standing on the edge of glory..

Mike ties in while we debate if there's time for one more route before the storm front in the distance engulfs us. We made it off the slab with a few minutes to spare, thus avoiding a climbing epic tale by the skin of our teeth and trudging happily home with a soaking and wry smiles!.....

a tin shed

 Totally papped through the railings at the edge of the whole city block that makes up the patagonia headquarters in ventura. This is the original tin shed where, legend has it, yvon chouinard started making pitons for climbing and started the giant that is patagonia clothing and what became black diamond mountain equipment too. Call me sad but i was excited to spot it!

BGA

 

Al, architect and onetime art director for Wallace and Grommett, reflecting on another quiet fun offshore logging session while the masses battled unfavorable winds elsewhere.

It's starting to be the season for finding the quiet corners out of the wind, for boots, more rubber and rather depressingly gloves and hoods before very much longer. With the dark evenings and winter storms, it's the time of year that my mind starts to focus on climbing (indoors) a little bit. Al is often on the other end of the rope as i dangle two storey's up desperate to clip the bolts before my finger strength gives up. Quite a position of trust if you think about it....... i must remember to stay on his good side!

It's quite refreshing to be able to pick a day and time to go do somthing and not have change plans for weather or tide at the last minute. We're pretty spoilt for choice around here for indoor climbing at the moment. The excellent bouldering room in Pilton school is getting about a third bigger as we speak, Barnstaple has walls in Petroc and an old church, the Mill near south molton is still open and exeter has the quay, reviewed in a previous post.

For those a little further along the coast, Bude just got a brand new bouldering facility, called the chalk house, in the kings industrial park on the edge of town. It's not been open that long and i went to check it out last week. It's a decent size, not as big as say the climbing academy in bristol but bigger than the bouldering areas at exeter or south molton. A lot of the wall is slab rather than overhang though they have plans to add a proper roof area soon they say. It's got a fairly lo-fi feel with ply rather than coated climbing wall surface and is obviously born out of a few peoples passion rather than a big investment by a business. On the day i went, they had just had a comp on so there were fewer routes than normal but there were still 50 routes up. They were ungraded but the majority weren't too hard, many of the steeper ones having fairly juggy holds, which i think is a good thing for a part time climber like me. One big difference compared with other places i've been is the height. The wall tops out at 4.5m which, although is regulation international contest height,  feels a long way up when you're clinging horizontally on bad holds lunging for an uncertain grip!

All in all it's pretty cool and great to have another alternative if you're down that way and the surf forecast lied!

spiderman?

Exeter just got a brand new climbing wall and i went to check it out a week after it opened. Called Quay Climbing it's located in an old electricity generating station in the Haven Banks area of the city. It's been really well done with a massive lead wall ( 15 metres at the apex!) and plenty of routes on slabs and overhangs from 4 up to around 7c. There are about 7 routes set up on auto belay's which allow you to climb without a partner to hold your rope, great if you post up on your own like i did! There are two bouldering rooms with lovely soft floors and a lot of routes ranging from v0 up to around v6 at the moment. Behind the desk, there's a friendly team, the man in charge is actually Paul who originally set up the Mill wall near south moulton and they have  little cafe for decent coffee too.

The wall is open now but, rather excitingly they hav climbing superstar Chris Sharma coming on the 14th October to open it officially. Should be a real treat to watch him monkey around in real life!

gearing up

Mike gearing up at Baggy Point. Climbing has been a slowly growing obsession over the last year, mostly indoors when it's provided a great workout and stress reliever when the surf is rubbish or the evenings are dark. A couple of weeks ago i lead my first route outside (trad) climbing, on the cliffs at sennen. So different to leading at a climbing wall and a real rush.

My last two surfs were great examples of maximising the fun in sub par conditions. It's suprising how much fun you can have in 1 foot mush on a soft top or a surf mat! I briefly rode the if6was9 board below and was very impressed. It's beautifully finished, feels wide but nicely foiled with nicely pinched rails so not clunky at all. It tip rode well given the crappy conditions and pivoted nicely off the tail. Well impressed!

climbing rocks

Super big thanks to my friend Mike who took me climbing on Baggy Point last week, such a pleasant way to spend a sunny evening with no surf. Definately found some new muscles too.

Pics are a 35mm film through the holga, nearly tore my hair out trying to get the negs scanned. As usual the solution was simple & nearly blindingly obvious once i found it!