Northumberland

Dovehole

As I’ve not been out doing any climbing of sorts for the past wee while, minus a cracking day at Dunkeld Polny Crag with Brian, I organised a cheeky 3 day boulder trip with 5 of the boys to Northumberland. This was their first time down so it fell to me to be the tour guide of the trip, using the campsite in Belford as the base. 

Casual Crag Attire

 

Noble attempt at His Eminence

The first port of call I wanted to check out was Dovehole on the way down the road. We couldn’t find anyone in the farm to ask permission as the guide states so left a note on the car. Unfortunately we didn’t get to stay long as we were washed off in torrential rain after just managing a 5+ as a warm up. The crag itself is situated on the hill in a clearing, being a little sandy but with amazing looking rocks and lines. Definitely have to go back at some point! With soaking feet we headed to Back Bowden to the Bat Cave to do Brant (6b+)We tried a few more down by Merlin’s wall though the midges were so bad we retreated… a day of retreat! Not bad to say it was so wet.

A bare foot night in the pub followed, which was good as England were playing so with the Scots in tow was pretty funny with the locals. For once I had the upper hand. To top off the night on the way back I spotted a pair of size 11 boots in the charity shop which I picked up the next morning at a £3 snip! Just a shame I’m a size 8! Still it avoided the trench foot I was getting!!! We spent the Saturday getting sunburnt at Bowden, managing 25 boulder problems in the day. Nothing too special just a few 6’s and the 7a sandy mantle, but some good efforts on His Eminence (7a+) from Jacob and the 6b in the cave we were close to finishing but too drained to get at the end of the day. Sunday was spent at Kyole in the Woods, where I got some new routes including a good 6a+ and 6b+ I’d never done. Brian and Arthur decided to leave an hour before us to head up the road. It’s a shame that when we got back to the cars theirs was still there with them nowhere to be seen. Turns out they’d took the wrong turn and were running around like lunatics trying to find the way out!

Ten under the Ben

This weekend I headed up to Fort William for the no fuss event Ten under the Ben bike race. After last year’s relentless 24hr race as a pair with Nikki we thought we should go solo since it's only half the time. Nikki unfortunately didn't get her solo place but entered in a girl trio, placing well to finish in 3rd.

Somehow I convinced Amy and a few of her friends that it would be a really good idea to come up and support and go walk Ben Nevis in the day whilst I'm on the bike. This proved to be a success with cracking weather on the Ben, however with it being the summer solstice there were supposedly loads of people. On another note after nearly 3 years of not meeting any of my mates she finally met too many of them!

The race started at 09.30 to finish at 19.30 with the extra hour to trail I'm taking it to 20.30. Lining up behind the bagpipe lead out band and then the model t ford I followed Rich to sneak to near the front, thankfully starting ahead most of the 600 people strong pack. This from what I expected and hears about afterwards avoided a fair few crashes, scrapes and mechanicals as soon as the single track was reached.

The course itself was a great 10.5 mile lap, diverted on the first to 9.5 mile to spread folk out. Long fire road uphills and fast technical downhills were the order of the day, including the upper red trail with the big fire road slog. Not my proudest moment getting completely dropped by an 8 year old kid who just flew up it. Didn't see him again! The river crossing seemed to result I. A few pulled brakes and wet feet too!

In the end I decided in lap one to try and get 7 laps in, switching positions constantly on the first 5 with a girl with a bloody elbow Nikki knew. I fuelled up every lap for ten mins but on the 6th I came in for a big feed. I saw her cycle past but didn't have any energy for emotions! In the end she did 9 laps coming 4th in female solo. I did feel for her though as I started looking respectable with the bib shorts under some MTB shorts and a Jersey and top on that. Lap 2 I shed the top and lap 3 the shorts to be in full Lycra the rest as it was so warm! What a treat?! Amy and her friends thought it was funny when they got down off the Ben...though I was laying out in the bibs!

I ended up doing 7 laps (73 miles) in 9 hours 35 mins. I had time for another though I was happy with that as I didn't want to kill myself. Especially since on the last lap my seat bolt sheared off leaving me without the saddle and a protruding pole! Thankfully i was coming near the start so stole another seat of a friend’s bike to finish! Another great No Fuss event which I'll try to do again next year.

