A Day at The Works

Had a trip with Jon yesterday to the new dry tooling venue in the Lakes 'The Works'. After a full days dry tooling your body ends up being more wrecked than pretty much any other form of climbing but as Jon said the thing that was most bruised by The Works was our egos! This place has tough tough grades. Still congratulation to Brian, Paddy and all the folk who helped develop a place which has the potential to be the UK's best dry tooling venue (its pretty close to that already).

 This isn't actually one of the climbing areas, I think it's occasionally still worked on but that cave entrance is about 20m high and wide and 40m deep - could be the home for Greg and Andy's next M25s!

 We started in Bakestone Quarry, which seems to get a lot less traffic than The Works proper. We did the red line - Outside Leg a challenging and varied M5 (felt like a pumpy M6 to us). The yellow line is Outfield a very worthwhile looking M6.

This is The Fang an M8 that I worked the moves on including my first proper figure four. It was the best route I tried during the day and one I'm motivated to get fit for.

We then went to the industrial sector at The Works proper, the area that has probably seen the most traffic. This is Time and a Half the crag warm up and given M4! Considering this is pretty much the lowest grade in dry tooling it's crazy - solid M6. The guys climbing are local guns 'The Two Petes'

It's The Two Petes again this time on Stein Pull an M6 on the industrial sector. We didn't do this one but did do Overtime M6 and Grand Design M6+, both of which were good.

 This is where the wilderbeast roam! The cave is much steeper and bigger than it looks. The lines are 20-25m long each and range from 60 to 80 degrees overhanging. Left to right: (yellow) Bloodline M10, (red) Blood Donor M9+, (blue) First Blood M9+, (green) Project M impressive.

One of the Petes on Bloodline (no fig 4s for this young beast) "It's only got one hard move on it, about M8" Luckily Petes arms are much better developed than his ability to grade!

So in summary this is a great spot particularly at the grades M6-7 and M9+ and upwards.

Edit: I should have added the best thing about The Works is that OK its a series of industrial holes in the ground but yesterday was at times truly beautiful.

The loneliness of the long distance dry tooler

Training for winter climbing has long been a challenging process - scratching around of old stone walls or under bridges, and more recently upsetting other wall users with hooky rubber band axes. The best training is offered by dedicated dry tooling crags but until recently there was a choice of two Newtyle (a 5 hour drive from Sheffield) or White Goods (a 2 - 2 1/2 hour drive). Luckily there is a little more choice with a new (by all accounts an excellent) venue at Hodge Close Quarry in the Lakes (still 2 1/2 hours drive from Sheffield) and Masson Lees near Matlock (45 minutes drive - yipee).

There has actually been a couple of routes for a 2 or 3 years at Masson. A short M5 and an upside down M lots. There has been a fair amount of activity recently and now the M5 has an M6 cousin, the M lots has doubled in length and become M lots and lots! plus there are two further lines drilled one completed (the left of the two) at M8+ and the other, when its been finished, should be around M7/7+.

Jon and paid a visit yesterday - behind him (click on photo to see full image) you can see the 20 quickdraws of the M lots and lots recently put up by Andy Turner and called Marginal gains - from the dark cave on the left it traverses to the far right hand lip of the cave. The two easier routes are to the left of the picture just right of the tree and the M8+ goes through the overhangs on the right of the photo.

 Heres Jon on the M5 - almost completely drilled like most routes but actually quite good as a moderate graded training route/warm up. I personally didn't like the M6 just to its right which is almost entirely natural but uses several natural threads which feel like they could snap at any moment. An axe in the face seemed an imminent possibility but I suspect it was early season wussiness.

I dogged out the M8+ (this is the first half) again totally drilled. I found it desperate for the grade and there were some moves I couldn't do. It would be at my limit if I was going well and I'm definitely not going well at the moment.

Newtyle and White Goods have a lot more to offer at the moment than Masson. But being so close and desperately needing to sort out my fitness I'll be back for more humiliation and sore arms at Masson soon.

Sony RX 100 Camera Review

Having broken a string of compact cameras recently and finally managed to put aside a little cash I was in the market for a new snappy. I opted for the Sony RX100 and the following review is based mainly on my experiences using it on a weeks climbing trip in Switzerland at the beginning of September. I'm sure my ticklist of what I was looking for in the perfect compact will be a familiar one. It's also one that perhaps until recently was unrealistic!

