to be the most interesting work day as it was a day full of presentations. Unfortunately Mark asked me to test their tutorial for the Monday and Tuesday on a Windows machine. Good thing I did as I found several problems but unfortunately it meant I paid no attention to most of the talks. Monday was spent helping support the tutorial, which I still find a little comical given that I had only run the program myself for the first time the day before. Think I was probably a net benefit as I was able to answer many of the numpty questions but I still had to pass many questions on to others. Tuesday we repeated the whole thing with another, thankfully smaller, group. Once that was done we headed to the airport only to sit on the tarmac for two and a half hours waiting for the weather en-route to clear. Finally got back to Lawrence at quarter to one in the morning (or 1:45 Washington time). A very long day given that I’d been up at 6am to go for a swim before work.

The weekend just gone I headed down to Arkansas with four women to go climbing. Not sure how that came about as I didn’t organise the trip, but they all seemed nice enough. Was disappointed when I didn’t get ID’d buying alcohol despite walking into the store with four women aged 21-24. They clearly thought I was a dirty old man or something! Finally got to Horseshoe Canyon Ranch, where we were both camping and climbing, at about one in the morning.

The next day I touched real rock for only the second time since I moved out here. I started off by leading some 5.6s (F3+) sport routes before leading a couple of 5.8s (F4+) all with no real problem. Next up was top roping a 5.8 trad climb (~VS) that had been put up by another party and looked like rather sustained laybacking. Glad I wasn’t on lead as it did indeed involve rather sustained laybacking and although my stamina is slowly getting back to previous levels it wasn’t up to that sort of sustained laybacking and I had to take a couple of rests even on top rope. The final attempt of the day was at a 5.10b where the crux was a mantelshelf. Now in case any of you have forgotten I’ll remind you that I am truly useless at manteling and this again proved to be the case and there was a lot of tight rope / pulling to get over the crux.

Sunday was not my most successful day. I started out leading a 5.8+ sport route with no problems. So far, so good. Then I got on a 5.9+ and had all sorts of head games. The climbing itself was not that hard but I struggled to commit to any move above a bolt. I got in in the end but I clearly need more leading practice having not done any since November! I then tried a powerful overhanging start to a harder route and again stamina stopped me – although not before I got further than I was expecting. My final route was to top-roping one of the classic trad routes at the ranch – a 5.9+ (~HVS) crack. It’s a stunning looking line (I’ll have to find a photo from somewhere) and I now really want to lead it. The top roping went OK apart from the crux, where I was lacking some strength, and one foot slipping fall in the top section so I definitely think it’s a viable goal before I head back to the UK for good.

After Sunday’s climbing we headed to Kyle’s Landing for a swim in the river before heading to Jasper for dinner and then to Sam Thorn’s campsite. We first caught the sunset before somehow a decision was made to sleep under the stars on the bluffs, something I’ve never done before – I suspect, in no small part, due to the British weather. Didn’t have the best nights sleep but it certainly wasn’t terrible and I think I’ll probably enjoy the experience more if I do it again as it won’t all be so new. There’s lots of climbing at Sam Thorn’s and I saw enough of it to know I want to go back!

Monday (a holiday here) we headed to Cave Creek, a climbing area just down the road. Here I finally got to use my trad rack! I started on a 5.9 with a couple of bolts for the cruxy section, the trad section going at 5.7 (~VS). Was a slab so I had no real problems and rather enjoyed it. Next up was a new bolted route not in the guidebook that we reckon went at 5.8, or possibly 5.9 for the tricky start, which again was mainly a slab and which only caused me a few problems working out the finishing moves.

I next belayed Carol while she trad led a 5.9+ corner crack, which again was a nice looking line (although not as stunning looking as the crack the day before). After Carol had led and cleaned it I top-roped it with no real problems so after the others had also top roped it I MTFU and gave leading it a go. Not my best lead ever as I was still having head games and rested on the rope several times but I did get it. Another route I will now have to go back and lead clean. That done we headed home.

In short one work weekend that went better than I was hoping and one really enjoyable long weekend climbing in Arkansas. I’ve also still been climbing indoors and am definitely getting fitter. Photos of the Arkansas trip are here. The climbing photos are from the Saturday while the others are either on the way to, or at Sam’s on the Sunday. Hopefully I’ll be climbing outside this Sunday, on some much nearer Limestone, and I’d also hoping I can sort out another trip to Arkansas before I go to Ireland and then the UK at the end of June.