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Tuesday 10 February 2015

2014


I’m back in the office now after nearly 13 months of voluntary unemployment spent travelling and climbing from Thailand to California to the Lleyn Peninsula. The desire to take a break from work such as this had been brewing for such a long time that to think it’s now been and gone is bizarre.

January
January was spend in Borneo/Malaysia and arriving Thailand. This photo is from a fairly small, but possibly the best, night market we found on our travels. It’s in the town of Kota Kinabalu, mine and Cat’s first stop on our SE Asian tour. There were amazing avocado shakes, loads of fresh fish and squid, and tasty buffets of unknown things for not many ringits. 

February
Most of this month was spent at Tonsai, of which this photo was taken. I had a really great time in Tonsai, even though I’m sure it has changed a lot over the last couple of decades of popularity, I still found a really nice place to spend time and to climb. The climbing is good, even though not likely to be world class, and then there’s the sun, beaches, cocktails…

March
After Tonsai things got a bit more hectic, Bangkok, Hanoi, Cat Ba, Saigon, Phnom Pehn… we were on the move a lot. As we were travelling north through Loas, we rented motorbikes for a few days to go and tour an area we’d heard of called the Bolaven Plateau. This ended up being one of the highlights of my time in SE Asia.

April
After getting back from Asia I was around the UK for most of this month, mainly resting after having spent a few months away and getting ready to head out to Yosemite in May. I can remember a few good little climbing hits, one especially good weekend in Pembroke discovering the delights of Range West with Caff. And, Sam had a stag-do! So I thought I’d use this photo of him downing an old speckled hen with snot running down his face after doing a bike race in terrible lycra.

May
This was a totally awesome month in Yosemite. We checked out a new line that proved to be way too hard then turned our attention to Salathe Wall. We spent 3 days on the wall up to long ledge and then 4 days camped near the top of El Cap trying the headwall. It was amazing to try this pitch even though it proved too difficult in the end. It had already been a good trip, but we had time for more and so went for a look at El Nino. Doing the first three pitches in advance, which were some of the hardest face climbing I’ve ever done, we freed the rest of the route in three days. This photo is me and Caff just topping out on El Nino.

June
June was another month that was mainly spent in the UK, catching up with friends, family, weddings, and a bit of climbing. One great day was had with Reeve, Lindy and Cat up at the Cromlech doing Cenotaph Corner, Lord of the Flies and the route in the photo, Atomic Hot Rod.

July
I flew to the Chamonix to meet up with the most ambitious climber ever, Musket, to try all of the hardest routes in the Alps. Aguille du Fou might not have actually been too hard, but it was too dangerous and unpleasant to access with bits of ice hitting us in the face. The Fiz, however, was too hard, but also really amazing climbing. In the photo Calum is flashing on second a particularly desperate 7c pitch. After getting a beating and with the weather being crappy, we headed to the Gorge du Verdon to try some more routes that were too hard for us :)

August
Me and Cat met in the Pyrenees to do a really, really long bike ride in terrible weather that broke us both for a while.  After we’d recovered from that we went and climbed this really stunning mountain called the Vignemale. This is the best shot I could get because we approached and descended mainly in the dark! It was a great day out on a stunning peak.

September
This was a month involving a bit of time in the UK, Mallorca and, in the photo, kayaking in Sweden for 8 or 9 days. We were really lucky with the weather, it looked like this the whole time. It was good fun choosing amusingly described islands to paddle to, explore and camp on.

October
All of October was spent in Yosemite Valley and it was as good as always, except maybe a bit hotter. We started by ignoring the heat and set off on Freerider anyway only to find that hours in rock boots, climbing and hauling all day in blistering heat wasn’t fun or conducive to success. Running out of water was also pretty rubbish. We decided to wait for it to cool off it a bit before trying again. We were on it second time around and this is a shot of me and Reeve the morning after topping out.

November
At some point, and in a frantic rush before the storm, we left Yosemite. I’d been down from Freerider about an hour and felt like shit, pretty grumpy too, but it was all good because we were off to Bishop. Met a great bunch of folk camping at the pit and spent the next few weeks getting beasted at the Buttermilks. Here’s Reeve about to tickle the finishing jug on Stained Glass.

December
Finally back in the UK, no more trips and totally broke. Job hunting was an urgent priority, but the weather was pretty good back in Wales and it was great to be back and get out on Lleyn with Calum and Caff. This is a photo from a day we tried a new line on Cilan Head, I’m crawling along a rubbly ledge and have just pulled a peg out of the cliff.


January


February
March
April
May
February
June
July
November
August
September

October

December

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