Beginner's Bolting - Roger Dyke
By Roger Dyke
So there we were, met up outside the long-since-closed Whaley Bridge Café, deciding where to go.
It was overcast, and the forecast was for rain arriving from the west. I looked at the heap of Peak guide books spread in the back of the estate: "With this forecast we really ought to go east, like Birchen."
"It's already after 10; too late to go that far."
"Look, here's 'Horseshoe to Harpur HilI'. I bought it 2 years ago and it's never been used: let's go to Harpur Hill and try bolted routes."
"Have you ever been on bolts?"
"No, but we'll work it out."
"OK., if you can find the place."
So, after a swift tour of Harpur Hill Industrial Estate and a trog along an over-grown track, there we were drinking coffee in front of a derelict quarry face that didn't fit anything in the book and even with my glasses on didn't seem to have any bolts.
"Let's go back a bit, and then get round the other side of this lot."
Ha! Now we have better rock, and there are bolts, and Midge even gets the rock to fit a picture. Harder than you might think, because a ton or two that was on the wall in the photo is now on the ground.
But now we're rolling? except for 4 things:
- All the routes look too hard for us.
- The first bolts are way above the ground.
- It is cold, windy and desolate.
- In the dull light, the rock looks uninviting.
No wonder we had the whole place to ourselves.
Never one to give up easily, Midge suggested "Why don't we top-rope something?" Ten minutes later, we knew why. No scope for top anchors, and it was starting to drizzle. I know when it's time to call it a day. "That's it - let's find a nice limestone valley and go for a walk."
Midge is made of sterner stuff: "Look here in The Book, Horseshoe has routes we might do, and it's further east so it might be dry." So, after avoiding the overgrown track by sneaking past an anonymous lorry unloading into a tunnel in the hillside, it was off to just-short-of-Stoney, into a neat little car park right by Horseshoe Quarry entrance.
Altogether a better prospect. Sheltered, yet open and welcoming. Impressive walls. And other people! Midge had studied The Book, and we headed straight off to Star Trek Wall to tackle the easiest route in the Peak, Uranus, F3. Only 8m high, and we could see there were a couple of rings at the top to lower off from. All went well as far as those rings.
Up there, it became apparent that:
- Two 9mm's is not ideal for bolted routes.
- I only had very short QDs, and needed a longer one to reach the rings if I wanted to keep my feet on anything.
- Beyond clipping in with a QD [OK, I now know it should be 2 QDs] I didn't know what to do.
- It was not a good place to make a mistake.
Girl-guide training coming to the fore, Midge called up instructions that if executed 2,000 times would probably have converted the ropes into a large crocheted tea-cosy, but followed just twice got each rope running from her, through a ring, and to me. And I didn't drop even one of them. And Midge didn't drop me.
Midge nipped up and collected the QDs, leaving one rope in place so we could easily try Skywalker F4, which shared the rings.
Skywalker was OK. Somehow we managed while doing all this to pop a rope through the lower-off rings for Gargle Blaster F6a.
Gargle Blaster proved entertaining, so now we knew we could manage F4 but hadn't the remotest chance on F6a. At which point, the Harpur drizzle caught up with us.
On the way out we looked at the superb 38m slab of Trog and Neanderthal F4/F5, and even worked out how to do 38m routes with our one 45m rope and one 40m rope. But with our limited experience and drizzle in the air, routes requiring fancy ropework didn't seem to be a good idea. We must be getting old and cautious.
We were tempted by Sag Ponir F4+ 'one hard move', which folk on RainDance [F6c!] kindly pointed out to us, but although it was steep enough to be still dry, somehow we drifted off to Outside Café and chocolate cake.
Well of course we now know you pull a load of rope up, double it, push it through the rings?.
We know why the gear shops are full of 60m 11mm ropes.
And we'll definitely go back to Horseshoe. Maybe in the winter, it's so sheltered. But we could really do with borrowing an 80m rope?.. hint hint.
Roger Dyke
