Clay and Cat took me out for my first road bike ride, a casual 20 mile route taking in Winnats Pass. I later found out its one of the top 20 hills in the country, which made me feel better about getting off a few times for a breather.
To cap off the weekend, a good lead from Al up the corner followed by my first E1 in quite some time with Cemetery Gates. We were somewhat humbled to watch a couple of lads ticking almost every route on both walls, but otherwise a brilliant weekend of climbing in North Wales.
We planned to complete an enchainment of four routes across the southern side of the Llanberis Pass. A late start due to rain meant we began on a slippery, dripping first pitch of The Cracks. Slow Ledge Climb followed and we missed a route on Cyrn Las to finish with Gambit Climb and Reade's Route. All were brilliant, including Reade's where I ran two and a half pitches together before the rope went taut!
Myself and Clay decided to finish the week with Papillions Ridge. We caught up with and overtook Steve, Hana and Verity near the start and cruised up some superb rock with the others never far behind. Nearing the top of the final tower a tremendous storm broke with heavy hail and rain. We abb'd down the descent gully slightly scared and were thankful that the others also made it down ok, mostly thanks to Steve's cool head and well-packed rucksack!
Clay and I teamed up with Hana for an ascent of the Aiguille d'Argentière by the Flechè Rousse Ridge. We had beautiful weather and our trip was only hampered by a poor Camptocamp description which wasted a few hours of route finding between the gendarmes. 15 hours later we were down at the hut.
Clay and I planned to climb the Migot Spur on the Chardonnet but we didn't get much further than the glacier. We'd hoped to hide in the drying room at head up late into the evening but with atrocious weather we opted for a bunk and left early the next morning. Lost in the thick cloud and with it snowing hard, we sat down until dawn on the ice and made a snowy descent back to the Albert Premier Hut at first light.