So ideally my compact would:
- Be genuinely compact, and portable (I used a Canon G10 for awhile a year ago which had a lot going for it but it was so big I couldn't carry it in a case in my jacket pocket when climbing - luckily it was strong as chimneying up a winter route in Glen Coe I tore through my jacket and gauged chunks out of the camera body).
- Have good enough quality resolution for double page spreads at 300dpi in the magazine I edit. Of course this isn't just a case of more megapixels but the quality of that image - noise etc.
- Be useable in a climbing situation - i.e. simple controls, useable with gloves and fast, or at least fast enough for the relatively slow sport of climbing. Many compacts, and most of the current interchangeable lens high res 'semi-compacts' suffer from being serious shutter lag, slow focussing etc.
- provide reliably metered exposures in automatic, semi-automatic operation. I tend to shoot on shutter priority or full programme modes.
- Have a great lens. I'm less interested in telephoto shots on this type of camera and much more interested in the wider angles plus as fast as possible. The fact that my favourite camera has been a Voigtlander (Leica M copy) on which I would use 15mm lens (sometimes a 12mm) might give you an idea of where my heart lies.
- Ideally it would be tough too, I'm realistic that I put cameras through much worse than the typical high street user, but I would hope a compact would last 2 years. So far none have.
- Oh, and it would be nice if it was cheap!
So how did the RX100 measure up?

It's definitely a genuine compact - here it is in it's dedicated case. It might seem strange to show it in it's case first but funnily enough this 'old school' case was one of the big deciding points for me on buying the camera as I've always struggled with finding cases that have worked with compacts. This works very well, and in Switzerland I was confident enough to just climb with it slung around my neck and over my shoulder - scraping away against the hard granite of Grimselpass.

 The lens does stick out a bit (plus its got one of those potentially easy to clog up auto-sliding lens covers which have gone wrong on numerous previous cameras).

 The payoff for this small size - no viewfinder - boo hiss.

Amazingly this tiny camera produces 20.2 million pixels (the DSLR I use has 12.3 million - although admittedly dated by todays standards - but 20million compares with top pro DSLRs). Theoretically this should be a disaster in a compact with their smaller sensors. The RX100 however has a 1" sensor four times the size of most compacts and over twice the size of similar sized 'performance compacts' although still smaller than a DSLRs. From that initial weeks shooting I'm extremely impressed - below is a shot at 125iso and a crop to show detail.

The following shot is at 400iso with the crop showing very healthy low noise details.

So in use - I haven't properly played with this with gloves on (something I normally would do before purchase) and it will be interesting to see how it does in winter conditions. The good news is the power switch, shutter, zoom and main mode dial are sizeable and chunky. A ring around the lens can be used to cover aperture or shutter speed depending on mode - which is very easy to use. Selecting ISO seemed a bit more of a ball ache, having to go into the camera memory, selecting flash was also a touch fiddly but typical for this sized camera. More important is that there is minimal shutter lag (see shot below), and focus seemed lively (although it definitely prefers straight edges to more organic forms).

Battery-wise it takes about 400 jpeg images and charges through the camera itself rather than through a separate charger so I bought and used a spare battery during the week. Jpeg files sizes are around 8-8.7mb - I don't shoot RAW.

Metering on the whole was reliable and accurate.

Interestingly whilst looking through my images for 'purple flaring' a problem that has been reported I noticed the 'awkward transition from rock to sky - this shot was the only one that really displayed this although I was surprised by a certain amount of noise even at 125iso in the blue skies - it will be interesting to see whether this comes out on the printed page.

Again exposure was reliable in more tricky situations - this shot was taken at 125iso 1 sec F2.8 propped up on stones.

The lens is a 28-100mm F1.8 - 4.9. The very big aperture at the wide end offers up loads of nice shallow depth of field possibilities

Heres a crop of the above shot at F1.8 at 28mm

I would need to do some more controlled tests but it does seem there is a slight drop off of quality/distortion at the edges - although minor enough to not be an issue for me (Its a lot better than my ludicrously expensive Nikon 14-24mm!). Some have talked of flare shooting into the sun or even some kind of 'purple flare' on shots with the sun just out of shot. I didn't shoot anything directly into the sun, but these two are closest and perfectly acceptable for me.

In terms of toughness - we'll have to see. So far so good - the case is a great help to that effect. In fact my general experience with the RX100 has been overwhelmingly positive. Once I've had a chance to play with things like it's video capabilities (1080 AVCHD) or gizmos such as HDR bracketing, Panorama sweep I'll perhaps do another blog.

And as for cheap? - I paid £599 (although you can get much cheaper on the web). That's not cheap in anyone's book but it has got me enjoying photography again and that's priceless.