Food:

Pack of jelly babies

Jamaica ginger cake

Half warm microwave pasta

Bag of cashew nuts

Spinach

Flapjack x3

7 energy gels

Five Ferry...Attempt

View from the top of the String to Brodick

Adam, Marc and I set off this Saturday to tick off the classic Scottish west coast ride the five ferries. Meeting at Arran we bought tickets and headed the 40/50mins across from Ardrossan to start. The ferries were in winter schedule but that would be fine right?

The route itself is 50 miles going up from Brodick to Lochranza via the coast road. We decided to extend this going up and down the closed string road which was getting a resurface at the bottom. This was a good hard hitting slog, where I found that although I though I was quick enough, I'm pretty rubbish compared to the guy! We headed down the other aide taking both lanes and hitting speeds around 40mph. It's too easy to gain speed though you should exercise caution on the sharp corners with steep drop offs. Marc's friends had first hand experience if this. The only casualty this time thankfully was only my water bottle which flew off without me realising! R.I.P we've had some good times!

In good time we covered the 20 miles to Lochranza to have lunch, watch the ferry come in and then leave again without us on it. A slight (massive) planning oversight on my part didn't read the second ferry could only take 11 people in winter cargo mode!! A week later and it could take the full capacity of over 100 people on its summer schedule! Whoops!

Waiting for the ferry to come in and leave again!

To make the best of a bad situation, which in all honesty on Arran isn't a bad thing since its so lovely, we set off to ride the rest of the island back round the coastal road and take in the other big hill in the south of the island. The ride was great though the wind picked up, blowing you about the road in the exposed sections. On the latter hill I've never been so physically tired tapping out a slow 4mph up the hill. A bit demoralising being dropped then watching Adam also being dropped by Marc! Turns out riding a road bike solely each weekend gives you unbelievable fitness!! Despite the pain the views were clear and spectacular as always. Such a great island so close and easily accessible from Glasgow. Five ferries, I'll be back and hopefully get further than just the one!

Felxi Ski in Glencoe

The stormy conditions of late have brought unbelievable amounts of snow to the west coast, with drifts up to ten meters deep in the ski resorts! This is all well and good, but finding a window to get out and enjoy it has proved difficult. Nevertheless on Friday I got a heads up from Stevie and Andy they had the day off and fancied doing something. After looking at the weather I managed to get the Monday off to head out and hope for the best on the slopes.

Setting off at 06:30 for 08:30 we set off up the road with my new ski's and boots in tow. Stevie and I were still recovering from a morning session on the Sunday at Carron valley where we set off far too fast on the first lap that he was nearly sick! I wasn't far behind. Great training for Glentress next weekend with all the lads. Arriving nice and early we managed to hire them boards quickly and head straight up the lift. Sadly the lower slope wasn't complete in coverage and the top lift wasn't accessible due to too much snow that it was covered over. Arriving in the corrie we could see why. The snow cover was unbelievable, there were no pistes with conditions just being ride anywhere! Getting the chair up involved lifting the legs in places, something I've never had to do! One thing is for sure it will certainly stick around.

Getting far to close on the t-bar!

Andy on the chair

After a flat light first run on quality slightly wet but fast powder the conditions improved to be brilliant all day. Andy and Stevie were fantastic on the boards nearly keeping up with my ski's and doing nose turns as they came down looking cool. We did loads of runs and dug out the jump park a bit and played around. Crashes didn't hurt as a result of the snow cushion....even when someone puts a lip on it when you don't expect it.

 A Monday far better spent than working!

Glasgow Weekender

Friday night saw the last of the Glasgow Climbing Centres winter bouldering competition which followed the same format of the last one…climbing with free beer! A winning combination in anyone’s book! The men’s open was well set with many of the problems being hard, well set and on small holds, which proved to me to be too tricky given a two month break due to a tweaky finger (which despite the rest seems not to have healed fully) and skiing.

In the end William finished the comp in 3^rd and came out with a free chalk bag, but everyone else won beers. Some of the lads took full advantage of the fact, especially asking me to get more beers when I was at the front of the queue to save on time till closing Vs. beer consumption.

