The Hunt for the Baboon

Another month, another brief weather window allows an adventure. It has long been an ambition of mine to climb the Baboon, ever since its first mention on the North Wales Bouldering blog. It's inclusion in NWB2 and a friends successful adventure, has spurred my efforts, both with initial forays in 2018, and this month's hunt.
My approach was as usual non standard, as I was combining trips with further pebble scoping. Hence my unorthodox approach over Cwm Bleiddiaid.

This did, however, afford myself great veiws of what appeared massive boulders. 

On closer inspection these were a little disappointing, the rock was mainly pillow lava and covered in jugs. Chatting to learned friends I've also discovered that a rare fern resides hereabouts and loves the rock, so no gardening folks! 

Not all the rock was disappointing. This fine finger may please someone. I was without a mat, however, and not interested in such diversions, I was on a baboon hunt. 

Behind a steep boulder I made my incursion back into the forest. I had a Google map pin, location on, and a can do attitude. I soon also had wet feet, as my feet had discovered an insinuating rivulet. This was in fact a boon, being bordered by swamp willows (easier to fight through) and leading straight to the Baboon! 

Willows and an insinuating rivulet. 

The Baboon! 

As with all these things, the fun was in the hunt. The actual quarry (meaning prey, not stone extraction) was a little damp and slimy on the left, meaning I had to be fairly selective with my hold choice.

I was dimly aware it had been done from a sitter, but a combination of no mat, concern of an impending battle, and a massive jug just above my head, led to a standing approach.

The first attempt went badly as I hit some slimy holds. It felt quite high and I became jittery about the state of the top out. 

I descended and sort out the down climb so I could assess from above:

Having sat on the summit I could have left it as that. Especially as despite clocking a jug just below the lip, the top would certainly involve some sketchy Heather pulling.

But... 

I sort of pulled on one last time. I've left this unedited for the full giggle :

There you go, adventure is out there. For the prospective repeaters out there, here's the pin:

53.0098430, -4.1461270

Enjoy. 

you are here..

Its that time of year where you take a frank look at where your at, and where you want to be.
Kind of MJ's man in the mirror, only in your socks..

The last week in May saw two great opportunities; a Day's climbing in Cwm Glas Bach, and my First proper Bouldering competition.

The cragging was mid week, perfect conditions, with young gun Calum Muskett. We weren't out to tear it all down, but got two particularly fun Climbing experiences. Calum led Pretty Girls Make Graves, a well protected and fiercely powerful E6 6b. He got it second go from the deck ( would have been onsight bar a failed slap..) I then had the oportunity to second it and suprised myself by doing all the moves. I chose however to get copious rests and fully dog it, as the comp was in a couple of days. I probably would have still dropped off it if I had given it full guns, but at a cost to me being able to move for the next few days.
Next was finally stepping up to the plate and getting on the sharp end for Fear of Infection. This is a classic E4 offwidth and Welsh testpeice, that I should have tried years ago. My first proper lead since the twins were born really, and it showed, with many gibber rests when the size six tipped out a bit or a foot skated. This was not a clean lead, but I was very happy to top out and will return to clean up a bit.

Basically my climbing at the moment is sporadic and depends on demonstrating during coaching sessions or during route setting (currently fishing for more Freelance setting if anyone needs owt..). At the moment this probably averages at about 2-3 hours effective training a week. This translates to maintaining a reasonable power to weight as I'm skinny, but zilch stamina. I'm ok for 20 moves to a shake, 40 to a rest, but on a squeeze chimney like Fear, thats only about 4 metres!


The Comp was at Rockover in Manchester, great atmosphere and a heathly prize fund, which meant a very strong field. The qualifiers were 30 problems from font 5 to hard, and 3 hours to flash them in. There weren't any points for  more than three goes so it was an onsight test. We'd brought the North Wales Youth Climbing Academy for some comp practise, and some of us coaches entered the adult open for some fun. It was certainly fun, and hot, very hot. I managed 183 points which means I flashed 18 of the 30 problems, got to the bonus holds on 3 further problems, and couldn't do any better on the remaining 9. A massive blood blister on my middle finger stopped play, so I know I was trying hard. I ended up 26th out of 50 so I was well made up. I may even get a chance to train for next year...

All taken into account, Bouldering is going ok, with a few Font 7a+'s going on the wish list, but if I want to make any gains on the ropes, I'm going to need to devise some cunning endurance training ploy. Whilst looking after 3 toddlers. Could be tricky.

A quick wander...

Having chosen to dive into the random world of blog, I thought I'd better start as I mean to go on and describe the last outing. Nowt special, was able to exit work early, and as I wasn't due to recapture my 9 month son for a few hours, I decided to quest out to the top of cwm glas bach, to examine that elusive breed; undescribed cracks!

Having entered fatherhood, my interests have moved away from tottering slate rubble epics and onto that safer alternative, offwidth cracks. So off I set to scope out "fear of infection" and the many cracks surrounding it that didn't fit the guide.

First obstacle was crossing the stream, as the levels were up and the bridge in bits and full of diggers. A wobbly tree below Craig Du deposited me safely over and a scramble past Craig cwm glas bach led me past slime, sheep-goats (they get very friendly up here), moss and billberries (yum yum). This lead to somewhere (not quite sure) and then some slithering down gullies, tree trunks, vertical bogs and wobbly rocks, lead to the "fear". Looks cool, and not to seepage troubled, unlike the approach, which as my decent, included more dampness, some rock fall, an abandoned croc(not mine- lacking hippyfeet), and some "maybe" projects... Watch this space.