Pennine Lines w/c 20 May 2024
|| Cooler and breezy || Very manageable ||
Valediction, Stanage || Climber: Dave Norton
|| Focus On... ||
The Banter Menace
Although we’re now getting a smattering of quite hot and sunny days, where on south-facing rock it’s eminently possible to fry eggs, we’ve also had a good bit of overcast weather. The presence of a decent easterly breeze might be unhelpful for most grit crags but it has meant that Kudos wall has actually been in fine condition for the time of year, and whereas my prophesiesed personal Rubicon Renaissance didn’t materialise last year it has been great to enjoy a few sessions there this year already. One thing about totally ignoring a crag for a year or two is you get to rediscover its nuances again. And not quite everything is the same as you remember - for one thing the river is silting up little by little each year, so the view changes a little, the jumping fish seem to be gone and the objectionable swan must be dragging its knees along the river bed these days. No wonder that thing is so lairy.
Tsunami, Rubicon || Climber: Rachel Briggs
One thing you can be assured of, other than aching fingers, is some lively member-of-the-general-public banter from passing walkers. The usual one-liners include but not limited to; “you’re not going all the way up there are you?”, “you must be crackers”, or “are you camping out here?” etc etc. No it only feels like I live here at times. Anyway, one thing I’ve noticed is you get a few Alex Honnold-based quips now, such is the market penetration of the amygdala-deficient soloist, forever lodged into the public psyche as THE climber of note. The only one whose name you need to know. Honnold is basically the Chris Bonington for the Beastmaker generation, a feat that not even the climbing Olympic gold medallists have achieved. The fact that the Spanish guy’s name escapes me is a case in point - perhaps because I’m not constantly getting it quipped at me from the mapcase-and-gaiters community (and is IS a community etc).
Anyway, it’s jarring to hear Honnold’s name bandied around at Rubicon especially. You or I would not expect the arching walls of finger-wrecking crimps and glazed footholds, all held in place with industrial epoxies, to really be up Honn Solo’s straße, but soloing speaks to everyone at an elemental level so all such contextual considerations of genre go out of the window. Or maybe the passing walkers are much more knowledgeable on Peak climbing trivia than I give them credit for and are in fact referencing Quentin Fisher’s famous attempts to solo Caviar back in the day? I guess we’ll never know. One thing is clear though; soloing is a great leveller and captures the imagination of climbers and non-climbers in a similar sort of way.
The magic of evening gritstone on 5x4" film || Stanage Far North
Paradoxically for an Oscar-winning activity flung into the limelight and hence public consciousness, soloing is actually one of the last remaining outposts of climbing which has not been sullied by encroaching commercialism quite yet. By its very nature it’s hard to sell us many must-haves for soloing. Your climbing bag for a few quick easy routes at your local grit crag of an evening remains filled with only a water bottle, chalkbag and a pair of shoes. It’s harder to monetise a niche activity where less is more, although I’m sure someone will figure out a way of ruining it for money at some point. But for the time being it remains a back-to-basics experience.
I walked up to the north end of Stanage twice in the last week or so, making the arduous 15-minute walk which understandably puts off so many people, to hopefully catch a sunset with the 5x4” camera without the warm weather crowds lighting BBQs or flying drones all over the place. On one visit the sunset died a death, and on the other it came good. But neither trip was really wasted time; I was reminded what an escape - or rather a perceived escape - it feels like when you come up here. With no road running beneath the crag, unlike the rest of Stanage, the feeling of isolation is tangible even though you’re barely a kilometre from the A57. I was reminded of various trips up here on warm summer days not just to try a specific boulder problem, but to do a good circuit of the various lower grade problems, the friendly slabby solos, the short quarried walls, the inviting cracks. Even with no film crew you can be that soloing hero on you own terms, at your own level, for just a minute. Micro-Honnolding. Put me down for a slice of that please.
|| Supported By ||
|| Recently Through the lens ||
Another good out-of-the-way grit option on these warmer days; Howshaw Tor
|| Fresh Prints ||
A couple of summer images, more or less away from the crowds, from the Print Shop.
