The pressure's on!

When I started climbing, I quickly got used to North-East winters. It started raining at the end of October and it didn't stop until sometime in March. This might sound bad, but it forced us all indoors and we got strong. Happily, it also meant lots of climbing trips abroad.
Things got steadily better over the years, culminating in the last couple of winters which were perfect for climbing. Yeah, there was a bit of snow, but essentially it was dry and cold for months. Perfect bouldering weather.

Things have changed...

It hasn't been dry in Northumberland for about ten weeks, if not longer. It's doing my head in!
There's so much to do on the book and I'm feeling the pressure, even though it's self inflicted. I've got my wish list of photos sorted out so it's time to start getting some writing and interviews done. There are a few sessions lined up for the very near future (weather permitting), so I have my fingers crossed.

I've been skiing in Poland and had a trip to hospital due to flipping upside down and landing on my shoulder. Agony, but it's not broken.

My insides!

The doctor got me some pretty good painkillers and gave me instructions to avoid beer, but assured me it was ok to drink vodka. Only in Poland!

Right then. Everyone get training hard for your photo session!

I'll be in touch.

Snow in The County

Firstly, I'd like to draw your attention to a couple of local heroes.

Congratulations to Steve Lynch who has won the Scottish Tooling Series 2010. Nice one Steve. You can check out his blog here:  http://www.steve-lynch.blogspot.com/

Also, some big news in bouldering. Micky Page, who is fast becoming a legend on the scene,  has climbed yet another another 8c, 'From Dirt Grows The Flowers' in Chironico, Switzerland. He's back for Christmas, then heading to Rocklands, probably for a Monkey Wedding. Let me know if you need a photographer, Micky...

Ok, back to business. I've had easier weeks, that's for sure. Wine therapy has helped me get over it, but I thought I'd share it with you.


Callerhues


I went out last weekend to see what the roads were like and they were still a bit iffy, but on Tuesday Russ, Tom and I decided to take a drive out to Callerhues to see what sort of condition the crag was in. Getting there was no problem, but we had to dig out a parking space which was a nice way to warm up.

Skiing into Callerhues

Tom and Russell fighting through the snow

The approach was heavy going. At best the snow was calf deep, but there were plenty of waist deep sections to keep us entertained. It seemed to take forever, but eventually we arrived and the crag looked fantastic. Big cornices and snow filled gullies, but no ice routes.

Callerhues

Boulevard buttress with The Eyes of Silence looking in 'good condition' on the right!

Callerhues Crack

Ice on Callerhues Crack

We got there quite late and the sun was going down, but there was time to take a few photos before we headed back to the car in the dark.  It was -10 when we got back to the car and I was glad to get out of there!


Bowden

A couple of days later I went up to Bowden with Katie. Normally in these conditions, we would have had to walk in from Belford, but Katie turned up in a borrowed 4x4 and we made it up the road. Generally, the weather was warming up a bit and the snow was beginning to melt. You wouldn't have thought so as it was bitterly cold. We were going to do some photos, but it was almost unbearable, so we just went for a walk to look at the ice.

Snow drift below Russet Groove

Believe it or not, this is the wall under Triple Cracks

Katie 'climbing' over the wall

Slab Crack

Giant's Ear

As you can see, everything is very wet. The icicles were breaking off and disintegrating in a pile of slush when they hit the ground.

Barbarian and Green Crack

The arch of Poseidon Adventure

Wave Wall

Simonside


Last, but not least, and inspired by Graeme Read who had made the trip the previous day, I headed up to Simonside. The road along the bottom of the forest wasn't passable, so after digging out yet another car parking spot, it was a long walk-in through the snow. I knew I'd be knackered before I even got to the car park, so I took it slowly. I had my skis with me as well. If I was going to go all that way, I might as well get some skiing in!

Car Park below Simonside

Forestry Road

Snowshoes courtesy of Complete Mountaineering

It was hard work getting up there through the snow. When I got to the top of the road there was a lot of cloud heading in and I knew it wouldn't be long before I couldn't see anything...

 

Forestry road at the top of Simonside

 I decided to make my way towards Ravensheugh as you never know... The weather could change. It was very, very cold, snowing a bit and the wind kept knocking me over. It was that strong! Every time I went over I had to take my bag off, then struggle to my feet. It was just grim, plain and simple, but don't get me wrong, I love being out by myself in conditions like that.
Great fun!

 

Simonside just about to disappear into the cloud

Before the weather crapped out 

The weather gets worse

I made it as far as the Ravensheugh turning, but the weather was winning and I knew it would be getting dark as I was making my way down, so I decided to get the skis on and at least have a bit of fun. Little did I know...
So there I was, skiing down from the top of Simonside, thinking that it was all over, when I suddenly went through the ice up to my waist. Because I was moving forward and had my bag on, my top half was thrown forward into the water as well. Needless to say, I got a shock! There was no warning at all. I had a bit of a struggle to get out because I was just clawing at the slush!

Anyway, I dragged myself out onto the snow realising that this could be serious because of the wind, then noticed my skis were still in the water. I had two options. Abandon them, or get them out. I knew roughly where they were as I simply had to follow the tracks. Of course, I was already wet and wasn't going to leave them behind. You know the rest!
I emptied the water from my boots and gloves and set off again on the long walk out. It wasn't as much fun any more! I should have taken a photo of the pool with my ski tracks leading into it as it was pretty funny, but I was already trying to block it from my mind and think warm thoughts.

Surely that has to be as epic as it gets in Northumberland cragging!


I think there's more snow on the way next week so tune in soon for more adventures...

