Finding Rhythm Again

Well after a hefty three months off from almost all activity between June, July and August I've been spending the past two months recovering some sort of fitness and enjoying rock again. Things got really hot here in June so it brought our roped climbing to a standstill before we drove back home to Ireland for our wedding and what I thought would be a summer of Irish trad and bouldering. I totalled three days on rock. Two days out in Lough Dan trad climbing and 2 hours in Ayton’s Cave one afternoon when Caroline was at the hairdressers. Haa!!

Lough Dan is Awesome. It’s beautiful. Both the setting and the climbing. Probably ten years ago I was motivated to try and climb Surfs up there. Mainly due to the picture on the back cover of the old Wicklow guidebook. It raped me… dry. I resorted to fully aiding the line but swore to return. This summer was a different story. After a long season building mileage on sports routes I did a quick mental calculation and translated E4 6a into 6c sports, then adding in the sandbag factor upped it to 7a in my mind, and racked up for a retro flash without any warm-up. You want to know the sad part? I remembered all the gear – yep, every single wire and cam. I opted to just take the small wires and peanuts. Man it was intense. There is so much more going on while climbing a trad route. It is a classic for anyone climbing E4, brilliant! Solid keyhole wire placements, two pegs, great granite, amazing position, lovely movement and climbing. The top out on the other hand was grim. A filthy overgrown slab awaits. Lough Dan is a crag that would benefit from a belay station above the trad lines. Nemesis conquered we ticked all the other routes on the crag with the exception of Archaos. This route has apparently never had an onsight and the pegs would need replacing before I was willing to give it a go and possible fall off. It’ll have to wait.

My little session in the Cave highlighted something that I had suspected for some time. All this sports climbing makes you weak!! I expected to be able to warm up on the problems I had done before and leave with a few new ticks – wrong! Despite the holds being wet I still actually thought it would feel easy, familiar. Caroline’s traverse went as the warm up but then I had to orientate myself amongst the maze of chalked holds. Eventually I found my lanky sequence again and clung on to the end of Loco despite the wet holds. This time even Afterthought felt harder and I used my feet. I worked some of the other lines but my time was up and I had to run back to the car… wedding business.

After two weddings, a christening and 8 weeks meeting, eating with and drinking with family and friends I hadn’t spent enough time with in years I returned to Spain with an extra 6kgs and low energy levels. Within two weeks of eating right and getting out on rock and running I had shed the weight and ticked a few high 7’s and low 8’s. We’ve visited new locals only crags and the psyche is high.

Then we found a real treasure – a 50m long steeply overhanging bouldering wall with flat landings. It had been found by climbers before and they left plenty of sika holds but strangely no signs of wear that you’d expect to see. No rubber work footholds, chalk on undercuts, polish. The fact that the entire crag was lines with scrub and thorny bushes was another strange indicator that climbers hadn’t been here for a long time – or they just came and sika’ed a load of holds but never worked the lines? Either way, two sessions now has seen the crag cleared and tidy. The rock is perfect and there are problems aplenty. Everything from the MEGA 50m traverse of the Gods to vicious straight up problems. I’d love to get some V12 boulderers up there to check out some of the lines. I mean back in Wales I could work things like Mr. Fantastic on the cromlech in sections without too much problem but some of these features are NAILS! I still feel a bit restricted without any pads but I’ll sort that out soon enough :o) Training season has begun – hopefully with a bit of steep rock to play on the edge will come back on the harder sports routes – psyched!!

Bouldering... on actual boulders! Really!

Lets talk some numbers shall we? 1 half-day, 2 people, 35 degrees, 6 litres of water, 13 cairns built, 2 pairs of gloves, 1 saw, 2 secateurs, 1 hatchet, 1 block cleaned, 5 new boulder problems, 3 problems climbed, 2 projects remaining, 0 pads, 20 or more blocks left to tackle... hmmm.

The obligatory before shot. Our first target was the arete block that Caroline spotted a few weeks ago. Fist we had to negotiate the 3m or so of prickly shite to actually get up face to face with it.

