To all dog owners: please pick up your beloved pet leftovers.

Unlike dogs, babies can't be left running around while climbing. 

Unlike babies, dogs shit everywhere and because the colour can be the very same as the ground, you run the risk of smashing it with your pad (don't sigh, it increases the smell).

My big willy dot and you (2)

Boycott 8a! from Shawn Boye on Vimeo.

In my backyard

Give that man a job!

I was meant to publish the above video ages ago but time flies and I hardly find any time to look after the blog. Anyway judging by the number of posts, you must have read that excuse at least 16 times last year so I'll try to stop writing it and talk only about what is relevant.

Very relevant indeed is this video that Michael Duffy sent me a few months ago at the end of the summer. 2009 has been a bad year for young architects, but for strong climbers it is another story. Having recently moved to Bray, we can only hope that it will make it more difficult for the Dublin man to complete the first ascent of the Arch. Michael has worked out all the moves including the last one on the dodgy top jug, but as the video shows, he has failed to link the most famous line in Portrane.

He wisely hasn't mentioned any grade but we can reasonably assume that this long standing line must not be far from the magical 8 figure, although I've been told it isn't about magic, it's all about will, organisation and power. Anyway, being recently responsible for Switch, Leftism, and Contact, respectively 8a, 7c and 8a+ Michael's unemployment has given him the opportunity to deal with a lot of unfinished business and I would not be surprised if more hard lines like the Wow prow or the Big Squeeze SS were falling before the end of the winter.

Michael is also a talented young architect. Someone, please, give him a job!

My big willy dot and you

I have registrations on various climbing websites. Registrations usually give you more options, and they allow you to use the forum. Another recurrent interactive feature is the climbing log. Users can set up a profile and then log onto their climbing log, where they can record their latest ascents. Of course it depends on the website. For instance, Bleau Info will only allow you to record ascents you made in the French forest, because the log tool is based on the website's database.

In some cases the system is more flexible, allowing you to create new entries for new ascents. On UK Climbing for example, you can become a crag moderator and enter all the info about your climbs if it is missing. Obviously this poses some ethical problems and the limit between showing-off and providing actual information is often blurred but if things are done properly, it is in my opinion a very good way to share info amongst climbers.

Where it pleases me less is when the webmaster puts you under pressure to participate in the emulation by sharing your ascent details with other users, notably encouraging an escalation of grades by creating so-called 'score-cards' which allocate points to climbing grades. This process is sometimes referred to as 'measuring willies'. I will not go any further in my description, we all have the same reference in mind. Let's call it My big willy dot and You.

Some will say that on My big willy dot and You, score-cards are optional and you can check out of the competition list and only use the log as a record of your ascents. Although this is true, your log is still not hidden and people can actually find your details especially when your log includes first ascents in a small country. I tried to keep a low profile by not filling in my name. I also stopped using the log options like FA as this tends to send local news updates every time you use it, but I was nonetheless discovered and I had to shamefully explain to my mates that I was using My big willy dot and You only because it was the only website allowing me to record all my ascents.

That was until I got fed up with My big willy dot and You 's webmaster, who kept insisting that I should fill in my name and asked me to use the score-card. I explained I was not really the showing-off type. I don't take off my top at the wall because I'm afraid to catch a cold and my size 0 features would hardly make me look like a beast anyway. But the webmaster of My big willy dot and You insisted on me using my real name because if everyone was like me, he argued, it would ruin the whole purpose of his website.

I think his comment was fair. How can you compare willies if no one is willing to put what they have on the measuring scale? Since my willy was not big enough to go on that scale, I cancelled my registration with My big willy dot and You. A few weeks later 8b+ became the synonym of warming up, which means achievement really starts at 9a now. I guess the webmaster of My big willy dot and You will eventually have to update its domain name.

Ailefroide's new Guidebook

Following an old post of Dave, I've been playing with wordle and here's the best picture I have come up with.:




Talking about the Short Span, Dave the Flan has updated his PDF guide of the bouldering in Ireland - that's no big news given that it's been up and running on his website since 04 September. The main 5th edition's addition features the Black Valley, a great spot in Co. Kerry that Damo Sullivan & Co had started to develop back in 2007.

Moving onto John Watson's comment on the last post, I did write a little review of the new Ailefroide's topo, which I had sent to the Short Span, but I think it collided with Dave's guide publication, so I'll stick it here instead.

Is it worth buying the guidebook?
(I bet you ask yourself that question every time you try a new destination)

Ailefroide’s new guidebook (Ailefroide, Topo des blocs, Team les Collets, 2009) was published last June, right on time for the coming summer event, the Ailefroide bouldering meet following the “Tout à Bloc” competition. I was going to spend a week there in August so I spent the money on what I thought was the result of some hard work from the locals.

Apparently this 2nd edition is an improvement compared with the 1st guide. According to Zebloc, 100 new problems have been added to the original 200 in the first edition, with 5 news areas and 2 children circuits added. The quality of the paper is better and the cover stiffer. The whole document is in black and white apart from the usual colourful sponsoring ads.

