UKC

Rockfax Announce New Book to North Wales

© UKC Gear
The front cover of the North Wales Rockfax  © Rockfax

Rockfax is really pleased to announce an exciting new guidebook - North Wales Climbs is being written by UKC Editor Jack Geldard, North Wales stalwart Mark Reeves and long term Rockfax author Mark Glaister, and it is due for publication this Autumn.

The book is being modelled on the very popular West Country Climbs with the intention being to cover all the major crags in the area from the Ormes, through the mountains and on to Gogarth. You can read more detail about what the book covers on the book page here.

Progress has been amazing over the last couple of months with the team able to take advantage of some surprisingly good weather windows. On a glorious Saturday a group of us got up early to trek up to the Cromlech in morning light and capture the cover photograph of Alexandra Schweikart on Left Wall - photo below.

Below are three example pages from the finished book.

Your Feedback

Since there are so many of us with warm memories about climbing in North Wales, it is a great time to give your feedback on grades, stars and general route comments. The book page here has links to most of the crags being included in the guide so, let us know what you think before the book goes to press.

As is normally the case with the selected Rockfax guidebooks, the choice of what to included is based as much on the crag it is on as the route itself. If we include a crag then we tend to include a good selection of routes on that crag.

Crags included

(Links take you to the correct part of the Rockfax Route Database where you can vote on grades, star ratings and add comments before the guidebook is published. Note: the list of routes in the database doesn't correspond exactly to the content of the new guidebook since some of it dates from earlier guidebooks. This is particularly the case on North Wales Limestone).

Slate Quarries - Bus Stop, Dali's Hole, California, Australia, Serengeti, Twll Mawr, Rainbow Slab, Vivian Quarry

Llanberis Pass - Craig Ddu, Clogwyn y GrochanCarreg Wastad, Dinas Cromlech, Scimitar Ridge, Clogwyn Gafr, Dinas Mot, Clogwyn y DdysglCyrn Las, Cwm Glas Bach

Clogwyn Du'r Arddu

Lliwedd and Gwynant - LliweddClogwyn y Wenallt, Clogwyn y Bustach

Ogwen - Tryfan, Glyder Fach, Gribin Facet, Cwm Cneifion, Cwm IdwalBraich Ty DuCarnedd y Filiast

CarneddauCraig LloerCarreg MianogCraig yr YsfaCraig yr Ogof

Tremadog - Craig y Gesail, Craig y Castell, Pant Ifan, Bwlch y Moch, Carreg Hyll Drem, Craig yr Ogof (Cwm Silyn)

Betws y Coed and the Moelwyns - Clogwyn yr Oen, Craig y Wrysgan, Craig y Clipau, Craig y Tonnau, Carreg AlltremClogwyn Cyrau

Gogarth - North Stack, Main Cliff, South Stack, Holyhead Mountain, Rhoscolyn

Ormes - Upper Pen TrwynLower Pen TrwynCastell y GwyntCraig y DonThe DiamondCastle Inn Quarry, Penmaen Head

Mid-Wales


For more information www.rockfax.com



5 Jun, 2013
Exciting to see, but not sure what the USP is over NW Rock with almost identical crag coverage. If you had NWR, would you need the Rockfax unless you simply liked owning duplicate books for the photos and the tickage (which I do!) My other thought is that this guidebook will be stashed down the jumper a lot due to the high number of multipitch crags and seacliffs covered. I find the W Country Rockfax a bit thick for that purpose. Bigger is not necessarily better. Oh, and one final thought. W Country Climbs is excellent but its major flaw was the coverage of Swanage/Portland (duplicated in Dorset RF) and Lundy (complete waste of space) adding to the thickness. I hope that including redundant pages for the sake of it is not policy.
5 Jun, 2013
Eh??? jcm
5 Jun, 2013
IIRC the Lundy section more or less spends a few pages saying "go to Lundy, it's great, but you'll want to buy a proper guidebook before you go there." I generally agree with Owen's point, anyway: it's good news and I'm looking forward to seeing what they come up with, but I'm hoping that they've managed to find a way of differentiating it from the Ground Up guide...
5 Jun, 2013
The size of the latest Rockfax books is something we are aware of. Our intention this time is to release the book at the same time as an App version (for iOS and Android). We haven't decided yet how we are going to sell the app version but it may well be that we can link it to book purchases some how. The reason we included the Lundy section in WCC was to alert people to the area. Virtually everyone goes there for a week and we couldn't give a week's worth of climbing so we just thought we'd highlight it and point people at the CC guide. I don't see that the Dorset section is a waste of space for people who don't own the Dorset Rockfax. It does what selected guidebooks do, points new or occasional visitors at the best crags and lines. The new Rockfax will of course have some overlap of coverage although we are including different routes and crags including some easier venues and Mid-Wales, but no Llyen. Additionally we use larger photo-topos and the style of the guides is different I think. North Wales is a big area though and I am sure it can support both guides if both are available at the same time. Our Classics book has sold well since 2010 so we do know what the market wants. Alan
5 Jun, 2013
Nice cover shot. i remember those moves very well!
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