I attended a very well run Wilderness Medical Training Far From Help course based in Grasmere, a weekend of gluing pork, improvising splints and measuring vital signs. We also found chance to sneak up to Castle Rock and a get route in whilst the rain held off.
An absolutely magical crag, set in an improbable location near Roche, St Austell. A nice selection of routes topping out into the ruins of an old monastery. We were joined at the crag by seemingly every youth under 15 in the county.
Hoping for a reprieve from weekends of climbing in the rain, we were sadly disappointed. An attempt on Chasm Route on Glyder Fach was abandonded and we made a soggy ascent up Y Gribin to the summits. By the time we were back into Idwal the rain had cleared a little in time for a consolatory nip up The Ordinary Route.
We took a chance the rain would clear and were rewarded with a fine day at Shepherd's. Cat was quite new to outdoor multi-pitch so we climbed Ardus and then Crescendo which both featured fantastic final pitches.
Napes Needle is a fairly iconic pinnacle but Cat and I were quite glad to simply get up and down again. The forecast rain arrived as swirling spindrift which made the down-climb of the final pitch decidedly tricky.