The info is plain but well organised. For each area you get a numbered list of climbs with their names, grades, and a quality indication based on a 3 star scale. Each boulder has been photographed and has been attributed a letter. The problems have then been indicated on the photos by a white line and the number corresponding to the list. And if you’re not sure where you are, a basic map of the boulders and their corresponding letters is also given for each area.

A small “Edito” introduces the guide. It is written by a certain Gilles Estrambouli but you cannot be sure if it is the right spelling because the name is handwritten and does not appear anywhere else. However the guy clearly wants to become famous because he claims Ailefroide “contributed to making him a legend.” I might be wrong but when you have to tell people that you are famous, somehow I think you’re not there yet.




Apart from this you do not get much text and this is maybe why I felt a bit cheated. It looks like the authors have wanted to keep it easy and simple. The photograph approach is indeed very handy for identifying the problems. On the other hand photographs do not give you indications of how to climb the problem. Of course we do not want the tricks to be given away, but when no description is given, you always come across that one problem where the question remains: “Is this in? Naaah, can’t be, that’d be too easy... wouldn’t it?” So you climb the line again without the hold to make sure you have done the problem properly. It can be fun and it can be a good way to get strong. I think it can also be a good way to frustrate visitors, and this is how I felt a few times.

So the question remains, is it worth 13 euro?

Here is a comparison including various guidebook details I gathered on the net:

. Guidebook Problems Pages Hardback Price year . Ailefroide,Topo des Blocs 300+ 66 No € 13 2009 . Boulder Albarracin 200+ 7 PDF free 2007 . 7+8 2000+ 288 Yes € 28 2002 . The Short Span 1400+ 114 PDF free 2009 . Northumberland 1800+ 433 Yes £19.95 2008 . Peak District bouldering 2000+ 384 Yes £19.95 2005 . Bouldering in Scotland ? 188 Yes £19.99 2008 . Targabloc 2005 350+ 35 PDF free 2005

However to really find out the answer to our question, we would need some sort of rule of thumb to compare prices. For example, spuds are priced per Kg, childminders per hour, and translators per word. So I think guidebooks should be price per problems. This way we can see that The Peak and Northumberland are roughly £0.01/problem, while Font is about €0.014/problem. We can also note that the sneaky John Watson does not want to give away the price of his hard work. The real bargain is coming from people like Dave Flanagan who give you the best competitive rate on the market at approximately €0.00/problem: the guy must be Chinese. But Ailefroide’s guidebook, at €0.043/problem is far from the crowd and should not therefore be contemplated...

But if you are not one of these brainless traders who made a fortune by putting the world’s economy on its knees, you might be able to acknowledge somebody’s good efforts (after all someone had to clean these boulders, right?) and in that case I strongly recommend you to buy the guide on the following webpage:
http://boutique.tlcprod.info/

AILEFROIDE

Ailefroide seems to receive an increasing attention. Although it is home of thousands of climbing routes and provides excellent resources both for summer and winter mountaineering, it might become a bouldering destination, i.e. bouldering being the sole purpose of the trip.



It has been 4 or 5 years since I was last in the Alps and although I used to visit the Oisans¹ valley on a regular basis, I had forgotten the amount of rock that mountains tend to feature. Like a dog looking around through the windscreen of the car, I was making a mental list of all the potential stuff that I would have to visit during this long family holiday week. At least that is what was in my mind when we drove to Briançon three weeks ago. But then I remembered why I was never a huge fan of those boulders: the rock is rarely nice to your skin and the conditions in the summer are not really suitable for pushing yourself.


I did manage to get a few sessions though, mostly on my own, but once or twice with my siblings. We did not visit any other area than Philémon, partly because it has enough problems and stays cool in the shade of the pine trees. But even this way, bouldering in the middle of the day was out of question given the height of the temperature, well above 25˚C.


Grades there are very inconsistent. In the lower part of the scale, like in many new bouldering venues, the climbing seems to start at 5. Either the guys who developed the area were too strong to make the difference between a 3 and a 4, or they’re just too elitist. Either way, it can be very frustrating for the true 5+ climber. At least it was motivating for my sister Annabelle who started to climb this year.


In the 7 range, it does not get any better. My brother and I both flashed Probar, a wannabe 7a prow, featuring very nice but very easy moves for that grade. I thought it was going to be a piece of cake... that is until I got sucked into Metamorphine, a wonderful line that attracted most of my attention for the rest of the holiday.



This excellent problem included a tricky sit-start below a mini-roof. When you managed to get to the crimps above the lip, you had to perform a hard rock over on a nearly vertical face to reach a fingernail sharp rail. I must have done this a hundred times. From that rail you could manage to establish yourself on the lip and technically move up the wall using small and sharp crystals. I must have done this twenty times. If you managed to get high enough you could throw yourself at the top, where two good and soft slopers were waiting for you. I got this on my first try, but never quite manage to link it with the rest of the climb. So altogether I must have done it about zero times. Approximately.


