UKC

I thought I'd try out this scrambling malarky and so now, I'm at the end of a fantastic couple of days and with a whole new perspective on things. We got back the second of these around 5:00 p.m. today to our camp in the Ogwen valley and as it was my climbing partner's turn to cook I sat down and started formulating this question.

It isn't really about scrambling though - if I posted it in the scrambling forum (if there is one) I'd get a scrambling answer, if I posted it in the walking section, I'd get walkers' answers but I've come at this scrambling thing from being fairly immersed in climbing for a while, so I need to get a view that works for me as someone with a rock climbing perspective. That makes it somewhat of a philosophical matter, or so it seems to me, as the question forming in my mind now is whether what you take with you on a day out on the hill is dictated more by what you are planning to do or by the kind of person you are, or the kind of outdoor background you come from.

All this started when one of my preferred climbing partners decided I needed to be taken on the scrambling exerience, so we set off this Thursday with hiking boots, camping gear and a short, thin rope.

"Do I need to take my rock boots?"
"No"
"Should I take my rack?"
"No"
"Shouldn't we at least take a couple of carabiners, a belay device and a figure of 8?"
"I spose so..."
But they didn't get took.

Yesterday, we parked by Lyn Ogwen and set off around Tryfan to find a route called 'Bristly Ridge'. That really was the start of an extraordinary set of adventures over these past two days and it's really opened up a whole new perspective for me on what a day out means. We found ourselves doing all kinds of things and encountering all kinds of situations that even my well trained and experienced partner had not anticipated and far from having the twenty or so assorted kilos of ironmongery and plastic we normally cart around, we just had food, water, clothing and a 30 meter, 8mm that never got used.

Most of my usual assumptions as to the sort of equipment I need to ensure my continued survival on this planet having evaporated in one fell swoop, I thought I'd kick this one off here in order to see if anyone else at least recognises this dilemma?

In reply to Andy Morley:

Mental masturbation at its finest?

In reply to Andy Morley:

There must be cake.

In reply to Andy Morley:

Good for you. Now learn to leave the rope and harnesses behind unless you absolutely know that an abseil is on the routecard.

And head to Skye (perhaps via Glencoe and the great Nevis ridges)

In reply to Andy Morley:

My view is that what an experienced climber takes scrambling probably differs from what a walker takes scrambling. You were right to take the rope just in case, though I must admit I have always neglected to do so

In reply to Andy Morley:

We did the horseshoe up Tryfan and Bristly Ridge and down Gribin Ridge last Saturday.
http://www.ukhillwalking.com/logbook/r/?i=76
Despite the glorious sunshine and zero wind I still packed a fleece, primaloft, waterproof, bothy bag, hat, gloves etc along with a 20 metre half rope. Needless to say, it all stayed in the pack all day. I've been up Tryfan and Bristly before so I knew I didn't really need a rope but I kinda justified it as good training for winter!

In reply to Andy Morley:

"We found ourselves doing all kinds of things and encountering all kinds of situations that even my well trained and experienced partner had not anticipated"

I'd be interested to hear a little about some of these situations, just to remind me of the delights of scrambling.

In reply to marsbar:


Had a real fine slice of chocolate cake along with mocha coffee with whipped cream on the way back last night. Probably 1000 calories for those two things alone. So I agree, cake is REALLY important

In reply to BnB:


All we took was the rope, plus a sensible amount of clothing, iron rations and water. I'm wondering what use an 8mm 30 meter rope could ever be unless you also had a few other bits and pieces? Trouble is then, 'a few' can quickly escalate to 'a lot'...

In reply to Alyson:


See my comment above on the rope, which never came out of its bag, despite our encountering some pretty challenging situations. But in the first part of your comment, you are focussing pretty much exactly on the issue that I'm trying to untangle. I'm thinking that the different amounts and types of baggage that different types of people might take would be mirrored in the different approaches that they would also take to scenarios they might encounter en route.

In reply to angry pirate:


I couldn't have taken all that. Not knowing quite what to expect, I just chucked a frame rucksack and a small bag in the car. My partner told me to leave the rucksack behind, so I took the bag which was a kind of canvas satchel. With that and an army-style canteen of water around my neck as well as my waterproof with the arms knotted around my shoulders, when I actually came to climb rock, I found myself being hampered very slightly by them sliding round on me so I think that in future, I will take a proper day-sack, but a small one.

In reply to Andy Morley:

I've not read the earlier posts but to my mind you've discovered alpinism!

self reliance is a big part and hence the rope some "survival" equipment makes sense.

head across the valley next time and do amphitheatre buttress. You may or may not need slightly more gear!