And the after shot. A couple of hours worth of ripping, cutting throwing and stomping followed by a fair amount of brushing dirt and muck off the boulder and it sat ready to be climbed on.

Heres a more telling view of the main act - the arete. I'd describe it as feeling like a frictionless, harder, limestone version of Rhythm and stealth in Glendalough with an equally worrying landing. The ground below the arete falls away in a mess of rocks and (now) some bits of trees partially filling a hole. The smooth nature of the rock means you have to bear down on the edges or verdonesque closed pockets that are there and simply do the moves between them. The obvious horizontal break is slopey too leaving some burl for the finish. I couldn't do it. Not without pads or more spotters anyway. To me it's a classic line. Location, angle, obvious feature and the right difficulty for me to work on. Definitely the hardest 6a I've ever laid my eyes on.

Heres what we got done. Caroline got the ball rolling by climbing the first problem. She pulled on from sitting from a knee-height sidepull and then balanced her way up and left. It was cool with a real slopey top move. Problem two starts as for the first but follows features rightwards getting higher and higher above the deck before having to use some slopers and small but positive footers to reach for safety. Problem three pulls on using a steep crack and then moves left on slopers before balancing back right and up to finish. The yellow arete project is worth obsessing over. The green project is an obvious line breaking out left from problem three and finishing up problem two.

After that we hiked back to the car and went for an exploratory hill run. Oh my God! More quality rock and this time we found a trackside overhanging wall - ideal for bouldering/training - not the mention the miles and miles of undeveloped single and multipitch rock, crazy!!

A Question of Style

On Sunday morning Caroline warmed up by sending her project at the Wildside. Cuestión de Estilo takes a powerful line up a single striking tufa through consistently steep terrain. It is famous (infamous) for it's wicked crux move that utilises a painful two finger pocket that has to be taken with the front two fingers as an undercut.

It winked at Caroline back in January but she resisted trying it until she had finished her other project. Caroline was inspired to keep trying this route after watching and talking with some members of the Ukrainian climbing team who were visiting and playing on it. One woman, who had to work it a fair bit before eventually redpointing it, was discussing and sharing beta with Caroline as they were of similar height. She reckoned it was closer to 7c+. Later that day her coach informed us that she usually onsights 8a's and had redpointed 8c+, hence her surprise at being spat off a 7c.
Caroline spent some time working on her own sequence through the crux but could never give it more than two goes a day as the sharp pockets would shred her fingers and the powerful style left her wiped out after only a few attempts anyway. Just when she seemed close to sending it the weather stopped play. It turns out that despite staying completely dry in even the heaviest downpour, the route seeps really badly for weeks after heavy rain making it impossible to climb. I suppose all those tufas have to come from somewhere! Sunday we got to the crag and it was the driest it had been in over 2 months. Opting not to take a warm up, Caroline jumped straight on the sharp end and put the project to bed once and for all. A brilliant lead and one I know Caroline is especially proud of for loads of reasons.

Heres the video...

Lost in Translation

Sunday was awesome. Caroline had made commitments to help a friend with her business start up so I was sent off to the Wildside with a packed lunch and my Spanish phrasebook. It felt similar to that first day at school memory. I got there early and as usual there was no one around. I spend an hour updating my printed topo to include all the new lines and sorted out the grades to the best of my knowledge. Then just sat down and read till the locals arrived. It's a weird time of year here in Sella. With the season drawing to a close there are no tourists. Just the local scene in it's eclectic glory. Knowing everyone’s names and faces from the previous 3 months of frequenting this rock helps but its a different story when you go scrounging a belay with embarrassingly poor Spanish. Luckily everyone was keen to involve the new kid and unbelievably I never had to wait or even ask for a belay. They're all so sound! I got stuck in with the belaying duties too and also got the beta for a few years worth of projecting. Everyone had their own routes and it was surprising to find out that mine was not the easiest! Everything from 8c+ down to 7c+ was being worked and the psyche (not to mention work ethic!) was high. I gave my route a couple of redpoints - making little progress after a two week break. At one point i was tempted to strip my draws and working something else but then i thought about something i read recently. Work your weaknesses but play to your strengths. And it clicked. At this stage, these sessions are training for the summer's trad. The season is over here and it's not a mission for the next tick anymore. Plus if I can clock 4 laps of a 28m long overhanging crimpfest with one fall each time and then play on all the other equipped routes in the 8's then i'm obviously training for something! All good!