I had nearly lost all motivation the last day, so I decided to leave the bloody problem altogether and do a bit of mileage instead. I managed to on-sight 2 other 7as and also send a 7b on my third attempt, which I think, proves that there always has to be a sandbag.




I did not meet any locals who could have confirmed this. There was a good few Italians, who after all were not that far from home. There was also some Spaniards, a few Britons and some other English speaking visitors but it was not the season for frogs, probably because the main event was just over and my compatriots had returned to the real climbing activity. They did a nice video of the Ailefroide bouldering though and when I saw it, I was quite frustrated to have missed it by a few days. At least I enjoyed a bit of team family bonding building –delete whichever does not apply – through a bit of bouldering, walking, swimming... And before I get any sarcastic comments about my bolt-clipping skills, here is a picture showing that, yes indeed, I also did a bit of that climbing stuff that some people dare to call the real stuff.




¹ I have checked and can confirm that Oisín never visited that valley and it is nowhere close the Tír na nÓg.

Moulzie outcrops

Bouldering in Moulzie/Glen Doll (South Esk river), Angus

Further to the last post about Glen Doll, I have been searching the maps to find out where I had been climbing and it turns out that it was not Glen Doll but the valley of the river South Esk. Some grassy fords surround a farm estate called “Moulzie”, located right in the middle of the glen. After a second reading of the Stone country guide, I realised that John Watson is actually mentioning some granite stones near the Moulzie farm. I saw some boulders indeed but most of them were quite small and the mini-crag was far more interesting. On the other hand I did not walk as far as “Juan Jorge” crag which is located around the corner of “The Strone” and I suspect this is where the other large boulders he mentions are located.

Glen Doll

Bouldering in Glen Doll (South Esk river), Angus

After a highly interesting CPD about style in translations in Perth on Saturday I enjoyed the great outdoor on a sunny Sunday, something that had not happened in weeks.

My original plan was to go bouldering in Glen Clova, but granite is not exactly the most enjoyable type of rock when the sun is baking. Instead I decided to go and explore Glen Doll. Although I did follow the guidebook directions, I did not have a proper OS map and I am not sure if I found the right place. I did find a nice little outcrop in the shades though - little from a route point of view because some of the problems I did were easily over 5m/15ft height.

I first had a couple of unmotivated lazy tries at an awesome roof prow. Looking easy enough, with very solid holds, it has a good grass landing platform. My excuse for not committing is that I had no spotters and only one mat. Moreover, I promised my wife not do highballs on my own again.

My attention then turned to the slightly overhanging wall to left, which seemed to have two nice break lines, probably as high as the roof but easier looking – so I thought anyway. After a bit of warm-up and the inspection of the top out via an easy descent to the right, I tried the main break line in the middle of the wall. I don’t think it was harder than Font 6a but with the height it felt much harder. I used a mixture of some shaky footwork and excitement self-control technique, if such a thing exists.

I guess that was my promise broken, and since it was broken there was no point stopping there, so up I went on the second line. This one might have been easier, had I not decided to swap feet at the wrong moment. The next second I hit the ground hard and felt some pain at my wrist: nothing was broken but a seriously bleeding cut chilled my excitement for more highball.

It was time to move on a less dangerous game. I climbed two other problems further left, as shown on the picture. It is worth mentioning there is a possible sit-start to the second line but it must go at a very high grade given the size of the crimps....

Finally I must confirm, as I was pointed out by my kind hosts that very same day, that there were no midges although it was June, it was very warm and there was no wind. So here’s a tip for the summer: stay East!

Tim's visit

Nothing much happened since Tim Chapman was over. Did I mention Tim was over? No?

We had a couple of nice days in the Trossachs, in Loch Kathrine first (where I did not even give a go at the Barrel boulder) and in Ben Ledi the next day: it is quite a long walk with an unappealing finish but really worth it when you consider the size of the boulders. They are enormously mahussive! Not little stones with a couple of moves including sit-start but proper boulders which some would consider as highballs. The rock however is a sharp schist covered with little curvy waves and shapes.


Although this can be enjoyable for the photographer, it makes it hard to read for the climber: we got our bum well kicked, struggling up 6bs, throwing ourselves at fake jugs and missing hidden crimps...



Two days later I nearly flashed Mugsy traverse in Dumby which was good for my wounded ego.

Since then nothing.

Well that’s not true. Last week young Felix managed to get me on a rope at the Ratho wall, and dare I say it, I got scared on an overhang, maybe 25m high, with quickdraws every metre and full of big red resin blobs everywhere (apparently they call them holds...).
The reality is I am actually very busy at the moment as I am seriously considering starting a business as a freelance translator (Any publisher out there, hint! Hint!) and our little boy is seeking more and more attention, so this does not leave much time for climbing. Although on the long term this should mean much more time flexibility, it looks like I will have to get extremely organised if I do not want my climbing routine to suffer.