In reply to Andy Morley:


You need to learn the basic techniques of moving together roped (as for 'easy' terrain on routes in the Alps), and this requires knowing how to make quick belays as necessary. You don't really need any extra gear (though a long sling and krab can save time). On such scrambles, you don't need a harness either. You just quickly tie round the waist using a bowline. It's extremely rare to have to rope up for anything on a scramble, so typically, this would be for one short, serious pitch or rock step, in bad conditions. I've never taken a rope on Tryfan North Ridge or the Bristly Ridge, and don't know anyone who has. Though of course it would be essential in icy/snowy conditions (though crampons and ice axe would then be even more important). And there were very few even in the Cuillin where I took a rope (problem of extra weight). Ones I can think of are: Pinnacle Ridge (SNG), Dubhs Ridge, In Pinn. I can remember definitely not taking one on the Clach Glas/Blaven traverse.

The sum total of the gear we took on serious Alpine climbs can be seen below - not a sling, spare krab or a nut in sight. (Even on things like the Biancograt on Piz Bernina, which I did with two great guys in the SWMC, we each only carried one spare sling and about 3 or 4 nuts at very most.)

http://gordonstainforth.apps-1and1.net/the-matterhorn-and-the-taugwalders-r...

In reply to Ann S:


Yesterday, doing the East Ridge of Y Garn...
http://www.outdoorsmagic.com/forum/walking-and-climbing/scrambling-y-garn-g...
...we found ourselves doing some challenging and exposed pitches in the VDiff to severe range at my estimation, with no protection and wearing hiking boots. As my partner and I began this year by soloing 20 routes at Windgather and had a good recent practice session for it when we did a 4-pitch 71 meter sea cliff on the Gower a couple of weeks age, we are well used to working together and have a good understanding of each other's strengths and weaknesses. But the fact that we did that ridge yesterday and were OK with it despite some serious exposure and dizzying drops next to us led me to question some of my existing assumptions about when protection is and is not a good idea. I would not have dreamt of doing a regular rock-climbing route that was that exposed without protection, but it seems to be accepted practice in scrambling. Am I right in this conclusion?

On Friday, our plans for Bristly Ridge were derailed when we had to go to an 11-year-old child who was stranded quite some way up Tryfan on the edge of a sheer drop down a gulley. This involved a climb up a heavily vegetated and only marginally off-vertical face in the 'severe' kind of vicinity (specially given our hiking boots and no protection), and then we had to wait with him and his father who was stuck 80 feet higher up from us to make sure both of them kept where they were during the two or so hours it took for a mountain rescue team to reach the lad and take him and his father off the mountain (MR would have got them out sooner if the helicopter they deployed had been able to approach, but there were well founded fears that given we were in a steep and funnel-like gulley, the down-draft could well have blown us all off). This is hopefully an a-typical scenario in the scrambling world :-| but it did lead to thoughts as to what we could have done with our rope to safeguard my partner, myself and the child during that long wait, if we'd maybe had a few slings, wires and crabs to go with it. My own perch was particularly precarious and I think I'd have appreciated it, but still, we got by without it.

How far this is removed from the general run of things one encounters when scrambling I have no idea but it still gave rise to this speculation on my part about what one should and should not take. A good point by Alyson above about the difference between walkers and climbers in what they would take - most 'walkers' would not have entertained the scenario we got into but would have approached the situation in a different way, but being climbers, our first thoughts were to go to the child who was moving about and in visible distress which might easily have led to his slipping over the edge.

I like the comment made just now by Alasdair about 'Alpinism' too. It really makes me think that as well as actual equipment an proper training, you do also need a wider guiding philosophy under which to approach these activities.

In reply to Andy Morley:

I feel that the real joy of the outdoor experience comes from leaving it all behind.
I like to keep my rock boots with me but the rest of it can stay in the garage.

Interesting perception though: hill walker sees scrambling as rocky walking; rock climber sees scrambling as solo rock climbing....

In reply to Andy Morley:

That made for good reading Andy and well done on dealing with what must have been a pretty nerve wracking episode with father and son.
I've had to help render assistance to a few people over the years (plus one stuck sheep) but fortunately not one involving a terrified child. Depending on who I am scrambling with I may chose to carry a length of confidence rope, a sling, a screw gate crab and at the most 2-3 nuts.
I have never found this a burden as I travel on the fast and light principle with a small sack which is tightly cinchable, so that it can't wobble around.
I admire your confidence in soloing VD/Severe grade stuff. You have more moral fibre than I have and that would stand you in good stead for a trip to the Cuillin, but the other skill to acquire is knowing which rock is more trustable than others. Rock on Tryfan is generally pretty solid, but dont expect the same elsewhere. The Black Cuillin is a pile of choss. Can't think why I keep going back.

