The best boulder problem in Ireland?

We all have a favorite bouldering problem, and generally it is our latest hardest ascent. But when you ask yourself honestly if that problem really deserves the award you generally come to the conclusion that there is actually a better line out there. So which one is the best bouldering line in Ireland?

Objective factors

Rock Quality
One might prefer sandstone to limestone but in the end it all comes to the same question: What is the quality of the rock like? Is it solid? Is it sharp? Does it get polished? Good rock is to bouldering what flour is to bread: It is the base ingredient that you cannot omit.

Approach
Although I am one of those who think you must deserve the climb, I must admit that a climb that stands on its own 2 hours a walk from the closest car park will never receive the attention it deserves. Ask yourself: What is the time ratio climbing/approach? How’s the walking like? Do you need a good pair of walking boots or will a pair of sandals do?

Conditions

Some excellent lines are doomed by their conditions: Every time you want to try them, there is something wrong: too warm, too wet, midges, seepage, high tide, rain pond at the bottom....

Ask yourself: How often did you try the line?

Subjective factors:

Line Clarity
The best problem is a problem that does not need any description. I personally believe that the purity of a line is what the true boulderer should value most: No matter how good a problem is, it cannot be described as a proper line if you need to eliminate half the holds.
Ask yourself: Is this an eliminate? How easy is it to describe?

Line Quality
Probably the most controversial factor: what can feel really awesome to some of us will feel like absolute crap to others … However everyone will agree that the true boulderer is always looking for his ultimate hardest move: the most powerful, the weirdest, the stretchiest, the nastiest....
Ask yourself: What are the moves like? What are the holds like? If there are many moves, are they all very different? Is it sustained? If there is only one or two moves, how original are they?

Location
I first thought this factor was objective, and then I thought of Bullock Harbour. I asked myself in which category would it fall. And surprisingly I could not choose. Obviously everyone loves beautiful places like Kerry, Wicklow, The Mournes or Donegal. They all have their stunning lonely valleys that you wish you could visit more often. And then there are the less attractive ones like Bullock Harbour: broken bottles, human and dog’s dumps, graffities and the junkie’s syringe. And of course the local bums who are always coming up with a good joke (You're a bit of an eejit mista', there's an easier way up there! ). Nonetheless I had some beautiful evening in Bullock Harbour, enjoying the sun, the sound of the sea, the view around and the occasional visit of the seals.
Ask yourself: Could I bring some non-climbing friend there for a picnic?

Popularity:
Finally a line is great because it receives attention. Otherwise it is just another piece of rock on Craggy Island.
Ask yourself: Is the problem well known? Has it been fairly described? How many ascents has it received? Do people refer to it by its name? Does it actually have a name? Is the grade still floating?

So I selected a list of 20 irish bouldering problems that I really like. I gave them a mark out of 5 (5=excellent, 1=very poor) for each of these preceding factors. Here’s the final score list:

Bloque Andaluz - Nerja Bouldering

Si hay escaladores españoles que leen este blog, pues tengo una

--> cuestion: donde se puede encontrar informacion sobre el bloque andaluz?
Esta es la primera vez que pongo un poco de castellano aquí así que me perdonan los errores. Ya tengo unos artículos que tratan de España, pero siempre fueron destinados a unos amigos de Irlanda. Aunque en realidad el artículo en cual trataba de Pena Corneira tuviera que haber sido en castellano, porque hay mucho más probabilidades que interese a un ibérico que un británico. Ya visite unos sitios en España y me parece que los españoles, lo tenéis bastante bueno para el bloque: la verdad es que cada vez que estoy en algún sitio en España me encuentro con unas rocas muy atractivas. Sea donde sea. Claro que hay de todo, pero hay mucho y por todas partes.

Hace unos días estuve en Nerja por segunda vez. La primera vez fue un par de años en invierno: mi mujer y yo estábamos harto de la lluvia irlandesa de Noviembre y decidimos de pasar unos días al sol.

Para los aficionados de las series de tele, este lugar es sinónimo de "Verano Azul", una serie culta de los 80s. Pero para los británicos es un sitio desconocido donde se puede pasar unas vacaciones tranquilas sin escuchar a ingles en cada sitio. ( La verdad es que en Nerja hay mogollón de irlandeses y británicos pero comparado con Torremolinos, es un mogollón muy pequeñito).