Winter...

It's proving a bit difficult to get out and take photos at the moment! The main roads are clear, but it's a struggle to get to them. I had a couple of trips out earlier in the week to check conditions, but it's impossible to get anywhere near the crags.


Here's the view outside Savage Photography Global HQ at the moment:

 This is the thermometer on the outside of the living room window:

 There is a cornice of jagged death directly above the front door:

I've been wearing my B3 plastic Koflachs all week, so at least my feet have been warm.

As soon as the roads have cleared up a bit, I'll be out in the snow taking photos, so check the blog for those pictures soon.
In the meantime, I'll be spending some time urban skiing as there are some steep hills around here.

Dan Varian repeats The Young & Andy Moir on Crater Maker

A couple of years ago, every time I saw Chris Graham he was raving about this route he was trying called 'The Young' up at Callaly, a beautiful set of buttresses deep in Thrunton Wood. It was first climbed by Andy Earl and, surprisingly, has waited ten years for a repeat.

I'd never been up there until I dragged Andy up for a photo session, and I was blown away by the 'Tombstone Buttress'. The photo in the guidebook just didn't do the route justice (sorry John!).

Dan had told me it was at the top of his 'to do' list and he was determined to give it a go while he was up a couple of weeks ago.

It had been raining for a couple of days and it had just stopped when I left the house. I half expected Dan to change the venue, but his optimism is infectious and off we went. Although the rain was holding off, the roads were soaking and the fields were waterlogged. The Cheviot was capped with it's first snow of the season. Even when we set off up to the crag, the water was dripping off the Autumn leaves. We didn't notice though. Dan was struggling with mats and I was in heart-attack territory with the climbing and camera gear. It's not too long a walk,but it's steep...

Amazingly, when we arrived, we found that the route was in perfect condition. The rock either side was seeping slightly, but the route itself was dry. Dan set about working the crux sequence on a rope and it wasn't long before he found a slightly easier way of doing it. Having seen Andy on it, he was certainly playing to his bone-crushing finger strength by making a cross through to opposing, shallow pockets and moving up from there. Dan ended up making a long move from one of these holds and could just get his fingers onto the poor sloper above. After matching on this, it's a series of tenuous, balancy moves on some weird looking 'pancake' features to the top.

I don't think I've seen Dan so happy as when he topped out. He couldn't stop smiling and there was plenty of adrenalin, due mostly to the topping out procedure not quite going as planned. For all the gory details (and Dan's comments about The Young) head over to the Beastmaker blog.

http://www.beastmakerblog.blogspot.com/

After relaxing for a bit and revelling in the glory, he repeated the crux move a few times for photos. He was loving it! He couldn't stop raving about the quality of the climbing and how incredible the route is. Dan has done a lot of hard problems and he reckoned this was the best of them all.
It certainly deserves more traffic, and Dan vowed to return with some of the Peak crew to show them what they've been missing.

                                            The Tombstone Buttress, Callaly

All afternoon, there was a mysterious wood-knocking coming from the forest. After much careful consideration, it can only be attributed to the presence of a Sasquatch living in Thrunton Woods. Dan assumed it was working The Young and wasn't happy with us being on its project, but I shall pass the matter on to Graeme Read, who is the local authority on Northumberland big cat sightings and Bigfoot activity.


Last weekend I was up at Bowden with the unstoppable force of nature known as Andy Moir. It was another day where it was raining on Tyneside and no-one could muster up any enthusiasm to go out. I drove up to meet Andy and was pleased to see a line of blue on the horizon. When we arrived at Bowden it was like a hot, summer's day! Perfect weather.
I really wanted to photograph Andy on Crater Maker. It's a great route with some fantastic, bouldery moves up the sloping ramplines at the start. Have you ever seen anyone on it? It rarely gets done, and I have no idea why. It gets E4 in the new guide, but it's soft at that grade. Saying that though, when I did it, it nearly resulted in a helicopter ride. I was right at the top when a hold snapped. I started barn-dooring, and only just managed to grab a hold and stop myself coming off. I was very lucky. It was in the days before mats, and there's a lovely spine-breaking rock platform underneath the route.

Here's Andy looking smooth...

It was a while since he'd done the routes at the end of Main Wall, so he did a few of those to finish.

Here he is topping out on Brown Ale Wall:

New Blog!

Ok... To kick things off I thought I'd share some of my recent climbing photos with you.

First up is Nic Ward on County Ethics at Back Bowden. Nic is super-strong and has been crushing the routes on the North Wall. Big things to come!

Great photo session for me. Great training session for Nic...

These are from a session at Bowden Doors with Adam Watson. Adam did Barbarian a few  times for photos.  There are only a couple of routes at Bowden that I haven't done and this is one of them. I'm not really sure why that is, but I think it's the fear of the top-out.
Anyway, Adam made it look easy.

These two are about twenty minutes apart. Look at the difference in the light!

 As the light was fading, Adam was weighing up Poseidon Adventure. He didn't take much persuading to get on it, especially as I could talk him up it if needs be. He was fine though and got yet another classic tick. What a day!

Also up at Bowden I took some photos of the fantastic Katie Mundy on Cave Right Hand. It was late when we got started, but the photos look good!

Over at Queens I did some photos of Christine Mundy on The Magician's Nephew. We were rushing over the moor and only just made it while the sky looked good. I'm really happy with these pictures, and Christine's always great to photograph.

Finish off with the Mighty Russ new routing at Caller crag. We abandoned Oxen Wood because of the rain, but five minutes along the road it was fine. 

Russ never lets me down...