At last!

5 years overdue I've made one of the bigger progressions in my climbing life - moving away from the wasteland that is Scotland. It was good for a while but the extreme paucity of local climbing, the unavoidable journey lengths and the minimal and often insular climbing scene all make it unsustainable in the long term - even more inhibitive than the midges and rain. To be fair, the climbing - when you eventually drag one of the 3 Scottish trad climbers who is prepared to go climbing regularly with an Englishman away from childcare duties and brave 4 hours of pootling up the A9 to take advantage of the one good weather window that decade - is truly amazing as is the scenery and solitude. I will miss those distinctly rewarding aspects along with a few good friends I have up there, the Central Belt motorway network (the singularly most first world aspect of Scotland is the willingness to actually IMPROVE road networks rather than ruin them unlike England and their """smart""" twatting jam-causing bullshit non-motorways), and Ratho and Eden Rock of course. Although we're not spoilt for walls down here.

We've moved to Manchester, home of the M60 gridlock, the M67 gridlock and of course the A57 gridlock. Maybe they could employ a Scottish Transport Minister to actually consider sorting this mess out or maybe they'll just plaster the whole fucking area with one way systems and speed cameras. It's also home to 13 guidebook's worth of day-trippable climbing (Stanage, Burbage and Beyond, Froggatt and Curbar, Over The Moors, Staffordshire, Peak Limestone North, Peak Limestone South, Yorkshire Grit 1, Yorkshire Grit 2, Yorkshire Limestone, Lancashire Rock, Cheshire Rock, Clwyd Limestone) compared to a total of one from Glasgow (half Lowland Outcrops, half Highland Outcrops South). Admittedly I did a load on the grit when I lived in Sheffield and the limestone is mostly shit, but there's still enough mileage and training options to maintain sanity. Plus North / Mid Wales in two hours and the South West arriving in the same day you depart, both significant draws. And in winter the dedicated climbers get out on the grit rather than wanking off about decaying blizzard gullies and "Are the Norries in nick yet" and other such incomprehensible BS.

Of course I can't take the slightest advantage of most of this as my elbows are still completely fucked. Tennis elbow in both of them seems to be hovering in between acute and chronic and taking advantage of the worst of both aspects - permanently sore and seemingly unresponsive to any treatment.  Climbing hard or any training are definitely out, a shite way to start the spring season. But at least being near the grit there are options to do easy pootling that is enjoyable, and of course SLABS. Thankfully I do like slabs.... Before I left the wasteland, I managed to squeeze in some very nice ones at Garheugh Port, including this highball gem which I mistakenly thought was an FA, it wasn't but I did a good job of cleaning it and tidying the base and sorting out the "experimental" grades on this slab so if you're visiting Galloway, go to it:

No more videos and photos from me for a while unless it's well esoteric, because every social media cunt and his drone saturates the web with the latest number-bagging bullshit from the grit...