Rain.

I got the train to Leeds to meet up with Dave Warburton. The weather looked 'iffy' but still worth a shot. We went to Baildon Bank which has a most pleasant walk in where you can meet a variety of 'Leeds charaters'. On approach, it began to rain so to start off, I tried 'Joanna', one of the classic VS' and it has to be said its a fine route! By now, many of the faces were quite wet, so we went over to 'punter about' on 'Big Curver', another lesser often climbed, but good route.

We were keen to have a look at the crag in the woods after this and were quite surprised to find it had recently seen a lot of attention, for both trad and bouldering.

Some of the routes looked good, if not a little sand-bagged ;)

Now the rain had become worse and we were fairly 'de-psyched' so left for the train. I had a tour round Leeds which was enjoyable and student life seems fairly enjoyable?! Then I got back on the train and headed for home, having done two routes but feeling like it'd been a big day! The people you meet on the train are quite fascinating you know, so maybe I'll end up taking psychology at university?

On Sunday, me and Jake went to Blakey Ridge, and again the weather was crap. Jake/I had decided he wanted to do his first E1 as his 17th birthday is tomorrow! We decided to visit the newly developed 'Middle Ridge Crag' and fancy our chances on 'Moral high ground' on the railway buttress. The buttress was soaking and not as good as it had appeared on the picture. The left hand VS is in fact OK but the other two are either a bit gash or eliminate. Jake made attempts at the route but ended up just getting pissed off and sacked it off.

We walked over to round crag, where we hoped to top rope some of the harder lines on the pinnacle and give 'twin cracks' E1 a go.

The pinnacle buttress has seen a lot of work recently from Franco and Dave which has made a great improvement to the routes. Unfortunately, due to the wet weather, they weren't particularly in condition although I imagine the previously cleaned routes such as Vamperic Obsession and Honey arete should be clean when dry.

We had a go at 'Octopet' E4 6b on top rope, which looks as though it could be a good route, but its in fact not and is like a greasy pile of grease, which has has extra grease on it with not very good moves. The rest of the routes routes on the buttress look excellent however and I'm really psyched for 'Picnic @ hanging rock' ....
Franco has also set me a project to climb by the time I'm 16, we'll see how that goes.....

We walked along to the lion buttress, I had a go at 'twin cracks' E1 which i fell off and so also sacked off and then Jake got pumped on a VS......