Estuve allí sin tener mucho tiempo para escalar y tubo suerte que había bastante roca en las plazas para practicar media hora al día. Lo que me extraña es que no se encuentra nada de info en el Internet. Es cierto que el Chorro queda muy cerca y que siendo una destilación muy importante hace sombra al resto. Pero eche un vistazo al google map y me parece que hay bastante por allí para blocar.

En fin me quede con las rocas de la playas que non son malas. Estoy seguro que no soy el primero porque hay muchas presas que están marcadas con magnesio y por eso me gustaría saber cuantos pasos hay por allí y si hay mas sitios cerca / alrededor.


Hize un par de videos:

For those who wonder what the heck, I was in Spain last week, enjoying the good sun (that yellow thing that appears from time to time in this rather gloomy irish sky) and I found some nice bouldering on the beach, but I could not find any info about it. The place is called Nerja. It's on the coast, close enough to El Chorro. The rock is a sort of conglomerate pudding: although it looks loose, it is actually very solid with a lot of overhangs and roofs. Very enjoyable but not documented as far as I know. So anyone who happens to know something about it, I would be interested to hear your comments.

Tick - The Nasty Bug

Who said that bouldering was not a dangerous activity?

Following a couple of fights with some tiny winny nasty dirty little bugs known as ticks, I have been looking for info and here is what I found: According to wikipedia, "tick is the common name for the small arachnids in superfamily Ixodoidea that, along with other mites, constitute the Acarina. Ticks are ectoparasites (external parasites), living by hematophagy on the blood of mammals, birds, and occasionally reptiles and amphibians. Ticks are important vectors of a number of diseases, including Lyme disease. According to Pliny the Elder, ticks are the foulest and nastiest creatures that be."

Sure we all heard about this. But what is less known is:

1. Because of climate change ticks have it better these days and there's more of them around, which means Lyme disease is actually more common. According to VHI healthcare, "there does not seem to be any great danger of contracting the disease from Irish deer. However, experts warn that the disease is gradually spreading to the most suitable habitats." So we are not all going to die right now, but we'd better get ready for when it happens.
2. Lyme disease is only one of the threats that ticks are carrying and it is part of a broader range of infectious diseases affecting the brain. Another bad guy that is now spreading from the east is the Tick Borne Encephalitis, aka TBE, a virus that attacks your nervous system and can result in serious meningitis, brain inflammation and eventually death. According to a not so recent article this guy kills about 5 people out of a 1000 in Europe, and for those who survive, life is not always back to normal (Tick-Borne Encephalopathies: Epidemiology, Diagnosis, Treatment and Prevention., Günther & Haglund, 2005) . Not a nice one huh?
3. Using greasy substances such as oil or vaseline is not actually helping. A long time ago my granny had taught me that the best way to get rid of a tick was to drown it in oil (olive oil or butter depending on which cuisine approach you are taking). Although this is true, this method is actually augmenting risk of infected materials being injected in to you: in other words, when drowning there's a fair chance that the bug will puke in your veins all the infectious crap it's got in him.
4. Ticks prefer French blood. Now this has not been proven, but if this was not true, how come then that I'm always the one who gets the bite when all my irish mates pinky butts remain perfectly untouched?

Anyway there is plenty of information available online and I strongly advise any boulderer who fancies a trip in the Wicklow mountains to read it. A good website to check for general info is the travel health tick alert. And for those who want the ultimate gear (yes, you who bougth a brush kit specially designed for bouldering projects, I am talking to you), you can get yourself an O'Tom hook.

So good luck to everyone, and as Metallica used to say: Kill 'em all!

Portrane - The Arch

I hope everyone enjoyed the good sunshine over the bank holiday. I spent the Monday afternoon in a crowded Portrane with Chris Rooney and Michael Duffy. Michael cleaned the upper part of the Arch, and gave it a good few attempts: he has worked out most of the moves to the high brown stone jug. What would make it an ultimate line would be a top out to the left, although this would require some good spotting and a few mats. Definitly one of the best lines in Ireland.

