Weekend climbing: new route bonanza

Last weekend when Jody and I were at Jaanankallio, I stumbled off through the dense wood at the end of the crag to, umm... do what bears do in the woods. Whilst on this humble mission I noticed another buttress of rock past the main area that actually looked quite good. We fought our way up through the brush for a closer look and indeed it looked very promising. Jod went back mid-week to clean and drill some bolts, and then a squad of us - four climbers and one baby - headed up on Saturday, ready to add some more routes.

Toby on the first ascent of "Baldrick" 4+ (HS 4c)

I cleaned and then climbed the one obvious trad line on the buttress. This went a pretty reasonable grade if you get your technique right and is a nice addition to the cliff that already has a few more moderate trad climbs for newbies to go at.

Jod sends the first ascent of "Lord Flashheart" F5

Jody climbed the first of his new sports routes next, with Simon and I doing the second and third ascents straight after. This is a really nice route, not actually that hard but with pretension to being so, and hence makes you feel pretty cool as you climb it.

Jody hits the jug on the finishing rockover

The holds are good but require big moves between them, but then after the juggy yarding the top out require getting your foot high and rocking onto it with nothing much for your hands until you grab the top jug. Flash by name, flash by nature - indeed!

Coffee time

The epoxy was still curing on the other lines so a coffee break was in order and a nappy change for baby L who seemed to be enjoying the spectacle of Mum and Dad climbing from the comfort of her carry-cot.

The crux of "Wee Jock Poo-Pong McPlop" 6a+(?)

Jody then did his second first ascent of the day with the delightfully name We Jock... I attempted the second attempt but fell off the crux a few times, before finally making the moves to dog an ascent.

Through the crux, but a slightly balancy move still to go...

It felt really hard and tenuous and I was going for the "reach dependent crux" ploy to excuse my failure, until Simon stepped in and cruised a clean second ascent. As Simon is a good inch or two shorter than me, the reachy excuse was not so believable anymore, so I'll just have to put the effort in and redpoint it next time.

Success!

So all-in-all a good day. Regular readers will remember last week's encounters with two "melanistic individuals" of the Vipera Berus genus, and hence might see a connected theme in the names of the new routes!