Even More Ducks

A second weekend at the Duck boulders, this time digging even deeper going underground to further develop the ever growing number of varied lines the cluster holds, Friday saw the best of it as the rock was dry. Sunday looked bleak! yet something still drew me back?  so I sort of dragged everyone back to check the unfinished business. Sorry

It's not over yet Tom

Tricky without the flake

Nigel on a top quality sloping traverse

Pumpy sustained underground, what more could you ask for

What a sunset, scary top-out!

Sunday visit, Mike and Nigel got the left arete, after it dried

eventually retreating to the usually dry Ravenswick, some lines were still dry

Good Day for Ducks

A big change in the weather, from sweltering heat to showers, at least the ducks were happy.

got back to a venue that will hold a stacks of problems when it is full developed. Tonnes of rock, a bit of a bouldering jackpot, after digging deeper good problems were coming thick and fast, only to be stopped by the showers ruining the top-outs, looking forward to a return visit with all the bracken gone

A Canopy Shelter

Underground Bouldering

Lisa got caught out by the rain!

Sam on a great find - good work Sam

The Meet - October 15th - 16th

Now the brackens almost dead, it's time to organise another meet, this time at my personal favourite place in the Moors, (absolutley stunning area)  We have been keeping this venue a bit hush hush, ready for the meet as the place has some hard projects to be done and a bit of work is needed to free up some more blocks, many hands at the meet will do this.
The Circuit is already over sixty problems from 3 to 7c with some new lines to be done across the grades.
The location will be revealed a couple of days before, so no-one can get their mitts on some of the lines before the meet. Please email me if you are interested: lee@betaguides.com

Quite a prize? if you can get started?

Night Bouldering

Two Venues

Focus has been narrowed down to two areas at the moment, Ingleby Incline and Round Crag, This seems the best way to get the guide finished. Especially when a good few of us are developing the blocks, Even with this narrowed approach, surprises are still appearing around every corner with some brilliant problems overlooked on previous visits, finding so much stuff to go back to, it's hard work! but good fun, one thing I have realised when bouldering in the Moors is that the rock sometimes doesn't climb quite as you may visualise it and in most circumstances the nature of the rock, friction, variation of holds, tend to give some great problems, even if the battle is a short one, making return visits very worthwhile.

Tony and Mike add a few to The Ingleby circuit

Looking grumpy waiting for the rain to stop at Round Crag

A belter of a problem 6b+*** from a very low sit

Chris Cruising a nice arete

Mike on Chasing Rainbows *** Classic on Rainbow wall, A gem  of a wall

The prow never looked inspiring, but climbed like a dream

The Parting of the Clouds

Three days off and a bad forecast wouldn't put me off getting to the Moors, Friday saw a visit to the woods to check out some of the blocks Jason tipped me off about, before entering the woods we had a dabble on the not so good looking block we named 'The Slug', even before we had climbed on it, It turned out to have a couple of cracking lines on the lower end. After that had a mad march through the woods blair witch style, madness but brilliant, some good blocks. 

Day two: was quite tiring! more marching, climbing, cleaning, yet again the Moors gave some great test piece problems,  even more than I had anticipated.

Day Three: The Moors can have what you could call "The Moses effect" splitting weather fronts leaving a nice bit of blue sky to climb under, So left one wet crag and moved to a dry one?! one hours worth of rain in three days, surrounded by rain clouds?

The Slugs Head 6c - Sloping side pulls

Chris on a good problem on the side of the Slug

Sleepy Hollow 7b+ brilliant

Steve on a perfect slab

Short but involving prow

Mike on Prisoner of War 7c+

I wish I was taller or there were some holds!

The Amazing Mushrooms

The mapping of the vast Ingleby Incline has begun, Over a mile and a half of blocks, crags and some hidden magical stuff in the woods, A mammoth task that's been put off for too long, We started on the lower boulders at the right end, these were relatively recently exposed due to deforestation, The blocks held some real gems and I think we were all surprised to get such a work out from the first three blocks? with a couple of things to go back for.  This area might take a while!

James on Jason Wood's Superb Mono Wall 6c**

Martin on a one of the gems 6c**, the arete to the right of this was a classic 5+***

Project - bottled it? left arete not allowed

Martin on a hard arete problem 7a+7b? The block looks like a giant 'Mushroom' at the right hand end

Looks like someone has been digging lower starts?

Now that's Fungi

A social get together

Needed some more 'money shots' for the upcoming Anston Stones guide, so between us we organised a little get together with a few friends and friends of Mike's.

On the day the sun gods shined down on us and it ended up a friendly relaxing session, Er!  except for the wasp attack on Debbie and the kids! bet the stings are tingling today? Our attentions were mostly in the Wave area and together quite a few classic were repeated, with a little diversion to Woody's Rock, as Ned had his sights on Vanilla Sky.

cheers everyone, for coming, I got plenty of great shots.

Plans for the Moors today have been aborted due to bad weather, what a shame! had my eye on something......

Warming up

Endless possibilities on superb rock

Ebola Buttress

Wave Wall

Vanilla Sky 8a+/8b