Heres a video from 4 crags all within 40 mins from our house. I was talking to the first ascentionist of the 8b at 2min50 called Clemencia. He was telling me that his original was static'ed through the roof a 8b+ and that the new dyno beta lowered the grade. He also said that it was class and would suit me, a real 3 star route! Oh and theres some shit hard bouldering in there too for any boulderers out there not feeling the love for the climbing with ropes :o)

Playing with Video

Heres a short vid of some of our recent climbing antics... well I should say of Caroline's recent climbing. I have been climbing, honest, but i keep sending routes when i'm not expecting to so i never bother setting the camera up! I'll change that tomorrow though... get some falling off and swearing footage of meself.

Been playing with different camera setups and video settings too... amazing what you can do without school work and marking to be done :o)

After 2 days on my current route I've fallen off the crux hold 5 times on redpoint, each time pulling back on and finishing it to the chains in one. Frustrating but fun. Enjoying the mileage it's giving me as it's a 13 cliper :o)

Busy Dave

As is always the way - the busier i get the less i post. And i have been BUSY! Anyway, easier to just put soem pictures up of recent adventures - the climbing is great!

Exploring the Water Cave above the Sella valley

The Wildside off in the distance... so much rock!!


Caroline warming up

Afterwork sessions at the wildside...

The most enjoyable way of building stamina - warming up on 8a, redpointing 8a, cooling down on 8a. Keep doing it with one fall now but the fall point keeps creeping closer to the chains - no hard moves, just resistance climbing

Mambo the Wildside guard dog and Caroline

Exploring some of the lesser known crags in the area - this one is full of 7c's and 8a's - short steep and fingery.

Rock

Back to writing about what this blog was intended for! It’s been a good weekend. Firstly Jo and Steve arrived for a small bit of half term R & R in the sun. Straight away we hit Sella Wildside. Last week I put our draws in two 7c routes that were not my style. Steep tufas and slopers with a small amount of resistance climbing to the chains. Both felt hard at the time and I figured I’d need to work them quite a bit purely to build up enough stamina to redpoint them. Saturday morning I tied in at the base of the first one and swung my arms about – 10 times. Fully warmed up and with not enough quickdraws to lead anything else I started up “Keep the Faith” 7c. Moving into the crux my hands felt cold but I was calm and just shook them out a bit and kept going. The crux passed in a blur and before I knew it I was in a kneebar shaking out one clip below the chains. Relaxed and enjoying the unexpected progress I hung out for a minute or two and then climbed on to clip the chains. Lowering off from the warm up and stripping a project. Brilliant! Next up was Caroline’s turn on “Cuestion de Estilo” (Question of Style). This route has the reputation of being Sella’s hardest 7c. A tricky to unlock section through some steep tufas requiring the use of a two finger pocket and excessive drop knee’ing. Caroline lead up to the crux and began working the moves. Every attempt ending in a fall and slightly refining or eliminating a potential sequence. By the time she had finished the route was looking ready for a send and she was looking tired. I tied in to give it a bash but didn’t expect much. Fighting through the crux whilst making up a sequence got me to within a fingertip of the send but trying to unwind from a deep dropknee with my left foot too low left me hanging from the first pad of my middle finger. Basically mono’ing the base of a crack instead of sidepulling it. I cam off, lowered off and pulled the rope – left foot higher! Next go it sent without a problem! Two steep 7c ticks at the Wildside in a day was an unexpected and awesome start to my Sella climbing. Psyched!! Before leaving on Sat I tied in and tried an 8a+ with the draws in – brilliant climbing! Like Dinbren but 30 meters long and without much of a break. I lowered off before the top but loved the climbing on it so will be back for the send. Sunday morning and with only a little time available for rock, Caroline and myself returned to Sella and I warmed up by going bolt to bolt up a fantastic 8b, “La Criatura”. Superb!! My new project!

