UKC

Dry Tooling at Hodge Close

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 Mattdevaal 14 Jun 2013
Very disappointed to see ** HVS Sasquatch has been dry tooled. Not the best route in the world but totally unacceptable.

Can these people please stop! Stay in the Works if you have to.

This is not a Troll!
 biscuit 14 Jun 2013
In reply to Mattdevaal:

Really !?!?

I find it amazing that more people don't get caught dry tooling. If you're doing it in a popular place like Hodge Close surely someone must have seen.
 Pagan 14 Jun 2013
In reply to biscuit:

I dunno - Hodge isn't that popular a venue and it'd be pretty easy to avoid being caught; you don't need dry rock so just wait for a manky day or when the crag's a bit wet and off you go, the floor's wide open for you to knacker a route and f*ck things up for everyone.

Pretty depressing really.
 Jamie B 14 Jun 2013
In reply to Mattdevaal:

Equally disappointed. Some very motivated and public-spirited people have made a real effort to open defined and accepted DT venues, and have also had to work overtime to refute the charge that this will lead to the spread of tooling onto trad venues. Surely anyone, even the c*** who did this, can see that this undermines all of those efforts and lends fuel to the anti-tooling lobby. Seethe.
 Scott Quinn 14 Jun 2013
In reply to Mattdevaal:
What a shame!

Sasquatch along with behind the lines must be most lakeland climbers introduction to hodge slate, the fact that a couple of selfish DT's
(hopefully a minority) saw fit to do this is beyond me.

Have any other routes been touched?
OP Mattdevaal 14 Jun 2013
In reply to scott quinn:

Not sure to be honest but I didn't really have a good look at other routes apart from the ones we climbed. Didn't do Sky but that would worth checking.
i.munro 14 Jun 2013
In reply to scott quinn:

> Sasquatch along with behind the lines must be most lakeland climbers introduction to hodge slate, the fact that a couple of selfish DT's
> (hopefully a minority) saw fit to do this is beyond me.


Almost certainly a minority but even if it's one guy & his toprope ...

Say he's keen enough to get out 2 days most weekends that's potentially 80 crags in a year & a handful of routes destroyed at each. Do we even have 80 crags??

needvert 15 Jun 2013
In reply to i.munro:
> ...routes destroyed at each...

Destroyed? With a pair of crampons and axes? Maybe if your crag is a children's bouncing castle.
 Petarghh 15 Jun 2013
In reply to Mattdevaal: was on sky the other day and that hasn't been touched
Rigid Raider 15 Jun 2013
In reply to Mattdevaal:

Ummmm.... forgive another naive question... when I learned to climb it was all about getting rubber on rock and metal on rock was something you couldn't avoid from time to time when wearing crampons; every time you hit a rock you flinched because you were wrecking the points and leaving unsightly scraches all over the mountain. So why on EARTH would you want to climb rock with an axe and crampons? (Which is what I guess is meant by "dry tooling") What kind of prize idiot would do that?
In reply to Rigid Raider:

because my dear boy, the world has sadly moved on from the days when proper climbing wasn't called trad.

There are now plenty of affordable climbing crampons and axes etc bought nowadays with the best intentions of doing some good winter routes, but a small minority who will use them at the slightest provocation whether they are needed or not. Hence a few months ago, debate about someone on Bowfell Buttress with all the gear - and possibly no idea....

The ethos you rightly describe is under threat from this minority who want to use their toys they have paid for. Dry tools - yes that describes them very well.
 Graeme Hammond 15 Jun 2013
In reply to Mattdevaal:

Sad if true! Hopefully not the tip of an iceberg and just a few misguided people that can be taught that this isn't acceptable. Stick to local ethics and use the dedicated DT venues. Personally I think climbing walls offering DTing in the winter should lead the way by telling participants about the ethics of DTing outside and where it is and isn't appropriate if they don't already do so. Hopefully this will prevent anyone new to the sport pleading ignorance. Those that should know better I'm not sure what is to be done.

Happy dry tooling in the right locations
 csw 16 Jun 2013
In reply to Mattdevaal:


Just throwing this out there, but given the close proximity of a dedicated venue, what reason have you got for assuming it was a DT enthusiast who did this, rather than say, the nutcases who recently trashed the works? I'm not trying to peddle conspiracy theories, but if all you have are tool marks, you can't really speculate on what group of people put them there, given recent events

@***hole thing to do though, whoever did it

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