On Saturday Andy, Rambo, Michael and a few their work mates and I went to Carron Valley on the mountain bikes. Conditions were cold, snowy but again after not being on the bike for 2 months my legs felt it! The track was good and a considerably better than the last time we were there, with no need to haul/push/throw the bike over all the fallen trees! The forestry commission have done a great job cleaning it up. It was however equally as wet in the afternoon when it started throwing it down! Nothing out of the ordinary happened but it was a great day out. It’s good to be getting a bit of fitness and routine back. Commute back to work commences soon/when it stops throwing it down!

Bansko skiing

 

 

This week I joined Martin and his mates on a week-long ski trip to Bansko Bulgaria. Conditions weren’t looking great from the webcams and it hadn’t snowed there for almost a whole months. Thankfully however they had snow cannons so there was a fair bit of skiing to go at, though only 30% of the runs were open!

As a result the runs were exceptionally busy especially on the weekend with numerous ski schools and hundreds of others on the slope. This proved to be a giant slalom course of avoid the people. I managed well all week, except one time when flying down 2m from the edge of the piste and rocks/trees of a very steep blue section (probably should have been a red), when some guy continued to head left and into my path. I pulled alongside to give him time to turn though instead of doing so he ploughed into me, resulting in my headfirst fall resulting in a slight busted nose and lip. Asking if I was ok I nodded my head, which turns out to mean no over there. He must have wondered what I was doing skiing off so fast. I guess these things can’t be avoided with so many people of mixed ability on a slope at once. The steep section of blue did prove to be a You’ve Been Framed comedy gold slope, though some looked painful – especially the double somersault I witnessed!

As the week went on we did more runs and quite a few closed ones. There was enough snow on these runs to get down them ok, and they proved to be the best slopes in my opinion.  The weather changed how icey the slopes were which kept it interesting, especially on rental skis with no edges to be able to turn well on. Finally on Thursday however there was a big dump of snow making the runs much better. The blacks were actually no longer sheet ice and provided a good source of entertainment watching Dicky fall down them in various styles.

Having a great day!

Starting a long walk!

Friday saw us at the top of the slope, with Martin messing about with his new skis on some grinds. I continued up walking the 50 minutes to the top of the slope for some waist deep powder to get down in less than five minutes! I have never skied on deep powder before, but the feeling is sensational and very satisfying to look behind and look at your track. All the effort is definitely worth it. Martin and Stephen joined me for a second run, though they did look like they wanted to kill me on the way up! It was all worth it though; probably the most satisfying run I’ve ever had on skis.

Laying some fresh tracks!

The new town itself had an interesting nightlife, a lot of touts and exotic bars, but in between these were some nice restaurants and bars primarily playing dance music and an apre ski environment. I cannot believe that every restaurant is the best in Bulgaria though!

 

 

Glencoe Ski

Today Fraser, Amy and I headed up to Glencoe for a cheeky ski day before my holiday to Bansko Bulgaria. Problem was everyone else had the same idea given it was the best day between the storms to get out. After an hour queuing for skis (feeling sorry for Fraser having to wait around) we got the first cable car up and touched down past the grass into the snowy corrie. Conditions were great, though when you looked up and saw queues like this you knew it was going to be a long day:

After doing a few of the blues to warm up the rusty legs we started on a few of the reds. The snow was beautiful powder up top and proved great fun even despite the white out conditions where you could only see a meter in front. Amy’s first Scottish ski experience.

Nearing the end of the day and down the red we tried to ski down the red in a whiteout and went a bit off piste, well more so than the other times we were getting down. Suddenly we hit a drift of really deep powder and staying afloat for a few seconds I thought we’d nailed it. Unfortunately this wasn’t the case with both Fraser’s and my tips being eaten to result in two spectacular face plants! Unscathed I got out, but as Fraser did he somehow snapped his ski in the process!

New Ebay boots!

 
New skis for Fraser! I also inherited my brother’s old ones, and after some boots were bought off Ebay I’m hot to slip and slide! 4 trips up and my kit will be paid off!