Caroline tied in and went for it on the 7c. This time making it into the two finger pocket at the end of the crux before slipping out of the drop knee position reaching for the crack above. Meanwhile in Echo Valley Jo and Steve were ticking away. I mentioned to Steve that in October I had redpointed a route I nicknamed “popcorn”. I forgot to mention to Steve that it took me 5 sessions to figure out the moves and redpoint it (more than any grade 8 I had tried in Spain). Despite having a name painted at its base I could find no record of it having been climbed before so without wanting to overgrade it I suggested 7c although I felt it may be harder. Steve kindly donated some time and finger skin to giving it blast and reckoned it’s an 8 alright and suggested that possibly even grading it 8a would be sandbagging. Steve also reckoned that it’s common place for the bolter to name the routes regardless of whether or not they have been climbed so mine may have been the first ascent – Cool! Very Morpho (reachy) and sharp but hard and I enjoyed doing it. After that Jo and Steve took a trip to Cova Fuma and Steve tried “Gran Fuma” 8a. Although I didn’t get to see him on the route it was cool to see someone else psyched about a route that I thought was quality – He’s keen to tick it before returning to the UK, fingers crossed he does!

Sella Wildside, Costa Blanca

Since Caroline managed to dispatch her project last week we've been free to visit any crags we want to. No choice really is there? It has to be the Wildside! This place is magic. An awesome fin of rock overhanging in it's entire length with heavily featured walls up to 40m in height. Tufas, crimps, pockets - it's got it. Located in a hidden valley and with access conditions that require climbers to have respect not only for the surroundings but also to limit the noise they make while climbing. It is a very special place indeed. It also represents the embodyment of everything I'm shit at. Stamina. Steep climbing on rounded holds and pinches. Nothing i can get my fingers behind or even stand on! Its like someone giftwrapped a crag to work on my weaknesses and put it around the corner from my house. I've so much to learn from this place. New types of footwork. New redpoint tactics. I'm so Psyched!! We've been a couple of thimes this week and I've been enjoying getting some mileage on the longer burly 7b's and 7c's. Full respect to Mr Barbour for his impressive list of Wildside sends! 8b in a day! Wow. I'm so far off the fittness needed for that type of climbing but I'm looking forward to working at it and seeing the improvements. All the routes are all so good that for now i'm going to enjoy doing some ticking. All the 7c's are the targets for now :o)


Our first visit to the Wildside this week we got chatting to the bloke in the picture above. He was a bit quite to start with but the reason became clear - he was redpointing the 8c+ pictured above. Awesome to watch. Every move dialed, he made it look effortless and then out of the blue his foot slipped and he took a huge lob from right at the top. Yesterday we were entertained by another super nice local redpoint Pinoreta 8c! Awesome fight. I saw him work this route on Tuesday evening and he looked miles away from the send but on Sat he made it through the crux and shook out before falling up the remainding 15m of sloping pinch tufas. at least twice the whole crag though he was off but he managed to keep squeezing, totally inspiring!! Venga!!

Heres the online Guide Wildside Topo

Another good weekend

Two days on rock working hard. Bliss! I just realised what i like... i like doing hard movement. It's all about the moving between piss poor holds for me... getting pumped and falling off easy moves never really did it for me (although i'm planning on doing plenty of that in the coming weeks).

I have a route that i'm trying. Last week i got psyched because i managed to to the top section. This weekend i gave it 10 goes in total. Each go failing right at the top. With every go i figured out something more. a foot movement, a twist, and clip, refining that poor heel hook etc.. but with each fall my skin and arms were taking a punishing they couldn't recover from. The top couple of bolts worth of climbing are on holds like the namesake pocket on the Gnasher problem up at the Sheep Pen boulders in Ogwen valley. Like a tight three finger pocket full of sharp teeth - ouch! Anyway, i loved trying hard and falling from the top over and over again. It'll go next day out. Chuffed to be climbing through the lower section every time to be honest as it's 8a in it's own right.

