March 2012....Jetty Buttress....First routes trip of the year to the North West. After a dire and soaking 2011, I was so happy to be back in my favourite area of Scottish climbing, I just sat at the base of the crag, soaking in the classic gneiss, the beautiful view across the bay, the quiet road scarcely 50m below, and felt like I'd come home...
March 2013....Jetty Buttress....First routes trip of the year to the North West. After a dry and satisfying 2012, I was still so happy to be back in my favourite area of Scottish climbing, I just sat at the base of the crag, soaking in the classic gneiss, the beautiful view across the bay, the quiet road scarcely 50m below, and felt like I'd come home...
I just love Wester Ross. It's felt special to me ever since 2008 when The Pylon King and I drove out of Torridon to escape the one morning of drizzle we had in a week of sunshine there, and happened upon the oasis of civilisation that is Gairloch, climbed at Gruinard Crag and Loch Tollaidh, and revelled in the spectacle of the mountains, hills and hummocks, and the coastline of bays, sea-lochs and islands. With supremely accessible trad and sport cragging, the nearby delights of Ardmair and Reiff, and a plethora of classic blocs, it is hard to beat.
This time the weather was fairly brisk. Day 1 at Jetty Buttress was sheltered enough to enjoy sunshine and steady trad. Day 2 at Reiff presented the choice of sun and strong winds or shelter and shade, resulting in a lot of numb fingers on short routes, some great bouldering, and 10 whole minutes where we felt warm (2nd problem in the video below ;)). As well as useful trad mileage (I felt pretty fine on the routes, the climbing felt easy after plentiful bouldering, although I need to work on smoother gear placement), I managed to do yet another of my winter bouldering inspirations, and this one was yet again bloody brilliant:
Classic wall problems @ Reiff.
The swing around onto the unnervingly shallow "vagina" slot on Romancing The Stone was the highlight of the whole brief-but-fun trip :)
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