Ramping it up a bit at Ratho.

The previous trip was a weekend in Aberdeen. Good wee trip....but....fuck me it is a long long time since I got to proper climbing areas. Will there be a chance to get to Lewis, Skye, Wester Ross, Ardnamurchan, and back to Creag Dubh and Glen Nevis?? A good two months of late summer / autumn, often the best time the year after April/May......seems so feasible on paper, but I have fuck all hope. Really a dismal summer.

However there was a slight respite in the dismality of my water-treading non-progression (Why progression? Why not just potter on? Because progressing is fun and pleasurable and interesting by taking you to new areas of climbs and your climbing and seeing what happens, that's fucking why...). I got to Ratho one evening with the intention of climbing in the quarry. It was warm and still and moist. Usually a good excuse to go to the wall itself, but Simon was syked for outside and that seemed fair enough. After a wee warm up or two, I led a cool route up the main wall. Just a bit trickier than my usual punteering, but it required some committment and calming myself in the conditions - including sweating away and staying pumped despite being on a good ledge. Dropping a rope down revealed the face was - you guessed it - gently overhanging. So much for Scottish wall climbing!!

The upshot of all this is to confirm my previous post that I can actually do okay on climbs that suit me well. And that I'm now rather syked for more of that!!