Climbing - Fairy Quarry Trad Climbing

Trad Climbing

Today for my birthday we decided to have our first go at trad climbing since we got our kit at Christmas!  We headed to Fairy Quarry where we have done a lot of caving before.  Tim had done some reading about the climbs and found a few that he felt would be a good starting point.  We arrived and had some lunch while looking at where to climb.  While we were there some others joined us and started climbing just where we were going to go so we moved on!!  

We ended up in The Glacis area on the climb called Pueblo. We managed our first climb ending at a tree!

By the time we had finished the area where we had wanted to start was clear so we made our way back. 

We went to the W/L area just to the left of Balch's Slide.  We climbed Back to Sandy Lane and Back in Kansas.

We had a good day in the sunshine and enjoyed our first experience of trad climbing and I had a great birthday.

Walking - Kingston to Swyre Head, Kimmeridge and back to Kingston

Kingston, Swyre Head and

Kimmeridge walk

Today Tim and I parked up at the car park just outside of Kingston. It was very cloudy and looked like it might rain on us at some point on the walk!   We set off over the hill to Swyre Head and navigated a route down over the front of it.  It was rather wet under foot and became much worse as we got down to the fields before the cliff path.  Eventually making our way to the main path it became a bit better going with just the odd muddy patches.  We followed the cliff path till we got to Clavell tower when we found a route to get down to the sea.  Having had rather a lot of wet weather the waterfall was flowing quite nicely.  We stopped and had some lunch before taking photos of the waterfall.  From there we walked up to the Kimmeridge car park and followed the road up to Kimmeridge village before climbing up on to the ridge to head back to Kingston. It was a pleasant walk and luckily it didn't rain too badly on us.

Caving - GB Cavern

GB Cavern

Written by Tim

For our first trip of the year myself and Sas decided to take a gentle wander around GB earlier today. Whilst driving up to the Mendip hills we splashed our way through many a puddle on the roads and admired the high water levels in the rivers, hoping the cave would be equally as wet. Fortunately we were in luck and the main stream-way was wetter than I've seen for several years. I should add we only tend to go to GB a few times a year, so today's level of wetness is probably somewhat less rare than the previous sentence suggests!

We set off down the usual route to the gorge, being accompanied by a modest flow under foot through the entrance passages to a view of a reasonable waterfall issuing from above the second climb. The main stream-way was in full flow requiring a bit of careful foot work in places to maintain dry socks. Once at the bridge we stopped for a photo or two before continuing over it and traversing the gallery route to the window overlooking main chamber.





From here we took the oxbow to the bottom of the cave re-entering the gorge to find water not far off lapping at our feet and entry to the ladder dig requiring a swim. This was slightly surprising as only this week I'd been told the bottom of GB no longer fills up! You can see the chain hanging out of the ladder dig in the second photo...





We then headed up stream to the bottom of the waterfall to take a look, but decided not to climb it to avoid the inevitable juice to the face. Here's a photo of Sas stood at the bottom...



From here we retraced our steps back up the oxbow, this time taking the longer route via the loop, rift chamber and white passage back to the bridge. Back at the gorge we noticed the water level was dropping and the colour had returned to clear rather than (taken from the Dulux colour chart) 'flood brown'. Back up the entrance passage to emerge to glorious sunshine. A fine trip.

Holiday - Exeter 26.11.15 - 28.11.15

Exeter

Thursday 26th November
Tim picked me up from work around 15.30 and we arrived at the Exeter Toby about 17:20. We checked in, unpacked and relaxed for a bit. We had decided that we would go to the Toby for dinner!! It would be rude not to!!! Later in the evening we made a quick trip to Tesco for some snacks and Milk for Tim's tea!


Friday 27th November
Last night neither of us slept that well, we had a slow morning and eventually went down for breakfast about 10. The weather was supposed to be bad but we had sunshine! We decided that we would do a bit of shopping Friday morning - There are a couple of climbing shops and I need some new climbing shoes. For lunch we found a great pasty shop we have been to in the past - however we both decided that we were still full!! While the weather was good I suggested we had a walk on Dartmoor. We set off for Haytor, after taking a massive diversion for road works we eventually got to the car park. The wind and rain had started - but we decided we were going anyway!! We got our over trousers and coats on while the rain and wind were whistling round the car! We made our way up to Haytor and had a wander round in the driving rain and fog!!

Back at the hotel we dried off and warmed up and decided what we were going to do for dinner. We ended up having a sharing deal in Pizza Hut and once again feeling incredibly full!


Saturday 28th November
Thankfully we slept better last night. We decided that we would head down to the Quay Climbing Centre in the morning as the weather was due to be bad.

When we arrived we had a look at the canal basin area and found out where we were allowed to launch kayaks from if we were to bring them on a future trip.

We went into the Quay Climbing Centre to register and get assessed. We were a bit early as the kids club had the centre till 12 so we decided to have a walk along the river till it was time to go in. As we stepped out of the door the rain started so we changed our minds and had a drink in the climbing centre cafe instead!! At 12 we had a short assessment of our climbing skills and then made our way down into the climbing area. We started off with some gentle climbs and then moved on to some lead climbing. We had a good climb and felt like we had at least worked off some of our Toby meals!! By about 3.30 we had had enough and set off to the car to go home. We were home around 6.30 and had the task of unpacking - it is always nice to get home except for having to unpack!!

Climbing - Portland

Portland Climbing

Fiona got to us about 9 am and after we had eventually got ready we headed over to Portland. We decide once again to try for The Bower first.  This time we were lucky as we had the area to ourselves.  Tim and Fiona started off by climbing Suntrap and Whispering Gallery.  Fiona then had her first go at lead climbing on Queen Of The New Year.  

We next climbed The Bumper Fun Book - I was pleased to manage this climb as the last time I tried it I didn't manage to get to the top!

Our next climb was Godbeams - Tim lead it and said it was interesting!!  Fiona had a go but was finding it hard going on the arms.  I surprised myself by making it to the top!  While I was at the top I re-rigged the rope for the climb next to it Six Finger Exercise - a nasty looking 6b+ - Tim did this climb and said it was quite tough - Both Fiona and I decided to leave it for another occasion!!  After a break we all climbed Tinkerbell a 6a with a difficult start - a little bit of equipment use needed to get myself and Fiona up the first section!!

Lastly Tim lead up Far From The Madding Crowd.  I made it up after a but of working out how to get over the overhanging section!!  Fiona finally called it quits with very sore arms!  A good day climbing.

During the day we had two common lizards gracing us with their presence.

Day Out - Glastonbury Carnival 2015

Glastonbury Carnival 2015

Wimborne Climbing

The Edge Climbing

Tonight I felt like I had really mastered the blue route on the overhang.