UKC

After a day at harborough rocks today me and my other half decieded to look at black rocks.

I climbed there about 30 years ago.

The right hand side was good and in good condition but

walked along the length right to left.

lean mans climb starting flake/overgrown green

in fact everything left from meshuga.promentory was awfull.the queens parlour area more like a vertigal garden.is it just me or does no one climb here anymore or is it a fashion thing.

Me too. Never took to the place.

Nope. I live maybe 10 minutes away and never climbed there. Bar a few famous routes it’s not very good.

Agreed, not much of it is very appealing, but Lean Man's Superdirect (VS 5a) is one of the very best VSs on gritstone.

It's generally steep, rounded and brutal, much like Almscliff or Hen Cloud so not everyone's cup of tea.

Unlike those crags it's also green and prone to getting overgrown, more so nowadays with our cleaner air. Again, climbers nowadays (me included I hasten to add) are less inclined to spend time cleaning routes, so overgrown crags are tending to become more overgrown.

I climbed a lot there when I worked in Matlock. Many of the lower grade routes up to and including VS are superb when in condition. But I never climbed harder than VS there even when regularly leading low E grades elsewhere because it was too intimidating and physical for me.

When I lived in Nottingham 1978-86, Black Rocks was one of our regular crags to call by on our way into and out of the Peak. At that time, as I’m sure lots of others here will agree, it was always pretty green over on the left side after a wet Spring, but cleaned up well. There were always other teams there, and Queens Parlour Slab area was clean without vegetation. There were regularly youths throwing stuff off the Promontory, lighting fires etc. but it didn’t seem to dim our enthusiasm for the place.

As a novice, I got taken up Birch Tree Wall in my trainers, seconded, then eventually led climbs which stick out in my mind even now, esp. Rope Trick and Firebird on the Promontory, and some stuff on The Block. I guess it’s maybe got a style which is less friendly and more committing than other grit edges and has fallen out of fashion. I guess that must have affected me also, never climbing there again even though we subsequently lived in the Peak. Same applies to Chatsworth.

After a couple of years away, we’ve bought a house near Shining Cliff and are moving back to the Peak, so Black Rocks is a local crag. We will be going there, but for the bouldering circuits which have developed in recent years. I guess these changes in activity also contribute to crags becoming less used.

Curious to condemn without experience.

I've always been fond of the place, characterful and uncompromising.

Demon Rib, Promontory Traverse, Birch Tree Wall routes all worth doing. Two world class offerings to admire.

Golden Days is a great highball, Bancroft 5b when I first did it.

I have very fond memories of the routes at Black Rocks. They seem to catch people out a little more than other places. I struggled leading the finish to Sand Buttress (VS 4c) and ultimately succeeded, but had to provide the rope of shame to someone else a while later. Lone Tree Groove (VS 5a) yielded to my mate doing backstroke up it. Stonnis Arête (S 4a) is fabulously undignified taken “a cheval” and Stonnis Crack (VS 4b) felt like a tough jamming test for the grade. 

Nice to see Stonnis Crack at VS now. It felt like the hardest Severe in the world when I did it

Agreed! I was friends with a pair of brothers from Matlock Bath in the early 70's, one of them never climbed again after soloing Stonnis Crack in his brand-new RD's (the original non-sticky climbing shoes).

Interesting one, climbed there a couple of times but never really warmed to it. Big ugly challenging routes. I reckon if you embrace that there’s some outstanding adventures to be had. I’m probably more likely to go back for the bouldering, confirmed coward that I am.

Mike Cheque’s film Stonnis was an outstanding love letter to the place, showing what most of are clearly missing out on. Doesn’t seem to be available right now but recommended if it ever reappears.

Ah, I hadn’t spotted that it had gone up to VS. My battered old copy of On Peak Rock has it at Severe and says “..a terror route from the turn of the century”.

Sad to hear - a terrific crag although somehow has one or two small psychological barriers, as others have said.

Stonnis Crack VS! Good Lord. Funny how all jamming routes eventually get upgraded.