In reply to Andy Morley:

Sounds like you did more than alright for your first time in big boots!
Easy scrambling is usually fine without owt but them boots but having a bit more stuff doesn't really weigh you down and it allows you to explore off route which I think is one of the best bits about scrambling. As well as 20m of lightweight rope I take a small screwgate, a HMS and 2 snapgates with a few nuts and a 120 sling on them. Grade 3 stuff/exploring sometimes needs a runner or a belay to make the day more enjoyable. I've rescued 3 stranded walking parties whilst bimbling around on Tryfan.. Cake is definitely obligatory.

In reply to alan moore:


A lot of the conversation between myself and my partner of those two days was about just that. But for me, it was also about rediscovering the half-remembered excursions of my childhood and on the summit, I watched the shapes of the shadows of the clouds on the slopes around the great theatre of that landscape and it felt like rediscovering old friends. It was the thrill of watching and photographing ravens - the last time I had been anywhere like that was when my children were very small and I took two of them up Grassmore and the Rannerdale Beck which, for a week, twice a year when I was their age, from the age of about three until eight or so I would climb every day before breakfast until I got high enough for the 'cark' of those strange birds to send me running down and down back to our old army tent and the smell of the primus stove and the waiting bacon. It was like an amnesiac wakening and discovering the home that he had forgotten he had lost. Apologies for the somewhat purple prose but even the walk down was magical - from the summit it looked a little boring, which I didn't mind after the sheer joyous terror (only a slight exaggeration) of the final crux, but the descent turned into a seemingly never-ending journey through an enchanted landscape (take the p*ss if you want to, I really don't mind ) and every time it looked as if it was about to end, the hint of disappointment that gave rise to disappeared in a fresh vista and the realisation each time that we were still much higher than I'd realised until finally the climax of the experience came right at the bottom with an easy passage through a dramatic cleft in the rock back into the bustling world of multitudes of people at the Lyn Ogwen visitor centre.


On a more prosaic note, I've just had a conversation about that with another of my climbing partners dropped by for a Sunday afternoon cuppa and who happens to be the housemate of the one who came with me on those two days. He says he wears approach shoes for scrambling as a compromise solution, though I'm sure that yesterday's partner would have become very stern had I suggested such an idea and would have said that proper boots were the only thing for such a venture. At one moment on one of the more exposed climbs yesterday I tried to smear into a corner, which my Meindl boots, good though they were, just were not capable of doing and my rather precarious handholds started to readjust themselves in ways that were not entirely under my control. I nearly had one of those moments when one's entire life starts to pass before one's eyes and though fortunately, it didn't quite get that far, I wouldn't have minded rock boots at that point. But then on days out like these it very quickly gets to the stage where bringing more and more different things with you against this and that eventuality would quickly escalate to the point where the whole thing became a chore.


Not having done anything of the sort before under either of those precise names (though I'm no stranger to the things those people actually do), I had seen 'scrambling' as a label that suggested something really rather easy - sort of 'climbing lite' or else a rather climby sort of walking. What I really seem to have discovered is whatever it was that I set looking for when I started all this 'doing it properly' thing, joined a club and all that, and which I suppose is quite simply 'adventure'. It never occured to me though that scrambling was a form of solo rock climbing - thank you for that. I started doing a reasonable amount of soloing this year and thought I was venturing into something darkly irresponsible - scrambling doesn't sound like that at all, but as you suggest, it's all about perceptions.

In reply to Gordon Stainforth:



Many thanks for this, which I've only just read, and for sharing those deeply personal experiences in your blog. This makes me think that for all of us, whether relative novices or experienced mountaineers, our own stories and the personal connections that we make along the way are every bit as important as the skills we have or the equipment we take - in all probability, they are much, much more important.

In reply to Andy Morley:

Sounds like you had a wonderful time. I climb a couple of times a week but still love to scramble. We did a quick hit in NW Scotland last weekend in decent weather. Northern Pinnacles of Liathach approached from the back corries followed by the full ridge traverse W-E. Then the Dubhs ridge on Skye (including the abseil, so a rope was taken). If the bug has bitten these are pretty much the best two outings in the UK for the combination of stunning scenery and sustained scrambling (apart from the Cuillin ridge itself) that can be accomplished in an 8 hour day. For the Dubhs you only have 7 hours before the ferry boat makes its final sailing. It's a proper mission!!