Here is a review by a good site http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/cameras/sony_rx100.shtml
This one has a nice chart comparing competitors sensor sizes and prices http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/sony-cybershot-dsc-rx100

Not snuffed it yet

Apologies for the several month gap. Work, family, apathy formed a potent mix to kept me from wanting to do anything that involved a computer when I had any free time. Eventually I managed some climbing with a superb week away with Jon in Switzerland. After the hard work of the Ran tour I also treated myself to a new compact - the Sony RX100. I'll do a proper review shortly but here are some pics in the mean time.

Touring with his Nibs

Yes, I'm still alive! Apologies for the 2 months without a peep but I've been kind of swept along in a tidal wave of life. Most of it life at its must mundane and essential - lots of work and lots of family. Of the former the big project for me launches next Thursday as I start a 13 date tour with Sir Ranulph Fiennes across the UK.

It's called Everest, The Eiger & More and is based on the one-off show we did last year at the Buxton Opera House. That was a sell out and with Ran on top form we got this incredible review from Dave Mycroft at myoutdoors.com

I know Ran is revved up for the shows and I've added some new material so it should be an excellent night out. If you'd like more information go to www.speakersfromtheedge.com Here is the list of venues - hopefully see you there.

June
Thu 7th SALFORD QUAYS THE LOWRY 0843 208 6010
Fri 8th BARNSTAPLE QUEENS THEATRE 01271 32 42 42
Mon 18th ST ALBANS THE ALBAN ARENA 01727 844488
wed 20th INVERNESS EDEN COURT 01463 234234
Mon 25th CAMBRIDGE CORN EXCHANGE 01223 357851

July
Mon 2nd BIRMINGHAM TOWN HALL 0121 780 333
Wed 4th HARROGATE THE ROYAL HALL 01423 502 116
Thu 5th DERBY ASSEMBLY ROOMS 01332 255800
Mon 9th SHREWSBURY SEVERN THEATRE 01743 281 281
Wed 11th CARDIFF ST DAVIDS HALL 029 2087 8444
Fri 13th LLANDUDNO VENUE CYMRU 01492 872000
Wed 18th MALVERN MALVERN THEATRES 01684 892277
Thurs 19th GUILDFORD GLive 0844 7701 797

The Loneliness of the Long Distance Bullers

Someone remind me which month it is! Yesterday had a superb outing to the seaside when Jon and I made the long drive to the Lleyn. Jon suggested the classic Golden wall link up at Dorys which sounded good but I fancied something a bit less normal. I'd always been attracted by the description for Pared Mawr in the guide 'the rock is particularly unsound, the worst (or best according to your bent) in the guide.' The route 'The Loneliness of the Long Distance Bullers' HVS 5a also intrigued with it's unique write-up 'Start in the middle of the crag, at the most obvious of features. Probably climbed before by sheep, birds, etc. The relationship of this route to the crag may change with time, with blocks turning into boulders on the beach etc. Wedge up to the overhang, possible belay in poor weather. Swarm over the overhang and exit through a cornice of rock to the top' - Irresistible!

The Line

The Ivy

The loneliness

The view

The next crag - Dorys

After that fun we went to Dorys, where I failed on the planned start up Knowing Her, the back up start up Vroom 23 and then finally succeeded on The Faltering Hand HVS 5a which we climbed to half height, before traversing...

Fascinating Witches HVS 5a

...and finishing up Knowing Her E2 5b and improvising a belay on top.

Lleyn we love you.

Slate Questing

Enjoyed a pleasant outing this week on North Wales Slate. Despite arriving by early afternoon and having only my floppy boots (not wanting to squash my still nipped toes) we set off on a link up recommended by the superb new (ish) guide from Ground Up. Dubbed the West Face of Australia it climbs a mixture of trad and sport lines on each of seven tiers emerging at the top of quarries.Tier One: Looning the Tube HVS 5b (no pic of Tier Two which is climbed via Surprise, Surprise a 6a)Tier Three: Jon leads Sodor a 5cTier Four: M.I.L Arete an E1 and supposedly the psychological crux of the link up.Tier Five: Razorback (HVS 5a) this had the toughest and scariest climbing of all the pitches Tier Six: Act Naturally VS 4b superb 40m pitch and felt more like a mountain route than a quarry climb

Tier Seven: Goblin Party (VS 4b) to finish - better than it looks and perhaps worth a star.

After spending much of the afternoon in cold mist, it was nice to top out to blue skies and sunshine over Snowdon.

Happy Bunnies. There are quite a few similar links in the guide - I can't wait to get back.