Lucy Creamer is briefly back in the UK after an incredible sport climbing trip to Spain. Over the winter Lucy has found exceptional form, redpointing two F8b's and on-sighting four F8a's.

Back in December Lucy redpointed Batuka (F8b) in Spain, before heading to France and back to the UK. She quickly realised that Spain was where she wanted to be and made an about-turn, landing back out there in January.

This time her stay in Spain was plagued by bad weather, however Lucy managed to out manoeuvre the storms, switching venues and maintaining her climbing psyche. When the sun finally did shine, she had already racked up a redpoint ascent of Zona Zero (F8b) on El Pati and an on-sight of Siouxie (F7c+) at Campi Qui Puigi.

"I realised that I was still climbing well" she said, initially unsure of her form after a lay-off back in the UK over Christmas time.

The weather stayed poor, but next up was a visit to Monsant and an on-sight of Monocroma (F8a). Commenting on the route, Lucy said:

"It has a pretty powerful F7c+ start, then another 20 metres of pumpy climbing with some tricky bits thrown in. I was very chuffed with myself to onsight this route as I knew I'd climbed well and there had been some tough sections that I'd got through. This was the start of a good onsighting period for me, where I did 3 more F8a's and quite a few F7c/F7c+'s."

Several more crags and F8a onsights followed, (full details on Lucy's Blog) and then a sunny spell coincided with a trip to Margalef, Lucy's "favourite place of the moment", where she had a quick look at a F8c at Espadelles:

"It was a good experience, as I had never tried one before. A fantastic route up at Espadelles but it felt very hard. I am way off it but it was good to see what it felt like. It's a long route with nothing desperate (all relative of course) but just so sustained. I would have to be so much stronger to contemplate doing this route, as most of the moves were big powerful locks (not my style) and some of the moves I couldn't even do...food for thought."

After a brief stay in the UK, Lucy is heading straight back out to Spain, with a specific project in mind:

"It was all coming together apart from the dream of redpointing an F8b+, will it ever happen? I know I'm capable but it's just getting on the thing. I'm hoping that after this short trip back to the UK that the weather will still be ok and I'll finally be able to put some time in at El Pati on Kalea Borroka (F8b+), we will see. The one good thing about this route, apart from being totally amazing is that it is in the shade so if the weather does stay hot it won't matter and should keep the route dry."

UKC wish Lucy the best of luck on her next trip to Spain.

Lucy's tick-list (some routes were climbed in Dec, but mainly over the last 4 weeks): 

• 2 x 8b's – Redpoint
• 1 x 8a+ - Redpoint
• 4 x 8a's – On-sight (putting the clips in on 3 of them)
• 4 x 8a's – Redpoint
• 1 x 7c+/8a – On-sight
• 5 x 7c+'s – On-sight
• 5 x 7c – On-sight
• 5 x 7b+ - On-sight 

Lucy Creamer is sponsored by Marmot, Scarpa and Grivel

Extra thanks go to Martin Panton for help with this report and to Tim Glasby for the superb photographs.