In reply to Andy Morley:

My happiest times in the mountains are big days hiking/scrambling. Basic bivy gear, a little food, hipflask, helmet, all in a 20L sack so you can move unencumbered. Feels like floating over the landscape for 3 days at a time. Bliss

In reply to Andy Morley:


Good effort. If only many who climb at the likes of Stanage had the same revelation. Of course it is each to their own, but I do smile inwardly when I see a new hopeful floundering on the opening moves of a Stanage classic with two sets of nuts, hexes, cams and tri cams in tow + a dozen assorted quick draws slings and spare krabs.

In reply to ByEek:


Lol - this could have been me and three of my friends earlier this year at Stanage:
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10153193808112759&set=a.1015298...

I think we left the tricams behind, but when we did the Gritstone Gallop in June this year (12 routes, 12 crags, 12/15 miles in 12/15 hours) we took pretty much the full Monty. We started out with three routes at the three different parts of Stanage and we just went for it with absolutely everything we had because, to be honest, we didn't have time to think to long and hard about each individual route. This took us to some strange places - me and my partner of the day nearly came to grief bigtime on an alleged VDiff at Burbage South called McLeod's Crack and meanwhile the other team found themselves unexpectedly doing an E1 or E2 or something like that at Lawrencefield through routefinding issues. Even though we had a big incentive to travel light that day, for something like that I don't think we would have done much different.

There's a huge difference between Peak District crags and Welsh mountains methinks. That's why I introduced the philosophical angle, in order to try to find some overarching way to approach questions of this kind. It would be very a very interesting exercise to try to do the GG only in hiking boots, with maybe the odd sling and a small rope. I may make that suggestion for next year, but what puts me off in all honesty is the thought of trying to climb gritstone in Vibram-soled hiking boots. I'm sure that it must have been done, but not convinced that I'm the one to emulate such a feat! Maybe one of the people who posted above could help me out here as I believe that the Gallop started as a training exercise for Alpine adventures involving Joe Brown & Co, or something like that. What would those guys have taken with them I wonder?

In reply to Andy Morley:

Nice story. I think the minimum gritstone climbing kit is climbing shoes... followed by chalk bag (chalk is optional but the psychological benefit of a chalk bag for me is huge) followed by an old toothbrush (to fit in with the beenie boys). If you are going to rope up, one of everything is usually sufficient. So rocks 1 - 10 followed by say 4 friends from 1 - 3ish. About 6 quick draws and you are done.

That said, I got caught out in Wales with my grit mentality. Turns out that 40m pitches require more than 6 quick draws!

In reply to Ann S: You can pretty much be sure he was not climbing VD to S stuff... it just felt like that. In a similar mode if you think the Black Cuillin is a pile of choss you just haven't experienced proper choss yet.

In reply to Andy Morley:
Macleods Crack is HVD 4a I think for a start that is a bit bold and slippery... hardly a major sandbag. Despite the friendlier grading on Ogwen classics, away from the crowds things can be tough: I did two routes on Tryfan east face yesteday that were given VD and D and I'd give then solid S 4a and borderline VD/HVD 3c. An old favorite (a common approach to Soapgut) I'd give HS 4b for the dangerous polished start: https://www.ukclimbing.com/logbook/c.php?i=5731

In reply to Offwidth:


Lol -
youtube.com/watch?v=iEIApUNVBKg&

In reply to adi bryant:


Sounds good to me. I might just try a day out at one of my usual venues with just what you've listed and see where it gets me. Do you ever take a harness? I hear you can get lightweight ones that fold down pretty small. I also came across this link:

http://www.ukclimbing.com/gear/review.php?id=3867

In reply to angry pirate:




I dont see with whats wrong with shorts and t-shirt.

It depends on the situation. If leading take more but you'll get the same training benefit. It just depends how hard you work.

In reply to Ann S:


If I'm really very honest, I actually quite enjoyed the experience. If you have to spend a couple of hours jollying along an 11-year-old while he waits to be rescued, you soon get back into 11-year-old mode yourself. And let's face it, how many of us at that age didn't harbour the urge to be able to dial 999 and then be around to watch it happen? Some very bad children even set fire to their schools for just those reasons. Having a perfectly legitimate justification to be in the middle of it all gratified the small boy who lurks within me no end. And we managed to convince the kid who was the object of these helicopters hovering overhead and liaison calls to emergency services that he was having a pretty spiffing adventure without too much difficulty. Sure, he cried a bit when they abseiled him down the gully but really, I think he stands far more chance of growing up healthy and balanced than the over-protected offspring of some of my (non-climbing) friends. The only person who really did suffer I suspect was the child's father who was sitting up above us unable to do anything. I would not have liked to have been in his shoes when he had to tell the boy's mother how their son came to be plastered all over the Daily Post etc:
http://www.dailypost.co.uk/news/north-wales-news/boy-11-dad-rescued-tryfan-...