Bouldering in Galicia - O Granito galego

Bouldering at Pena Corneira, Galicia, Spain

Forget Hampy, it is too far. Forget Targassonne, it's too cold or too hot. The futur of European granite bouldering lays a few kilometers away from a town called Ourense in the south of the Galicia region, northwest of Spain: here, 15km of hills are covered with huge round granite boulders. There is so much there that you could spent your entire life climbing first ascents. The place just blew me away. It has it all. It is beautiful and quiet. The winter conditions are perfect even though you can climb there till the early summer.

Agrandir le plan

 

But first thing first, let's talk about Galicia. It is a country I love for lots of reasons. 

It is quite different from the spanish stereotype you may have in mind: Like the Irish, Galicians are Celts. Like the Irish, they're welcoming and hepfull. Like the Irish, they have their own music and their own language. And like the Irish, there is a fair amount of them on the other side of the Atlantic.But unlike the green people, Galicians know what matters in life: quality food, quality wine and taking the time to enjoy them.

So, what's the rock like? 

Imagine a granite so fine that it sometimes looks like grit. Although this not the case everywhere, it is definitly very enjoyable in the "developed" areas. I met there with Miguel Feijoo Fernández, one of the very few but dedicated locals. They climb only in the Pena Corneira itself - the tip of the hills range), where they have 4 sectors more or less "explored", the reason for this being that this is where the granite is the finest. But with all the work they have put in there, they are far from having it developed! Miguel is currently trying to organise a oudoor competition in Octobre, the reason for this being to open more problems.... It says it all.

Here is the usual info:
Best season: Autumn to Spring although the magic conditions occur most often in Octobre / Novembre.
Nearest airport: Santiago de Compostella (home of one of the most famous christian pilgrimage)
Language: they don't expect you to speak galician so you'll be fine if you speak spanish (you should be able to survive with english only though)
Accomodation: lots of hostels in Ourense, but you can camp in Pena Corneira, the place is a paradise.

More info available on Miguel blog.

There also a general blog about climbing in Galicia here. These guys have a forum, and some of them speak english.

More pictures here.

Mall Hill Video

The Wicklow cranking season is nearly over and with the longer and warmer days, boulderers will be back to good old Portrane. So as a conclusion of this winter’s posts, here is a video of Mall Hill. Yes I finally took the time to put these little videos together.

They are not as great as I hoped they would be, but I think they are good enough to show the quality of the bouldering in there. It only features the Dublin-Beauvais boulder on the left side of the hill and a couple of boulders in the forest: I have not recorded anything on the right side of the hill but maybe this is an opportunity for next year as there are some awesome lines there too.

I should also mention the climbers names: Michael “the Dude” Nicholson on the slab and “The small Matter of Up” (No Mikey, this was not a first ascent…) , Michael Duffy on “Piece de Resistance” (Michael, this is the only French name I could think of, so feel free to rename it) and Myself on “Living the dream” and “Coup d’Etat”.

The Short Span New Problem Database

Deadly! You can now register your irish first ascents online: Dave Flanagan has set up a New Problem Database on his Short Span website. I think we'll probably see some banter going on, but this has been a long time waited tool that should prove to be very handy in the future.

MALL HILL ROCKS!

Mall Hill is probably my favourite venue at the moment. I first climbed in there back in 2004; At the time a good bit of the forest was still standing and the place looked very different. Dave Flanagan, Diarmuid Smith and Ped Mc Mahon had given us a tour but we were not too impressed by the walking around the place. You first need to cross a river and although this is not a problem when you wear a good pair of rubber boots, you may find these same rubber boots very inefficient when it comes to walk up hill through the wet logs and the piles of pines branches left over by the forest exploitation. The only problem that really stunned me at that time, was the excellent “Living the dream”, in my humble opinion probably the second best Irish line in the 6 grade after Andy Robinson’s stunning “Shadow” in Lough Dan.

However I never came back to that problem, due to various reasons: the walk in, the travel distance and off course the usual unpredictable weather. Besides I was not even sure where the bloody line was. I did come back to Mall Hill the following year with Seamus Crowley, Dec Tormey and Kev Cooper. As some more of the forest had been cleared, new boulders had appeared: we climbed things like the “Chigaray arête” and the “Dublin-Beauvais” dyno. This latest boulder has a huge undercut slab and to the rear is a very round arête that looked quite attractive: this is probably the only project I kept thinking of in Mall Hill.