Caroline must be building the required stamina for her project because this weekend saw her climb past her previous highpoint and stick the crux dyno and swing. after that she made it a further clip and came off on the final move to easier ground. Brilliant!!! She fell off looking at the chains above her due to the tiredness of two day on and 8 redpoint attempts. Soon now, very soon


This evening theres a light dusting of snow on the mountains around us... didn't expect that!


Keep cranking!

Failure

I've never been so happy with a fail. Today i had my first go at redpointing Bloque. I got into the crux. One crimp from the hold that marks the end of the difficulties. It will be mine, oh yes, it will be mine :o)
I'm still having fun playing with my phones camera too...

Playing on Bloque from Dave Ayton on Vimeo.

Boulder hunting - Google Maps style!

Today i went on a solo boulder hunt. Fueled on too many months without bouldering, too many bouldering videos on my laptop and too many blog posts about you guessed it.... bouldering. All internet trawls for info on Costa Blanca Bouldering result in minimal finds. The best seem to be found on a Beach near Denia (one hours drive north), at a crag called Montesa (50 mins drive north) and in a dry river bed at Castell de Castells (45 mins inland). After scanning the coastline near our house on Google Maps i thought i hit on something worth a look. Two dark grey limestone blocks - bungalo sized on a beach 10 minutes away.

Unfortunately the tide was in and i've no bouldering pads in Spain. BUT at least i know they're there! I think i'll just have to accept that the White Coast of Spain is sports climbing central and not a prime bouldering spot, ah well. 3 hours gets us to Albarracin so i guess we can't complain. Gonna have to get a pad soon though... any suggestions? I'm thinking a simple and cheap Alpkit Phud again (or maybe two)

Puig Campana 1408m, Costa Blanca

Thats the name and height of the mountain in our back garden. Last weekend while my brother Robbie was over chilling out after his graduation we walked up it. Class! Brilliant views over the coast and so much rock in the hidden valleys to the north and west (between Sella and Echo valleys). Anywho, heres the altitude profile and a few pictures. Seeing as how the running is going well now it's looking ripe for a weekend run :o)

Check out all that rock! Not a single bolt or route on the entire ridge... yet!

Coronas at the top... nice!

Doing battle and routes of anti-style

Today was a good day. We got out to two local crags and have both made what feels like progress in the right direction. So far since moving to Spain i feel like we´ve not really began to get our teeth into the climbing. Partly due to temps and conditions, partly due to having guests and partly due to work pressures. This weekend marked the beginning of something different... i can feel it. To date i´ve managed to pick off a few choice routes here and there... always going for ones that play to my strengths (even the 8a+ a few weeks ago was right up my street). Today i began work on what could become a nemisis. Although it´s only 8a, it´s in no way technical and in a very real way feckin steep and powerful! It crosses a 6m roof and then blasts up a beautiful barreling head wall via dynamic climbing on sloping holds and pinches. Absoloutly fantastic!

Cova Fuma

Me taking in what i know will be an ass kicking - Gran Fuma, 8a

Today i gave it two full on redpoints. The first one i was placing the draw but still fought through the crux move, only to fall off above the next bolt. Eager to punish my body into getting fit i tied in quickly with little rest to try again, A Muerte! This time i made it one foot move higher but was soo pumped once i fell off that i couldn´t even pull back on to top out. After a few minutes on the rope i hiked to the chains. Deciding that it would be easier to top rope it to remove the draws in the roof section i got another good workout! but this time came off directly above the crux. Brilliant! This thing will make me strong - i love it!

