UKC

Hi folks, 

Had a fun if midge-infested day on the Etive Slabs last week climbing Hammer. Great route! Some words and pictures here for those interested:

http://mistymountainhop.net/nailed-by-midges-on-hammer-etive-slabs/

Hope you enjoy!

Dave

That brought back memories of a sunny day back in the mid 1980s, luckily for us the traverse was dry & the midges held off until we were descending back to our rucksacks.

Great stuff! Was surprised just how hard that traverse was!

Excellent, that brought back vivid memories of my only trip there, late eighties.  We did Hammer and i took my second ever fall just after the scoop.  Went off route, i think, was still serving my apprenticeship in slab climbing.

Got back down to find everyone else leaving.  Brilliant, we thought, got the place to ourselves.  Such niaivety!  Well, we got half way up Spartan before they descended on us.  There was Dave, half way up a pitch with no gear and me, writhing around on the belay while wiping the b*****s off my neck.  My hand had turned black.  Put me off Scotland for years.

On the plus side, we discovered that if you drive at high speed down Glen Etive with the sunroof open, the wind seems to suck the little b******s straight out through the hole!

I do quite fancy going back to Etive (the Pinch Direct looks brilliant).  Just not in June....

Looking forward to reading this (I think the UKC traffic has melted your server!). 

Climbed The Pause last week and was blown away – both by the crag and the quality of the route.

Luckily the midge didn't bother us until the belay before the last pitch. How were the ticks? We stopped counting after brushing 30+ off our legs / waists / arms on the approach... 

Thanks Dave, glad you enjoyed the write up and it brought back the memories! Good effort taking a fall after the scoop - presume you had found some gear by that point?! Spartan is a classic too, I think better than Hammer actually and about the same difficulty excluding the Hammer crux (which is unfortunately much harder than anything else on that route). Bloody midges, they know how to spoil a grand day out! 

Server is serving away merrily now, most likely random internet dropout in my street rather than traffic.

The Pause is another level IMHO compared to Hammer. Really enjoyed Hammer but The Pause has to be on the short list for the best E1 in Scotland. That's good about the midges and a shame about the ticks. We brushed plenty off including some adult whoppers which were horrendous. Last year when we did Pause the ticks seemed to be even worse than this year. 

My God, you can see the midges in the photo.

Agreed...

Hammer is nice and consistent if you do it in the style of the FA

It's years since I've been there. Is there a lot of bracken or something for the ticks to spring from?

Good write up. I enjoyed Hammer. I found the Scoop pitch pretty tricky but that Traverse is super tough. I was glad not to be leading it!

I enjoyed that write-up, thanks. Good pics too.

Great route, quite different to the other slabs routes in that I thought it more a corner climb with slab sections rather than a pure slab climb. It's notably steeper than the main sweep too. I did it late 1980s, I definitely got the start wrong as it was desperate. The Scoop was steady and the traverse, which I seconded, was tight rope time.

I might be mixing this up with another route but was there a rockfall from above the traverse during the 80s? I have vague a memory of some paler and cleaner rock which had much better friction near the top of the route. Could be wrong or confusing it with a different route though.

Brings back memories. Our hazzard in March, a couple of decades back, was an unexpected localised blizzard. While the sun was out I was manipulated into leading the scoop, which I felt was quite easy for HVS and overegged in reputation. My partner did the traverse lead and not unreasonably panicked a bit when the snow suddenly started, soon after the traverse crux, and climbed too far past the belay, so was slow setting up, and we couldn't communicate (we traversed much lower than you... just below your last gear in the corner, partly to cut the risk of a leader slip).  Eventually I gulped and set off and nearly made the traverse seconding in the settling snow, with scary levels of slack, but popped off the last move before better holds.  I slid, caught something, span, and fell a good distance (7m?) and got my first ever Etive kiss and hurt my elbow, then got back on and finished the pitch on adrenaline. I also sprinted the lead of the last section leaving red on the snow and my clothing.

The Pause is even better and a full grade harder adjectivally. No epic or accident on that but it was a really brilliant test of boldness above the overlaps and a safe technical crux traverse underneath them.