More Hard New Routes in Wales and Scotland

The best winter in years continues to offer spectacular conditions all over the country and climbers are making the absolute most of it. There has been a steady stream of hard new routes and repeats over the last couple of weeks.

Pete Harrison has added a direct start to Travesty (VIII 8) on Clogwyn Du at IX 9. After a self confessed compromise in style (he top roped the route) he managed to squeeze in the ascent on the rapidly de-riming crag to give Wales its second grade IX 9 after Cracking Up. The Welsh Winter Wiki has an interesting commentary from Pete on his thoughts about the grade and style.

Andy Turner and Dave MacLeod have both climbed The Tempest X 9 in Scotland. This route has a long and tumultuous history. It was first climbed by Neil Gresham in 2001 with pre inspection, gear placed on abseil and top roping. For this reason Neil graded the route M9 and thought that hard winter climbing in Scotland was likely to be done in this style in the future. Andy Turner cleaned the line of all the rotting gear but in doing so managed to blow any chances of onsighting it. He did climb it clean but it was left to Dave MacLeod to get the routes first true on sight a few days later. For more information of these ascents visit Dave’s Blog and Andy’s Blog.

Guy Robertson and Pete Macpherson have climbed Super Rat (IX 9) on the seldom in condition Creag and Dubh Loch. The eight pitch route climbs the massive Central Gully Wall and took several visits to finally get in one push. Guy commented on UKC that ‘this is the ultimate winter route – long, remote, direct, super-sustained and technically quite difficult’. To read an article on this route go to Super Rat IX 9 - The First Ascent.

It is probably worth mentioning here also that (though it does not get the lofty grade of IX 9) Chris Parkin has girdled the Black Ladders in North Wales to give a 16 pitch grade VI 7 called The Maginot Line. This route took 12 hours and almost every pitch involved a full rope length. You can read a short interview with Chris in the latest issue of Climb magazine alongside Tim Neil's top Ten winter outings on Ysgolion Duon. To read more about The Maginot Line visit the DMM News Archive.

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