Even better this evening was Caroline´s performance on her 7b+ project in Echo Valley. During the past few years Caroline has developed a healthy bias towards climbing routes on positive edges. Standing or God forbid pulling on sloping holds was a definate no no and hence avoided. Climbing at Ceuse this summer helped Caroline to get to grips with this style and after ticking a couple of lower grade 7´s near by in Spain she began working a extremely thin and technical 7b+. This was equal in grade to her previous best route but completely against her style. To make things more difficult the meager holds on offer were always just out of her reach. From my perspective Caroline couldn´t have chosen a better route to push herself on. As i keep reminding Caroline, if she wants to climb harder routes she must learn her own techniques for dealing with reach. In this case it involved Caroline literally dancing up the vertical face, coiling, springing and standing full stretch on one tippey-toe to reach a mono edge while the other leg kicks back. A brilliant lead and a flying pass on her "leading thin, technical limestone" lesson. Now... time to find her something that will work her hard...

Finding my level

Chaos! Spanish weddings, 3 day maths courses, water companies, telefonica, upcomming school inspections, 3 new schemes of work for A-level, a guest from Oz, two visiting Swizz and my Dad's 50th birthday party! Jaysus wept i've been busy!!! I think things are about to find their level now... fingers crossed.


In the mean time we've managed to squeeze in some climbing. I ticked a 8a+ in under 5 redpoints and managed a possible first ascent in similar time. It could be anything between 7c and 8a and suited my style and reach. Fiercly fingery stuff! I'm still on the lookout for any information of it so i'll confirm what it is when i find out. Caroline managed a few 7b's redpoints after work and we've installed a Bachar ladder and pull-up bar in the garden. Apparently i'm gonna need biceps for this steep stuff so i better start working on them... haa! Next paycheque the campus board is going up too :o)


Also... was beginning to believe that our local crag may run out of 8's for me to play on and then i came across a PDF topo online for a steeper cave EVEN CLOSER to home! Two 8a's, and 8a+ and two open projects.... drool!! The Sleeping Lion. Grrrrrrrr :o)

Costa Blanca

Our new home! We met our landlord and got the tour of our new house. Air conditioning, heating and of course pool maintenance. Once we said goodbye to Mr. Landlord we began unpacking and moving stuff around to make the house feel like a home. The house is in a lovely part of the town in a small residential area high on the hillside of Puig Campana (the towering 1400m mountain). 10 paces from our front door gets you onto wild mountain side trails running up and around the peak. Looking out from the rear of the house you can see Calpe and Altea beaches and the Mediterranean. The first priority after getting settled in was to sort out all the documentation required for working (and being paid) in Spain. Once we got our head around all that we began to explore our local area for climbing and running. Lots to go at but unfortunately August wasn’t the time to do any of it. Climbing in 37 degree heat was just way too much for us but we made a good stab at exploring all the same. There are three big crags that stand out immediately as being the big players in the area all within 30 minutes drive of our house. Wildside at Sella is an awesome overhanging buttress of perfect tufa dripping limestone. Around 30 routes from a lonely 7a to a mega hard 8c with lots to go at in the 7c to 8a range. Stamina is required! Bovedon at Gandia is home to a mind blowing expanse of horizontal climbing. A huge cave on a mountainside and fully equipped with permanent quickdraws, it stays dry in the rain and all winter and is home to a host of routes and linkups starting at a burly 7c and even has a 9a. Forada shines out as a mini Ceuse without the walk in. Lots to go at there from 6c to 8b.

Closer to home we have the gift of the quiet and relatively small Echo Valley. A handful of grade 8’s up to 8b taking powerful lines through some steep terrain will be providing a lot of entertainment during those shorter evenings after work methinks. Despite the temps we tried to climb and felt the need to get something done after the few weeks disturbance to our climbing. I managed a few 7b+’s onsight and Caroline was back onsighting 6c+. With the conditions being poor and so many crags to explore we never jumped onto anything too hard, it was all very relaxed. We were not pressed for time here – these are not our holiday crags afterall.
Anyway, it was way too hot and we had all of our camping stuff to collect from Neal in Ceuse so we hit the road once again, this time bound for Gap, France.