Holiday - Bettws, Wales 04.11.16 - 08.11.16

Holiday at Bettws, Wales

Thursday 3rd November

This evening we had a phone call from where we were ment to be staying this weekend to say that the boiler was not working.  They had had someone out all day to try and sort it but with no luck.  Therefore we were unable to stay there.  The owner suggested somewhere else we could get in touch with butthere was no answer when we rang.  I got online and found a little cottage called Hafod at Bettws.  We managed to get a bit of a deal from them as it was such a last minute booking.  Cost a bit more than we had paid at the other place but we just very pleased we managed to find somewhere else to stay in less than 24 hours time!

Friday 4th November

We loaded up the car and we were on our way around 18:00.  It seemed a slow first part of the journey as we had to go via the caving club at Priddy to collect the key for the cave we are wanting to go to.  We got over the toll bridge and then stopped for some dinner.  We rang the place we are staying at to let them know when we were expecting to arrive.  By 22:30 we had found our way up twisty little lanes and found the cottage.  We got unpacked, relaxed for a bit and then headed to bed - we were both shattered.

Saturday 5th November

This morning we eventually decided what we were going to do. We decided to go for a walk.  Tim had found a route up Table Mountain and then on to Pen Cerrig Calch. We packed our rucksacks and drove to Crickhowell to get some lunch.  On the way we drove past the start of the walk to make sure there was somewhere to park.  We found a bakery in Crickhowell, we got a filled roll and a cake for lunch and a pasty for breakfast!  We drove back to the start of the walk and got our walking boots on.  We set off up the hill - Tim had said there was a lot of up, I didn't realise he meant directly up!  It was a very steep route up to table mountain.

We made it to the top and found a cairn and a lovely view.

From the top of Table Mountain we could see the path that led to Pen Cerrig Calch.

Once off Table Mountain the route was much steadier, not for long though - it soon became steep again, particularly this section!

Looking back down the hill we could see how Table Mountain got it's name.

Steadily plodding on it got more windy and much colder as we came over the top of the hill.  We saw the trig-point and had to have the compulsory photo as proof!  Further on we climbed into a cairn for a bit of shelter from the wind.

We set off back down the hill to find a sheltered spot to eat our lunch.  Even from our little shelter we had a lovely view!

Carrying on down the hill it was clear how steep some sections had been on the way up!  We skirted round the side of Table Mountain and we were soon back at the car.

On our way back to Hafod we stopped at Waitrose and did some shopping.  

After a rest and a hot drink to warm up we heard from Phill to say he was about half an hour away.  We rang handbells for a couple of hours and eventually managed to ring a quarter peal of Plain Bob Doubles!

Later on this evening we made ourselves some dinner and relaxed watching TV, looking at photos from the day and writing my blog.

Sunday 6th November
This morning we had a look at the weather and decided we would go climbing.  We knew it would be fairly windy but we hoped we could find a sheltered spot.  We drove up a lot of narrow windy lanes and found the suggested parking area. We easily located the path to the crag.  We got out of the car and realised how freezing the wind was!  We piled on some layers and set off up the hill.  We first came to the Preliminary Walls, further on round we got to the Main Wall.  

We had a look at all of the bolted routes to identify what was what and decided we would start with a route called Jug Fest.  It wasn't really a sheltered spot so we both got very cold.  We walked further round to another route and found we would still be in the wind.  We looked at the time and decided we would abandon the hill and head to Llangorse multi-activity centre ad do some indoor climbing!  

Part of the centre has been made with limestone boulders so it had more of a feel of climbing outside. Unfortunately it was also quite polished in places.  We had a nice afternoon and much warmer than we would have been outside!

Back at the cottage we got changed, warmed up and then had a look online to find a pub to go to this evening.  We ended up in The Dragon in Crickhowell.

This evening we have relaxed and looked at the cave survey to suss out where we want to go tomorrow.

Monday 7th November
This morning we decided where we would visit in Agen Allwedd.  We sorted out an emergency call out and got our kit packed up.  We drove over to Llangattock and parked outside Whitewalls Caving Club.  We set off down the track and walked the 45 mins to the cave entrance.