This is very similar to Adi Bryant's list. I think I may adopt something like it and try how it feels out in the field. So I would ask you the same question as I asked him: do you ever take a harness of any kind?


It's all down to practice. Looking back at my UKC logbook, I see that I have soloed a whole bunch of severes at Windgather this year, another bunch of them on the Gower, a few in the Diff range at Castle Naze and the odd few at various grades at the Roaches. It's no accident that I did most of those in company with the same climbing partner who I was with during Friday's episode. I think it's a lot about understanding your own strengths and weaknesses in the context of what you're looking at, but having someone you trust alongside you adds hugely to your confidence. Oddly, I often find severes easier to climb than VDiffs, and that I seem to get more scared when climbing with ropes than when soloing.


Some of the stuff up on Y Garn was pretty scary, but then the guidebook did warn us about the 'huge fallen blocks'. In the longest section towards the top,we each found our own way through those blocks and made a point of testing each piece and each hold first. I've done far scarier things in my misspent youth when I worked in the building trade in my gap year and as an unemployed graduate, before the days of 'elf'n'safety.

In reply to Offwidth:

Happy to glory in my status of choss dodger in chief. When I read those bits in the guidebook that say "this route has a gorgeous coating of bat guano, luminous lichen and has the same attachment to its crag that Bashar Assad has to his own people," I tend to remember that I have a broderie anglaise class to attend. I have an inexplicable desire to climb rock that will still be there in 15 million years, in case I get cryogenically preserved and ever want to come back for a rematch.

In reply to Andy Morley:

"This is very similar to Adi Bryant's list. I think I may adopt something like it and try how it feels out in the field. So I would ask you the same question as I asked him: do you ever take a harness of any kind?"

When scrambling I only ever take a harness when heading for the Cuillin. It is not my usual rock climbing harness which would be too bulky; I always use a BD Alpine Bod, which is a nappy style with no belay loop and folds away like a pocket handkerchief. Mine does require a maillon to link waist and leg loops together and as we all know maillons weigh the same as a small Ferguson tractor but you should still be able to get some with a proper belay loop. For non Cuillin scrambling the rope tends to be there in case of problems occurring with other people. If you are going to adopt this minimal short rope and bits of gear tactic then make sure you know how to do an Italian hitch aka Munter hitch for direct belaying. When scrambling anywhere I wear a pair of ancient Walsh Raids fell running shoes, but take rock boots on the Cuillin if climbing a graded route.

I spent a day seconding at Castle Naze and got the distinct impression that the crag was trying to eat me.

Your right about the dad. If I were him I'd be on a slow boat to Guatemala by now from where I would ask for a paternity test to prove I wasn't his dad anyway.

In reply to Andy Morley: I'm not sure where this fits in your scheme of things but there's a lot of core skills which probably aren't much taught nowadays, e.g. direct tie with a rope, using natural spikes as runners and the use of alpine or waist belays. Familiarity with those means that you can just take a rope and absolutely no other gear and still be immeasurably better off in a slightly sticky situation than you would be without.

In reply to Rob Exile Ward:


I like this. I'm beginning to suspect that I must be a closet gear freak who is developing a subliminal leaning towards minimalism. I'm going to lock myself in a room so no-one can disturb me while I practice Munter hitches

In reply to Roadrunner5:

I agree. It was t shirt weather all day. I think it was more that I hadn't been out in a while (all kinds of riddled with arthritis of late) so was thinking a bit too belt and braces about the whole experience. Plus it was chilly when I got up
With hindsight, I'd leave it all in the car bar a windproof, water and some snacky treats.
I think I'm so used to sitting on hilltops for hours on end waiting on D of E groups I tend to pack warm. It's a hard habit to get out of but I'll hopefully have it out of my system before winter.

In reply to Andy Morley:

Practicing the Munter is time well spent and soon enough youll be able to do it blindfold with boxing gloves on. Check out the wonderful collection of Mike Barter YouTube videos.

youtube.com/watch?v=IRYkca9xEjc&

In reply to Andy Morley:

Yup. Taking up fell running and mountain marathons coming from a hill walking background! Amazing how little you need.