But after having spent most of this winter sessions in the Stonecutters Glen, I needed to come back to some well developed areas, that would involved less brushing and more climbing. So one of the latest weekends, I went back to Mall Hill with Michael Duffy and he showed me a good few lines that I did not know about: I am not going to give any names here, firstly because he did not give me any and also because I am not sure if they’re even recorded on Dave Flanagan’s guide. I came back to my round arête anyway, just to find that it was an eliminate with 3 various top outs. Without much surprise Michael sent two of them in no time, but I am foolishly still hoping that I will get the last one. He asked me to give it a French name, so I am proposing “Piece de Resistance”: it should suit it given the fact that it might keep one busy for a while. We also decided to check what was left of the forest, and there it was again: although it was too wet to climb it at that time, “Living the dream” was waiting silently hidden in the forest, 20m away from the path. I had forgotten how good that line looked like but I was psyched straight away.

I missed a good opportunity two weeks ago thanks to the good old Irish mist so this weekend I did not leave anything to chance: I came prepared with 3 mats and my old reliable mate Michael Nicholson as a spotter. We warmed up on what looked like an uncleaned line: after some serious brushing Mikey sent what he wanted to name “Kate Moss”. After having checked the guide, it seems that this line had already been climbed as it matches the description of “the small matter of up”, something which we find really hard to believe given the amount of cleaning that was required prior to any possible attempt. We then moved towards the goal of the day, and although I must admit I firstly felt nervous, I sent “Living the dream” in a couple of tries. So our attention turned to 2 other projects on the same boulder. The first one is “Strictly Ballroom”, a hard sit-start to some very slopey holds that link onto the traverse of the top of the boulder. This remains a project. However the other one gave up after a good few attempts. “Coup d’etat” is a hard deadpoint that can result in a high, funny but very safe fall if missed. This is probably what I like most about all these lines: unlike Glendalough, the landings are generally very safe.

Altogether Mall Hill is a beautiful place loaded with problems and projects. And the forest part is very enjoyable on a dry day, so I strongly recommend it to anyone who has not been there yet. And do not wait because I would not be surprised if next year the whole forest was cleared. I am currently putting some videos together which should be shortly be available here.

Updated bouldering guide to Ireland 2008

The Short Span Bouldering guide to Ireland 2008 - Version 3 has arrived!
Dave Flanagan has put a huge effort in it as this edition now contains over 1000 problems and takes less memory than the previous PDF guide.

The main addition is the popular Doolin, but it doesn't include the newly discovered Black Valley in Kerry. This should be updated more regularly in the next editions. Another area that Dave is planning to add in the next edition is the controversial Glendalough update.

More information on The Short Span website.

STONECUTTERS GLEN GUIDE

Bouldering in Stonecutters Glen, Co. Wicklow

The bouldering guide to the Stonecutters Glen is now available here.

As far as I know an onsight climb means you have never seen anyone on the route before, you have not heard any info or received any beta (which is hard these days giving the description you get in some guide books), you have clearly not toproped the route before or even inspected it with an absail. When you are climbing a route after having seen someone on it, it is called a Flash. A lead that you have actually worked out is a redpoint.

Now not so long ago (when I was still a sports climber, that is) an onsight was the base on which a grade was given. So if some route was given 7a, that meant onsighting it would mean that you would have climbed 7a, flashing it was 6c+, leading it was 6c and toproping it was 6b+. But this is sports climbing, I've been told the real trad thing is different.

Anyway when it comes to bouldering, these concepts become very subjectives, and grades are supposedly there as a pure technical info. How come then we are still arguing about adding a + between these 3 and 4 grades? Actually in some guide you can even find problems graded 4a+. And don't oppose me the "Vermine" example, I have also seen some V10+ in climbing magazines...

So anyway, I personnally think we should go back to the good old Font colour code, and I decided to give it a go. I can already ear some people saying "Hey, do you know that rockover problem in the Stonecutters? I think it 's definitly yellow, not blue!" You wish...

Anyway, any comments welcommed!