Froggatt 2: The Return (Part Eins)

So finally I have returned to the crag. For a weekend no more sweating it out in an overly-warm climbing gym, clipping into pre-placed quickdraws - it's time to rack up and get ready to place some gear, folks.

OK, so I'm writing this well after the event, but I'm a busy man y'know!

This return to Froggatt has been planned pretty much from the time we went there last, what with so many routes un-tested and some real classics missed out on. The main reason we missed them was due to a severe lack of a handbook - we were really just guessing at routes, climbing what we could see (which, if you think about it, is the same kind of climbing as Froggatt's pioneers). Another issue the last time was that unfortunately, due to circumstances, Charlie had to lead-hog. It was my first time on the rock and no one was about to let me lead on the rock - it's so much different to leading indoors they may as well be different worlds!

This time the group was larger; in addition to me and Charlie we had Tom (a previous appearer on this blog) and Camilla, one of Tom's friends for whom Froggatt was only the third time she had climbed - ever! All other things aside it takes courage to be attempting seconding and abseiling on only your third go out with ropes and harness!

Fun in the Sun(set Slab)

Super-Ultra-Fun stuff!

Our arrival at the rock face proper was not a leisurely descent to set up a couple of top-ropes; no, it was for some reason we decided to build an abseil. Hey, no protests here, I think they are awesome. I gave Charlie a hand setting it up just the same as a top-rope, then got Cam to go down for her first abseil - as expected she was a little shaky but seemed to enjoy it. Once everyone else was down (including Tom who is by no means the world's biggest fan of abseils) I had to make my way down. As I was last man down I had the fun experience of abseiling fully loaded with a 15kg pack. It may not sound like much but it's a significant shift of your center of gravity!

Once down we decided to leave the rope in place and use it to climb the very convenient Sunset Crack as a warmup. First time up I made a little bit of a fool of myself, getting caught in sections I really shouldn't be struggling over, but on my repeat soon after I did the entire thing cleanly and smoothly in a shade over a minute. With everyone warmed up it was time to head on to the main focus of the four-hour journey to get there: leading.

Charlie wedging his way up the oversized crack of North Climb 

With the warm up out of the way, Charlie and Tom decided they wanted a crack at a relatively easy lead to North Climb, just to the right of the famous Fatal Attraction and the infamous Science Friction. It's a route me and Charlie did last time we were there, but then we'd top-roped it; I had used it as my first practice 'lead' with the safety line of a top rope. It was largely an uneventful climb, well made by both leader and follower, but the exciting part was to come.
blow out their respective cobwebs;



Tom somehow got it into his head on an abseil down the face of Fatal Attraction that it would be a doable climb, so on a top-rope they attempted it; neither got much closer to the top-out than about six feet. On my attempt I barely got six feet off the ground - it's a seriously difficult climb, well deserving of the E3 grade it's been given. Embarrassingly Camilla got far further than me, but in her defence she's small and strong - my power-to-weight is far, far worse!

On the Terrace

Charlie attempting the 5a to the right of Terrace Crack

After a bite to eat and the promised black weather stayed off, we decided to do a  reapeat of mine and Charlie's favourite route the last time we were there; the slabby, think-y Terrace Crack. Although only a HVS in the guide, it's a very enjoyable climb with a confidence-pushing few moves that puts you out over an overhang into nothingness. As before it was a cracking climb - I seconded again, as I did last time, but in much more pleasant conditions than May, which left me feeling like a much better overall experience.

Camilla just before the overhang on
Terrace Crack

Tom and Camilla also got a climb on the same route, but on her follow Camilla unfortunately suffered her first proper Crag Attack, freezing halfway up the climb and being unable to continue. It wasn't neither way on a rock face. It was quite a sobering experience, especially as me and Charlie discussed the possibility of having to build an abseil to attempt a rescue.
that she couldn't do it, more that she couldn't bring herself - the big, outward-pushing overhang at the start of the route sapped all her confidence. It's the first time I've seen a proper panic attack on a rock face - I've had my fair share of freezes and retreats, but I've never been able to go






Like and Ibex, Like an Ibex

The committing first move on Heather Wall
(image courtesy of Karabiner Climbing Club)

Having rescued Camilla from her freeze, we moved on. It was starting to get towards the end of the day, and possibly in hindsight we had been riding a wave of luck in that there had been no falls, none of the promised rain and no real problems on any of the climbs. Not ones that had put anyone at risk, that is. However, pumped and psyched as we were we decided to have a crack at the rather easy Heather Wall and use it as my first lead. Geared up and prepped, the start was, honestly, inauspicious; it was only when I was on the wall that I discovered that the first big move is in fact a 5a - harder than anything I have climbed outdoors. With that over and done with, all that was left was for me to climb the wide protected crack that forms the route. However, with maybe eight meters of the wall left, the heavens opened and the stone turned from warm, welcoming and grippy into a wet, frictionless slab that may as well have been polished concrete for all the grip it gave me.