In reply to Ann S:

I have to admire you... an avid scrambler who avoids choss at all costs (I always found it hard to avoid... partly why I moved into climbing on better rock) and is taken with the munter hitch (a rope twisting belay or rap technique I tend to leave for emergency use) . I guess life is great partly as it takes all sorts.

In reply to Offwidth:

Yup. I do waist belays as well, but only when I'm wearing my lederhosen.

In reply to Ann S:


It's a great crag, but I know what you mean. There's a route there called 'The Niche' that really almost did eat me. Once I got my head stuck inside that eponymous aperture, It didn't seem to want to come out. That one would definitely have been easier to have soloed as it was placing the gear that was the scariest bit.

Here's some pics of one of the 2 VDiffs and 1 Diff I did there which are really fun to climb.
https://www.facebook.com/Andy.c.Morley/media_set?set=a.10152852929952759.10...
I took some similar photos of my partner of the day soloing 'The Scoop' (HVS I seem to remember) which I really must put online as they're fantastic. I was staying in the Pinnacle club hut a few weeks later when I saw on the kitchen wall a sepia photo of some young woman, barefoot if memory serves, back in the dawn of time and thought 'that looks familiar'. It was the same route.

In reply to Ann S:

Interesting image ! Trad abseils??

In reply to Andy Morley:


Brrrrrrr. Brings back frightening memories. Definitely the most pumped/scared I've ever been on a Severe.

In reply to Andy Morley:

Can't seem to bring up the piccies Andy but I'm pretty rubbish with Facebook.
It would be interesting to know if the female climber whose photo you saw was Angela Soper.

In reply to Offwidth:

Not till I get my Rhino hide full body suit for Christmas.

In reply to BnB:


There were a couple there at Castle Naze in a similar vein I seem to remember. The most scary but also the most fun so far for me this year on gritstone has to be Gargoyle Flake at Bamford. I seconded that one, but the guy who led it who's 28, has the physique everyone here dreams of and a similar spirit to his Polish countrymen who flew planes here in WW2 took a good 10 minutes over the niche just before the flake itself, and fair play to him!

In reply to Ann S:


Shame about that - I tried to load them to UKC but failed. They're a sequence and they work about like those old 'what the butler saw' flick-books, if you run through them they work almost like a movie. According to Facebook, anyone should be able to see them. They're a testament to the climbing skills and photography of the guy I was climbing with that day who solo'd alongside me a little way off to take the pictures. I'm annoyed I didn't make a more careful note but I _think_ the route was Central Tower. Some really great routes there in that VDiff range, a real joy to climb.


The name sounds familiar but there are lots of similar pictures of girls in berets and knickerbockers doing scary stuff long, long ago, hung around the walls of that hut. You should join if you have the inclination, if only to go see their hut.

In reply to BnB:



Unless you camp by Coruisk for a week in the constant, constant rain, grabbing the last day's marginal weather to do them

This thread was started in the OFF BELAY forum and has now been moved.
Please could you try and post in the correct forum, it makes life easier for both users and moderators.

Climbing Gear
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In reply to Andy Morley:

I greatly enjoy moving together on easier stuff (Bosi Ridge, East Face of Tryfan routes). You need a bit more gear (harness, screwgates, belay plate handy, a few nuts and smaller cams) but its not too heavy and you get some degree of safety (sort of). Plus you get to try all the fun things - why build a belay and clip into it when you can just wrap your seconds rope around this spike? Why put gear in when you can just be the other side of the ridge? etc...

Finally, another noteworthy exciting thread. Like!

In reply to andrewmcleod:
...or why deal with the faff and extra weight when you are effectively soloing. Moving together for a whole route is useful occasionally for practice but it's really what you do on an easy section of a harder climb to save time. Most people I've seen doing it on Tryfan frankly look unsafe (and yes I've enjoyed blasting up routes there alpine style and solo).

The east face makes me wince at times even though I love the climbs: lots of bad practice and wrong targets. I've watched people moaning about my mate Pete who is often seen there politely soloing; not realising he is probably the most experienced climber on the face. Yet at other times you see the queues on GA clearly leading to benightment (when escape or alternate VD exits are possible off left from the base of The Knights Move Slab) and so many happy to lead over each others ropes (like the two pairs on the start of Pinnacle Rib Route on Sunday).

