I Haven't Driven a Peg for 35 Years...
By Roger Dyke
Back in the late 60's, early 70's, when men were men and climbers were penniless, our pegs were almost all other people's. We seemed to get an adequate supply without nicking belay pegs, or pegs referred to in the guide-books: we only acquired pegs that folk had used for extra aid, or to abandon routes from.
This was in North Wales by the way, not the Alps.
At that time it was considered a bit rash to venture onto a HVS you hadn't done before, or to prospect any new route, without a few pegs and a hammer apiece. And on a fair sprinkling of VS and above, pegs were standard then anyway - look in the old guidebooks.
If you were abandoning a route, there was nothing more reassuring than the ring of a well-placed peg. I remember just a few years back, quitting a route on Dinas Mot when the rain came in. My partner had gone down, the No.5 wire had taken the strain fine, so I took out the big Rockcentric backup. Then I looked at the solitary little wire in its crack and thought "My life depends on this: a peg would be nice."
Pegs didn't come out just because the rope shook them a bit. (Well, they did occasionally, but only when other people were abbing from them, not me and my friends.)
In an emergency, flat blade pegs would do a reasonable job of spreading stuff on bread, and with perseverance you could open a can with a pointed one - best to wear gloves. Another dangerous occupation was using an angle peg as a spoon. New ones were OK, but old angle pegs develop burrs.
Ah! The pleasures you youngsters on the climbing walls miss...
A nice thing about pegs is, they work in mucky cracks. If Neville and I ever get round to cleaning the two unclimbed [Severes? VS's?] we have our eyes on at Gogarth, the pegs and hammers may yet see a final outing... but don't tell the Countryside Commission for Wales. And Neville being into safety and all that, I may have to replace the two on the left in the picture.
Meanwhile, are the younger, bolder members of the Club still using rock pegs in Scotland? At least in winter?