About 12.30 we unlocked the gate and got out of the cold into the cave.  The entrance section is a mixture of walking, stooping and clambering over bolder obstacles.  The rock is very slippery which makes everything just a bit annoying!  The last last section is a boulder choke - where we went round in circles the last visit to Aggy!  This time we remembered the way through and eventually emerged into Barron's Chamber.  A large chamber that leads into main passage.  From here progress is much quicker!  We located the start of Southern Stream Passage.  A little further on we consulted the description text to check we were in the right place.  We realised we had ended up in the Upper Stream Passage so we back tracked and found a hold in the floor to continue along Stream Passage.  We very quickly found that this passage became annoyingly stoopy and generally irritating!  We got to the point we would have to start crawling and decided that we would call it quits at this point.  We set off back to the entrance with Tim doing some photos on the way.  We got back to the entrance just before 17.00.

We had a good trip.  Though stripping off out of caving clothes to get changed for the drive back to the cottage in temperatures of 2 degrees was not that fun!

Back at the cottage we warmed up, got dinner and cleaned up in the shower!  This evening we are both quite tired so have just had a lazy evening.

Tomorrow is our last day.  We have to be back for a handbell rehearsal and take the Aggy key back to the caving club.  We have decided to set off for the Mendips and have a walk and a pub lunch before completing the journey home.

Tuesday 8th November
This morning we packed up all our stuff and loaded up the car.  We set off in good time and get down to the Mendips around 11.  We parked near the top of Burrington Coombe and took a footpath that went to the top of Beacon Batch - The highest hill in the Mendips.  We had a lovely walk over the top of the hill and then back around the side of the hill.  At the top we took the obligatory trig point photo!  

After the walk we went to the Castle of Comfort pub for lunch.  We decided we didn't fancy cooking when we got home!!  The journey back from the Mendips didn't take too long and we were back with enough time to get he car unpacked and everything sorted out before our handbells rehearsal.  We had a great time away and would definitely return to the area but hopefully to the cottage we booked in the first place!

Holiday - Yorkshire Day 11

Yorkshire Holiday Day 11

Thursday 16th June

Today is our last day in Yorkshire, we are going home tomorrow morning.  We got up to a dry and bright day.  We had packed our climbing kit last night so we could get going this morning.

We set off and went via Inglesport for a cooked breakfast!  We returned to Twisleton Scar and made straight for the main wall.  We climbed the following...

'Christine' Climb the chimney on the right-hand side of the mushroom and finish up the wall above it - Diff.

'Skeleton Scoop' The wide crack-seamed grove can be accessed from either the left (delicate) or the right (strenuous) - HVD

'Bay Wall' - The central line up the back wall of the recess is hardest at the start - VDiff

'Broken White' The wide broken chimney - VDiff

We then headed back to The Candle Area for a last climb.

'Game Reserve' The cracked wall - VDiff

We had been really lucky with the weather and we had great views.

When we got back to the cottage we sorted out our climbing kit ready to pack in the car tomorrow.  We then got showered and headed out The Plough Pub in Wiggleswick for dinner.  This evening we have also had a bit of a tidy up to make tomorrow's packing easier.  It will be a shame to go home as we have had a lovely holiday.  However it will be nice to see Doughnut Bunny!

Holiday - Yorkshire Day 10

Yorkshire Holiday Day 10

Wednesday 15th June

Today we had decided to go caving.  We double checked the weather forecast and it was looking dry till about 17:00.  

We decided to go to Bull Pot.  We didn't have enough rope with us t go down all the pitches so we had decided to do the first 3 which still required us to take just over 100m of rope on the trip!

We got all our kit ready and set off to Kingsdale.  The first task was to find the entrance!  We know it was on the top of the Kingsdale scars so we had to walk a lot of up!  By reading the caving guides we had we had a rough idea on how to get up there.  We drove up the road and when we thought we were in the right place we parked up.  We got everything we needed out of the car and set off up the hill.  After a considerable amount of up we came to a vague track running across the top of the first scar.  We headed right along it and came to a little stream.  From the description in the book the entrance was near to where a stream sinks.  We both started to have a look around for the entrance - we had seen photos of it so knew we would recognise it when we saw it.  I followed the stream downhill and after a short while I found the cave entrance.  