In reply to Andy Morley:

Funnily enough I seconded Gargoyle Flake myself only this Sunday. It was a toss-up who would lead Wrinkled Wall and who'd get the Flake. I'm glad I ended up with the joyous traverse. That niche is an intimidating and off-balance enclave and it's only when you climb the route that you realise the main event is in the middle and, after overcoming that, the much photographed top-out is a bit of a blur. Funnily enough, the move up the flake turns out to be easy but the stance below is proper worrying.

In reply to BnB:

... it's fun intimidating but not adjectvally intimidating (like: 'it goes where!!???' intimidating) I still think its easy for a VS.

In reply to Siward:


Poor chap. Speaking as a (semi) local, Coruisk is not a place to camp for a prolonged period unless you have enormous good fortune. Even Sligachan a few miles away is about twice as dry and its peaks far less prone to clag.

Better stay on Skye in dry comfort and then pick your nights to camp out in the wilderness.

In reply to Offwidth:

The route is certainly obvious. The discomfort is all in the gear placement and removal. My mate was so gripped he nailed a wire in so deep it took me ten minutes to remove. By then I'd had enough of leaning backwards

In reply to Offwidth:


It's definitely safer than soloing (at least some of the time), otherwise nobody would bother doing it There are times it is totally safe, there are times it just means you will probably both die instead of just one of you, there are times it just means a 30m fall instead of a 300m fall; its as safe as you make it - but you can tailor the safety to the situation (sometimes).

For me I wouldn't move together on anything I wouldn't be comfortable soloing (I don't want to get a false sense of security from moving together), but soloing is not a road I want to start going down (personal choice).

But I understand what you mean and mostly don't disagree. Certainly when I have to shout at my impatient second... :P

In reply to andrewmcleod:

Is it safer? The liklihood of a slip is less in experienced soloing (less weight, better focus) and the consequencies of an alpine style slip on the ledgy terrain of the east face are not so great, with there often being things to hit.

In reply to Andy Morley:

I may well consider joining PC when my family circumstances change, but at the moment I am tied up with carer duties, which is why I enjoy chatting with enthusiasts who can still get out there. However I will be off to Skye again next May come hell or high water, even if I just sit in a bunkhouse for a week and watch the rain piss down.

In reply to Offwidth:


Without risk compensation, it is clearly safer most of the time (if you have any solid gear on the rope) - you might still die hitting a ledge etc, but equally you might just bounce a bit...

With risk compensation (I've got a rope so I'm safer)? Depends exactly how you treat it -as you say the risks are a lot more obvious if you are soloing. I'm not convinced the weight thing makes that much difference. You are likely to be wearing a backpack anyway on Tryfan, with the advantage that if you have a rope you can haul it past any particularly irritating chimneys!

That said don't a large fraction of fatal accidents happen on 'easy' ground, often while unroped? That (and the fact that it doesn't scare me have as much as it probably should) is the personal reason I avoid soloing, and prefer moving together. I am reasonably good at saying 'this is easy but what's the point of bringing all this crap up here if I'm not going to protect it properly just in case, so put some gear in'.

In reply to andrewmcleod:

Again you spout nonsense: why are you likely wearing a backpack? I almost never do and certainly wouldn't when soloing. It's ten minutes back down Little Gully so why not leave the sack at the base of the climbs unless you are heading over to another mountain? I can see why you might want a tiny sack or to clip a carry bag to your harness with a windproof and some thermal kit (and maybe a water bottle or approach shoes if pitching) but the commonly viewed 40 litre bulging rucksack just seems to me to be adding risk and detracting from the fun of the place.

It is simply not at all clear that moving togather roped is safer. It could be safer either way. The unroped deaths on easy ground you talk about are due to lack of focus and my point is on a direct comparative basis focus is more likely to wander when roped semi-protected soloing (what moving together alpine style effectively is on somewhere like the east face) than soloing. Then you add the hazzard related to the fact the two climbers are moving tied together (if the bottom climber falls, both likely do). If you are going to take gear and protect it properly, then pitch it (unless you are practicing moving together or on an easy section between trickier bits).

In reply to Offwidth:

You are right, I am assuming I am going somewhere else. Most of my moving together has been on enchainment days (Milestone Buttress->Tryfan, Idwal Slabs->Glyder Fawr etc). Otherwise I wouldn't be in a hurry and so would have time to pitch it... but I am just not efficient enough. At some point I have to do Great Gully, which is 13 pitches, and could be a long day (given the ~2 hour walk-in?) without a bit of moving together... PS my backpack is pretty empty after I have taken out the limited climbing gear - I really don't see it adding risk (I have even heard some alpinist claim it made you safer in case you landed on your back!).