Not being able to safely continue up and not wanting to leave gear in the wall, I now had to very slowly and carefully down-climb the sodden crack, jamming hands and feet and even suffering a couple of minor falls. Despite my relative terror and absolute certainty that I was about to fall and break a limb when I took out my last protection, Charlie, Tom and Camilla kept spirits up by abusing me in various badly-done foriegn accents, including an absolutely classic Russian/Spanish singsong that ended in the famous phrase "Like an Ibex".

With their support I got down, heart in hand and instantly stated that I was done for the day; I now needed to get into warm gear, get down to the pub and have some warm food. Still riding the adrenaline high I enjoyed some fish and chips, before returning to set up the tents on a rather precarious but atmospheric ledge. It was time to sleep to be ready for another day on the face.

Sympathetic is not a word Charlie identifies with

A short reflection

It's a busy weekend for me, but I've always got time to blog. I'll warn you, I'm in a wordy mood.

As I sit here on a Friday evening, unpacking my gear from a two-day training event with work on the hills and packing gear afresh for a 6am wake up to head back to Froggatt in the morning, a thought that has been plaguing me sneaks back into my head: "what makes me do this?"

Now don't worry; I'm not about to jack it all in, but it is an interesting question - why do I put myself through early wake ups, 40 hour weeks in a retail job that to be honest I'm not crazy about, punishing physical training, letting my other commitments fall by the wayside for a sport I only took up eight months ago? I mean, we all get that I do it because I enjoy it and it's fun, but what exactly is it that makes it fun? What makes climbing special?

On Wednesday I posed this question to Charlie, and in his normal way he came up with something succinct and witty; "I love the fact it's outdoors, it's freeing, it's a challenge and it's out of the ordinary." and to be honest that pretty much sums it up for me. It's not just the climbing, it's the periphery too; the build up, the fact it's an event to get to a rock face, the camaraderie, the friendship, the socialised elements of the whole affair. I will never understand people who wish to climb walls and mountains alone because I am a social animal; I do the sport because it's a team sport. It requires people to learn and work together to achieve goals, lean on each other's strengths and reinforce each other's weaknesses.

In most of his work, but specifically his book Dark Shadows Falling, Joe Simpson refers to an 'apprenticeship in the hills'. For me this is exactly why I climb. It's a challenging pursuit; you can't just pick up a harness and be good, unless you're one of the lucky few who have that unnatural knack for rock. It takes time, patience, practice and a lot of training to be a good climber. It requires specialist equipment by the bucket load (which feeds my unnatural gear fetish) and is formed of a small, tightly knit clique of people with a strong sense of ethics and community. Some of you may know my background is Armed Forces; to a large extent the climbing community is much like the Army. If you don't know, it's hard to pretend and be believed by someone who does. Those who are serving or have served their apprenticeship on the hills know their place and their role, and the pecking order is unbreakable. Cheating isn't something that's really a problem; kudos is earned by doing it right, not doing it easy.

I'm only at the very start of my apprenticeship; there is still so, so much more for me to learn about. The ability to judge weather conditions and their application on climbing, the ability to know when to retreat and when to press on, to learn about snow, ice, mountains and summit pushes. Some people never finish their apprenticeships, always remaining in a learning stage. I can honestly say that if I was to never pass it, I'd be happy to learn my entire climbing career. I mean sure I'd like to be at the cutting edge, but this is real life. I want to do things because I enjoy them. No seven-summit peak bagging for me, no races to solo up the north face of the eiger. I want to do this because it's fun, and I want it to stay that way.

It is this that endears me so much to climbing; the fact it's special. The people who do it are a special, unique clique. The equipment is special. The experience of being halfway up a rock face, a rope below you, nothing but sky above and your own skill and technique being the only thing keeping you in one piece. It makes you feel alive; for me, I feel like I belong. It's worth the early wake ups, the missed nights out for this life. It's the feeling that as Simpson explains, turns a terrifying experience into a fun one in our memories; what, when following a difficult climb and a friend suggests another, prevents you running from the bar screaming bloody mary.

People may not necessarily understand this; I don't ask them to. Many people have and always will directly question why I want to do something like this; hopefully I can point them to this little article and it will go a little way to explain why I do something that I personally fully regard to be totally insane. No sane, logical person would look at a snow covered mountain face or smooth gritstone slab and go 'hey, that looks like fun'. More than likely they'd turn around, walk the other way until they hit the nearest pub.

I'll see you all soon; Froggatt beckons tomorrow. First leads. Should be fun.