How many pre-1900 VSs were there, I wonder.? Though SC is just after that, I think.

jcm

I wasn't aware of that film but I'm watching it just now thanks. Here's the link  vimeo.com/131717281

Whatever you grade the awkward Stonnis Crack (S) at Cromford, it was still a remarkable climb by Puttrell in 1900, because it’s so pure and has to be climbed by jamming techniques. 

Me too. I started climbing when I was 12. I lived in the East Midlands, and Black Rocks, along with Willersley, Wildcat and High Tor, were quiet easily accessible by train. I have very fond memories of Black rocks: Lone Tree Grove was my first VS lead (it had a lump of limestone jammed in the crack - on the crux - in those days) Demon Rib was my first extreme, and yes, like everyone else, I had a fight on Sonnis Crack. And don’t forget Railway slab; in fact I bouldered at Black rocks long before bouldering was fashionable. And there was two brothers - I think they were called Bolger or something similar - who were real specialists there. Also, there was a wonderful cafe down in Cromford (on the A6), where the heavily buttered white toast was the only thing we could afford. No, Black Rocks was a special place back in the late 1970s. 

The stuff that is left of Gaia is pretty north-facing, so it gets green. The routes on Birch tree wall are great, but generally tough at the grade, I think. Demon Rib is very mean. 

I've also thought that people wandering around chucking stuff off the top is a bit off-putting too 

Unit has no foreskin is one of the many quixotic scribblings on the rocks there.  Long shall we meditate on its hidden meanings

Ah thanks, better search skills than me!

One of those Bolgers would be my old mate Terry with whom I had some great climbing adventures, and even more playing music with him and a bunch of musicians from the Nottingham Climbing Club around Peak District pubs when it was too wet to climb

Amazing, that’s great to hear. We used to doss in the bandstand, in Matlock Bath, because we’d read (in Crags, I think) that’s what our hero’s Allen and Bancroft did. Wildcat was night-lit during the ‘illuminations’, and it looked very pretty. Seems a longtime ago

We used to doss on that bandstand too, it was only a relatively short stagger from the County and Station pub. It was a long time ago.

I don't think this is particularly unique. I was at Ramshaw two weekends back and we all commented how green and often not-very-climbed-feeling and from memory all the routes I did had at least one star and none were harder than VS. 

It is an intimidating place and not in the modern idiom, but we used to go there a lot back in the day. I think this change in attitudes and preferred styles is clearly reflected in Demon Rib being upgraded from E2 to E4, good but it’s not world class, in my opinion. For sheer brutality in a currently unfashionable style, try Fun Traverse; it’s anything but.

Modern idiom? The bold (old E2 sandbag) arete finish to Demon Rib was the main reason for the upgrade in the 1996 definitive guide. I'd add Harding didn't do that bit on his 'FA'.

Stonnis Crack isn't quite VS imho and it can be climbed without jamming at the same approximate difficulty. Logbook votes show it just on the HS side of the  HS /VS border so I'm not sure why it's been upgraded by Rockfax.

Stonnis is a brilliant climbing film whatever grade one climbs... anyone who hasn't watched it should go to the link above and do so immediately.

I knew Harding hadn’t done it, just like  Nutcracker art Cratcliffe. Nat Allen told me about these issues and when in conversation with Harding I raised these misgivings and he was quite evasive. By the way I never queried Demon Rib at E2 and put it in my diary as a pleasant route and by contrast what about Great Slab at E3 if DR is E4?

Jusr watched, per instruction. Excellent, thanks for the encouragement.

Meshuga looks easier than Stonnis Crack, however...

Lol

Epic quality is a matter of skill set needed vs climber skills on route undertaken.

Great Slab's moves are slightly more serious but the similarly bold 5c's on Froggatt are E5. E4 is the right grade in my view, and not a soft one either.  UKC logbook votes do indicate top end E3 (from a lowish number of votes) but the comments from experienced climbers I trust in our BMC guidebook team were (and ditto those on UKC comments are) solid on E4.

I heard the ground eroded below Remon Rib, making the bouldery start harder and a bit higher.

I did the start numerous times, it made a good boulder problem in it's own right. 

And Yuji Hirayama making Golden Days (E3 6b) look about VD.

Great little film.

A great film, never heard of it before, thanks for the link