UKC

Diedro ubsa, The Penon. Remember doing this a long time ago. Remember thinking after abing down to the ledge from the cave and being joined by my son, christ if the rope gets snagged or stuck as I pull it through we are realey going to be in big trouble here. Luckily everything went ok and we finished the climb with no problems. Has anyone not been so luck on this pitch and how did you get out of the situation?

In reply to Russell Lovett:

I didn't know you climbed up there.

In reply to Russell Lovett:

I've posted this before...

A friend told me this tale. He was climbing a route somewhere to the left and watching two climbers setting up the abseil on Diedro UBSA. It was clear from both conversation and body language that one of the climbers was a climbing instructor and the other his client. The instructor goes down first then calls up to his client that the rope is free and that he should come down. To my friend's horror, the clients reply was "How do you get this thing on the rope?"

In reply to Russell Lovett: Funny you should ask, I tied knots in the end of the rope being what I thought was cautious, but perhaps overkill for an 8 metre abseil. However, I then like the dumb ass I am neglected to untie the knots before attempting to pull the rope down. Various ideas were then floated, like free climbing back up, or jumar the rope. Shortly afterwards I passed the knife to Gavin and he cut the rope in a totally unlike Touching the Void moment. We continued the route with a shorty. The rest of the rope was handed back to me that evening by friends following. It was a beautiful moment.

In reply to Mark Collins: Could you have reclimbed the 8 metre abseil on the lead (assuming you had a fifty metre rope and had only used a small part of it)? I hasten to add that I haven't done that abseil....

In reply to Russell Lovett:

The 1st time I did it I lowered Sherri down the abseil, she wasn't that experienced at multi-pitch. At the level of the ledge there was a bit of a pause until I said "You need to open your eyes now". At the belay she clipped each and everyone of the many bolts and pegs.


Chriw

In reply to whispering nic:

There's a couple of possibilities to the meaning of your statement in the way I have read it:
a) Are you talking about free climbing the rock along the line of the abseil back to the start of it on lead, or
b) Are you talking about jumaring back up the stuck rope on lead.

Scenario a) has the unknown technical difficulty of the rock and protection available. We probably only had a skeleton rack of quickdraws and nuts, as its a kind of trad/sport hybrid.
Scenario b) has the unknown quantity of the stuck rope. Will it pull through the eye of the belay chains.

Both have risks of potentially big fall factors onto the belay, we were unwilling to take. Having worked out that we could finish out the route on a shortened rope for what I think were the remaining 3 pitches, it was a no brainer. Oh no I think I'm lecturing, but the old adage of you can replace a rope, you can't replace yourself rang true.

In reply to Russell Lovett: cheers for the replys some good stories there, its a long way to the ground from that ledge and the exposure is right in your face with no where to hide and still a fare way to go to the top, can imagine the panic realey sets in if you get stranded on that ledge and you are the only party on the route.

In reply to Mark Collins:
Hi Mark

Having now bothered to look at your profile I can see you that you are an experienced climber and that you wouldn't misuse the expression 'free climbing' - I may have interpreted it as a reference to considering soloing back up to the ab point.

I don't feel at all lectured as I work as a climbing instructor and am probably guilty of a bit of lecturing myself, and also I don't know the route in question.

From experience of running a variety of climbing courses, especially with relatively experienced climbers, a surprising amount of climbers who are faced with the scenario of a stuck rope consider jugging back up the jammed rope as a better option than lead climbing back to a belay on their spare section of rope even where they have enough rope and the climbing is reasonable.

In reply to Russell Lovett:
Don't remember having a problem with the abseil. It was after that things went pear-shaped!
It got dark and my mate climbed something ridiculously steep to get to the top. I couldn't follow! At about 3 in the morning the bomberos arrived and set up a winch system to haul me up. Much to my shame of course.
Still need to go back and do it properly.

In reply to toasted: nearly made the same mistake as you. Sun was geting realy low not sure which line to take from the ledge, but made the right choice in the end. Got to the top just as the sun slipped below the horizon, recall it was one of the noisiest places I have ever climbed at with thousands of gulls roasting or coming into roost and all calling to each other at the same time. Quite eerie realy but absalotly spectacular as l haveee never see so many start in the sky as there were that night.

In reply to Russell Lovett:


Well, at least you wouldn't have gone hungry...

In reply to Russell Lovett:

Thankfully, no rope issues at the abseil, but memorable nevertheless.

I did it as a rope of three. I came up last to the belay before the ab to find both my friends tied into all the ironmongery in the cave and, it seemed, to each other about 10 times too. Both were smirking and giggling as they pointed towards the abyss. They called me 'the probe' and told me to get on with it. I got the message. Once I was just out of their sight on the ab, I let out a blood curdling scream. The bugg*rs were well psyched by the time it was their turn!

It went dark on us on the final pitch too and we had a 'fun' descent on a virtually moonless late December night. Er, no headtorches obviously. A few years later, it went similarly dark on myself and two of my sons after a late-start Christmas Day ascent of Vía Valencianos. But, having learnt my lesson, we were well prepared this time, with one headtorch between the three of us. The battery died some 15 mins into the descent. Er, no spare battery obviously.

Dave

In reply to Russell Lovett: As I swung on to the ledge someone who I had not seen since 1970 arrived at the same time via another route.

In reply to Russell Lovett: so IIRC I started the ab, didn't swing to the left (not mentioned in earlier guides) and soon found myself below, and on tricky ground, so continued down the length of the rope and reclimbed the previous couple of pitches (to the obvious amusement of friends watching from Via Valencianos). Then I did it properly!