A change of focus

I’ve spent most of the summer focussing on my running, a decision I’m pretty pleased with as it has yielded some good results – sub 4 hours in my first Ennerdale, 13th in a British champs' race, 8th at Wasdale in an English Champs' field, getting the Snowdon Horseshoe record and a monster run I’ve wanted to do in France for ten years or so. But in a month’s time I’ll be Patagonia bound for a four-week trip with Mick Fowler, so it’s about time to change focus.

Patagonia has never really been somewhere I’ve been that interested in going to – besides the atrocious weather it seemed to be too much about rock climbing and aiding than the more alpine-style mixed objectives I’ve preferred for trips in the past (last year’s trip to Greenland being the exception). However, as might be expected from Fowler, when he suggested Patagonia, he wasn’t thinking of the famous Fitzroy or Paine groups, but a remote mountain that nobody seemed to have heard of and that he hadn’t even seen a photo of. I said yes.

A few months of research later it would appear that, true to form, he has picked a whopper – Patagonia expert Rolando Garibotti described the unclimbed south-east face of Cerro San Lorenzo to me as a “phenomenal wall with endless potential (almost 2000 meters high, 10 kilometers long), very remote considering the short approach” while Patagonian pioneer Yvon Chouinard told me he could think of no face bigger than this one outside of the Himalaya. Psyche levels are certainly rising.

I’ve got one more thing I want to do with my running this summer, a fast traverse of the Welsh 3000s, a run I’ve done twice before but never when properly fit (best time 6 hours and a few seconds). I’ll hopefully get that done in the next two weeks, then no more running (maybe just the odd local race) just climb climb climb for three weeks. Oh, and there’s the small matter of an Msc thesis to be getting on with...

After the trip with Mick, my girlfriend is coming out to meet me in El Calafate for another three weeks. We hope to do a week-long tour round the Fitzroy massif on skis along with some more leisurely and luxury touristy stuff, which by then I’ll no doubt be craving!

The winter that was

A typical wet summer coupled with a now nearly sorted knee injury means climbing seems a distant memory at the moment. So I figured a look back at the winter and start thinking about the one to come was the best way to keep the psyche going.

It wasn’t the most productive winter, but for the quality of the climbing and skiing certainly made up for a lack of quantity. The alps saw one of its best snow years for the last decade and with endless storms through late January and early February making pretty hazards conditions up high around Chamonix the trees of Courmayeur offered the safest bet. An almost daily commute through the Mont Blanc tunnel along with most of the Chamonix locals brought you to the land of good coffee and an endless supply of powder to be hovered up in the trees.

(photo – Pete Benson)

As well as an amazing snow year many of the classic valley ice lines formed this season, the highlight for me was along with Nick Bullock and Pete Benson climbing a friendly formed Tequila Stuntman. The final pitch is the meat of the route with Nick quickly dispatching the 10m of dry tooling before a hard couple of moves over to the hanging ice and a quick blast to the top.

Fast forward 2 ½ months (yes skiing is as hazard’s as ice climbing....) and the draw of the mountains returned. Wanting to do something a bit different Nick and I decided to have a look at the Grand West Couloir, a Gabarrou route (who else!) from the mid 70’s. With only a handful of ascents and all requiring a bit of aid not much info is to be found on it. After a very comfy bivi at the Plan de Aiguille and packing a Compressor Vest each, by-passing the initial pitches and following what looked like the obvious start, Nick torque his way up a short, hard crack to reach a snow slope that lead up into the couloir proper. Three steep sections separated by steep snow slopes brought us to the headwall where 4 long pitches of quality mixed and ice climbing on sound Chamonix granite saw us on the easy final snow slopes 9 hours after starting.

(photo – Nick Bullock)

With the route over the crux of the day was the 5 ½ hours of wading through waist deep snow reversing the classic Midi-Plan traverse leading back to the Aiguille du Midi station and a previously stashed bottle of wine... (alpine climbings all about been prepared!)

A week or so later saw Nick and myself wandering down from the top station Grand Montets to the base of the north face of the Aiguille Sans Nom, this time joined by Ian Parnell. The plan was to do the Russian Roulette start and finish on the Gabarrou-Silvy through the head wall. A few years ago having found the top of There Goes The Neighbourhood bone dry Nick and I had traversed over to finish up the Gabarrou but somehow managing to miss it and finding ourselves at the other end of the face finished up the British route instead.

No mistake this time and after some poor climbing on the Russian start, a 5 star bivi on the median slope and 7 pitches of quality ice and mixed with a crux 95^o section leading us to the final 200m of calf burning ice slopes and the top. With no bottles of wine awaiting us this time, instead a cold bivi just over the other side and around 15 abseils the next morning saw us in Chamonix for a refuelling session on Midnight Express burgers.

(photo – Nick Bullock)