Tim came and joined me and we started to get our harness and SRT kit on.  Tim began rigging the entrance pitch and once he was down the bottom I set off.

At the bottom of the first pitch we scrambled down the rocks and followed the cave passage round to the top of the second pitch.  We started looking for the bolts to start rigging from.  We couldn't see any at a sensible height, only the ones high up in the ceiling.  We followed them back and found that we needed to climb up one wall a bit further back and start rigging a traverse line high up.  Once over the second pitch we abseiled down and swung over to the ledge.  We had decided to go on down Slot Route as it would be safer than Fossil Route if it rained.  Tim rigged it with a re-belay point just less than half way down and abseiled down.  Once he was down I followed.

The bottom of this pitch was as far as we were going to go.  We followed the stream passage to the top of the fourth pitch and then turned round to head back out to the entrance.

Once I had passed the re-belay point I called to Tim so he could start headding up the lower part of the pitch.

At the top I took a few minutes breather before making a start on the next.  I was a little way up when Tim emerged at the top of the previous pitch.  He un-rigged and packed the rope away while I was ascending.

Once I was at the top he was able to start climbing up.

Back across the traverse un-rigging as we went we were at the bottom of the entrance pitch again.  It is always a nice feeling to be nearly back at the surface!

This time Tim lead the way out and I followed.  We then had the job of the final bit of un-rigging and packing all the rope away and the walk back down the hill.

It was a good trip.

Holiday - Yorkshire Day 9

Yorkshire Holiday Day 9

Tuesday 14th June

Today we had decided to go to Bolton and go on the steam railway.  The weather had been saying it would rain today but this morning it was bright and dry!  We made ourselves a packed lunch and set off to Bolton.  When we arrived at the station the train was already there.  

The train went to Embsay ad came back 20 mins later after the train had changed ends.

From there we drove to Bolton Abbey thinking it would be a nice place to sit and have lunch as it was still dry.  We got there and thought £8 to sit and have lunch was a bit steep so we drove on!

Further down the road we found a picnic spot near the National Park Centre in Grassington.  We found a midge free bench and ate our lunch.  Afterwards we had a walk into the village.  It seemed to be rather posh!  Tim sampled the carrot cake from the bakery.

We next carried on down the road to Stump Cross Caverns,

When we got out the weather was still brightening up so we headed for Gordale Scar to look at the waterfalls.

We parked on the side of the road and set off down the path.  The cliffs very quickly rose up around us.  It wasn't a long walk before we got to the lower waterfall.  There were some climbers making a very difficult climb look graceful and easy!!  We made our way to the foot of the waterfall and found a route to climb up to get to the top of it to get to the upper waterfall.  After taking some photos we carried on up the gorge to get to the stream at the top of the upper waterfall.  When we got back down to the bottom we sat and watched the climbers on another difficult route.  

Back at the car we went a bit further up the road and walked to Janet's Foss, another waterfall in a wooded area.

This evening we had a relaxing evening and tried to decide whether to go caving or climbing tomorrow!!

Holiday - Yorkshire Day 8

Yorkshire Holiday Day 8

Monday 13th June

Once again we started the day be checking the weather forecast!  It looked like we were going to at least have a dry morning and then the rain would come.  We decided to go to Castleburg Crag (we had looked at the climbs there last week so we already had an idea what we wanted to do) and then if it rained we could run away and go indoor climbing at Inglesport.  We packed our bags and set off

We parked up in the 2 hour parking in the square at Settle and walked up the hill.  At the crag we checked the book to make sure we were at the right point and then we kitted up.

We started off with 'Settle Festival' A long pitch taking in the full height of the tallest buttress.  Start on the path and climb up the face to a final awkward move on to a ledge on the right before clipping the lower-off out to the left- 4.  We moved on to '3 Peaks Bunk Room' From the low detached pillar make hard moves over the bulge t a ledge.  Climb the juggy wall to a final short corner - 5.

After we had done these 2 climbs we only had 20 mins left on the car park so there wasn't enough time for another climb.  We packed up and returned to the car, it was nice timing as there were rain clouds moving in!

We made our way to Inglesport to have some lunch and then have a climb on the indoor wall.  

Back at the cottage we made some dinner and had a relaxing evening.  We are hoping to go on the Bolton steam railway tomorrow.