If you want to do it quickly though, the only other alternative is soloing - is that what you would recommend instead? Its not a route I want to go down (I know that moving together is not 'safe' either).

PS I have always though of moving together as 10 times safer than soloing but 1000 times less safe than pitching. I have a friend who successfully arrested a fall of one of his friends while moving together in the Alps, but I know there will be plenty of times it has all gone wrong.

In reply to andrewmcleod:



Thanks for that interesting comparison of two points that look as if they might be contradictory but which aren't really, I don't think. This brings us right back to what I saw as the point of the question that I started this thread, which is the way different people see situations completely differently, when apparently the situation is the same for both of them and they're in it together. I could say loads about the significance of all that for people exposing themselves to high-risk environments, but for now I'll cut to the chase as to the paradox just mentioned:

When someone solos a route, seeing it as something a little special - an exception of some kind - they are probably safer than in the normal run of things because most accidents in my experience arise in routine situations when people loose concentration and their attention slips. Doing something out of the ordinary and dangerous focuses the mind. But in anything, if you do it a lot it becomes routine, you're going to have an accident eventually if your routines aren't spot on and if you're not always 100% in everything you do. If you accept that slips are inevitable under that scenario, then doing anything with some kind of safety net is less likely to go wrong.

In reply to BnB:

Ah but it was a long time ago, we were young, and all was well with the world. A great week in retrospect

In reply to Andy Morley:

In terms of perception about scrambling, I wonder if anyone else had a similar experience to mine. I had a very traditional route into the great outdoors starting with hillwalking summer/winter, then scrambling, then climbing summer/winter. When I first started scrambling I took to it like the proverbial duck and never had any heebee Jeebee moments.
After I started climbing and then going back to do some scrambles I had done earlier, I remember having some 'hang about' moments when I thought 'I've done stuff like this with a rope and gear below me.' These thoughts didn't last long but it caused a refocusing on the importance of checking every bloody handhold, whereas on my first scrambling expeditions I had just swarmed up stuff.

In reply to Ann S:

I came from the same background and when I moved into climbing I thought it was a lot safer, on better rock, but a bit obsessed with risk reduction trivia (like locking crabs on belays pieces).

In reply to Offwidth:

What -you use locking crabs! I use safety pins on mine.
Closed of course

In reply to Andy Morley:

I'm going to go all Zen* on you!!!

You don't need what you want but, you want what you need.

Sort that out and you'll have about the right amount of gear.


*It could be something else but I probably can't spell it.

In reply to Bob:


OK, let's see if your formula works?

So I don't need what I want you say... What do I want? I want adventure, which I got in abundant measure during the two days that inspired all my thoughts and questions above. Do I need it? Strictly speaking, no I don't but life would be dull without it. As for wanting what I need, that's almost a tautology but given that during the course of our adventures, lesser needs occur all the time en route, I am certainly motivated towards addressing those needs, so yes, I want them, and tools (gear) are a part of that process.

I'm not quite sure where that gets me, but as I said, last weekend, I got all the adventures I could possibly have wanted and more besides. As to gear, I was adequately clothed and provisioned, but no more so than for a 12-mile lowland walk and the most valuable piece of equipment was my Canon Ixus digital camera because in a confusing and sometimes ambiguous mountain environment, it enabled me to zoom in on distant objects and then examine them on the screen, benefiting from both the telephoto lens's zoom capacity and however many megapixels in capturing the data in conjunction with the display's zoom function which together allowed two of us to see things in detail that weren't available to the naked eye.

Mobile phones also allowed us to communicate effectively, which is obviously of prime importance on the hill. Traditionalists will tut and do hand-wringing exercises (great for improving one's physical grip though not the mental one) but those two items were of far more use than any amount of slings and carabiners.

However, future adventures will be different and there, slings and carabiners might come in useful so I shall digest people's comments above. The philosophy is more important though, particularly that of the Ancient Greeks; stories such as Daedalus and Icarus and concepts such as 'hubris'. Looking back at some of the more significant of the challenges of last weekend, I think I can say that my climbing/ scrambling partner and I made a series of decisions in a range of circumstances, which could have gone either way, but on both those two days I'll stick my neck out and say that we got them right. Far from being a source of pride though, it's a cause for self-examination as it's quite scary to think what the consequences could have been if we'd made the wrong choices. We could so easily have done that, so it's always a bit of a 'phew'. But it's also good to look back and pick these things over for precisely those sorts of reasons.