A BLUSTERY DAY IN MAY

On Saturday night, me, Matt and Martin drove up to langdale for an early start the next morning on Bowfell Buttress. As we got there fairly late, the campsite was full and we found a nice spot at the side of Blea Tarn. Decided to go the pub first, to avoid being caught with our tents up in certain illegal places, I must admit I was feeling quite anxious after all the climbing talk and flicking through the guide books as crevasse rescue and the like. Anyhow ... put tents up around 11:30 and may have drifted off around 3ish as it was so windy!
Woke up 7am sharpish and packed up. Moseyed up to the car after taking a few scenic photos and had some breakfast. I refused a potato cake Matt tried to feed me, as past experiences have taught me not to accept any form of food or drink for him...

It was about a 2 hour trek up Bowfell and traversing across to the base of the Buttress, and after a quick gear sort out (very quick for me), and a bite to eat, we began up the 1st of 7 pitches. The 1st pitch was easy, but we soon came to a chimney, which gave the climb its VD grading. Theres alot of waiting around in multi-pitch climbing which resulted in getting very cold, and taking pics of the interesting bedding planes of the conglomerate which is Bowfell! All was going fine and there were a few other people on the rock too, we came to what we thought was the ‘slippery chimney’ and had allot of fun getting up it. Only to find out later that is was indeed not a VD and part of an E3 route!! We had a slight communications breakdown around and about the final pitch. By this point it had got so windy that me and Martin couldn’t hear Matt shouting to climb at the top of the pitch, so we just stood there ... and stood there ... and stood there. Eventually I moved up onto a slightly higher ledge and waited till I felt the rope tighten, and took it everything was fine and began the last pitch.
Topped out about 4.30ish and summated Bowfell before walking off the hill and making it back to the car in good time to get back in time for tea! Spent the journey home texting my dad to see if he was still alive in the cairngorms after his train had failed to arrive.

All in all a good days climbing that certainly inspired me to get serious with some ropes in the coming summer months.

THE PRECEEDINGS TO A CLIMB – LAST FEW DAYS OF COLLEGE

Thursday 22nd may was my last day at KGV College, took many photos, mainly in geology, when I ambushed someone in the corridor asking them to take pics of our class! Spent a bit of time in the LRC not doing work ... and reminiscing the past 2 years.

Friday – met Emma, Bex, Rachel, Claire, Adam, David, Hannah and Nicole at Frankie and Benny’s for Jon’s surprise party. It took a while to get him there, but Adam and Eddy did a good job in the end. It took us about 30mins to order and we also had this amazing cake that Emma made, I ate 2 pieces I was so impressed with it! After, me and Bex skipped down to JJB with Emma and Rach so they could join the gym, then went on a miniature shopping trip to Matalan before departing for revisions sakes!

Scary Film, Pink Party, Classical Concert ... the usual

Friday night, went to the cinema to see ‘Doomsday’ with a few from Network; Carrington, Matt, Jenny, Tom and Martin f.lol. Just the name says allot about the film, and I ended up taking my polar bear with me for when I got scared, as well as my purple fluffy socks. Turned out to be not as scary as ‘I am legend’ and I only jumped once! Spend about half an hour in the car park after, trying to get Tom’s car to start etc ... was deceivingly cold that night.
Saturday had a big lie-in =] then went into town to get my hair cut, also got a free head massage ... very strange, but nice! Walked down to church to help out with the carwash, only to find it had finished as they had run out of cars! Got in about 2 and did some revision for a few hours before getting ready for Sarah’s ‘pink party’. Got a phone call from Pauline at about 8 asking me to go and pick her up, and we got to Tarleton for about 8.45ish.
Had some very pink champagne and partied all night with some friends from geology and some I haven’t seen since snow and ice in February! Requested my all time favourite dance track – Whitney Houston, ‘I wanna dance with somebody’, and also saw some very interesting dance moves from Matt...
Sunday ... revised all day then Mike and Jon picked me up about 5.45ish and we set off for Liverpool Philharmonic to see Steph and Becky in their concert! Lets say ill be listening to classical music for the next few days! Lack of sleep started to catch up on me when Jon asked how McDonalds had an effect on the environment, and I replied with, ‘they cut down trees to grow COWS!’ We did end up stopping off there on the homeward journey, and as I had to money left from buying everyone ice cream in the interval, I stole a straw ... =]
I will have to start getting more sleep, as exams have started, as I keep doing stupid things, like sitting on the step for an hour because I forgot my keys .... But forgot to ring the doorbell!

Pizza and movie night!

U know how ... in the movies ... (and friends) the 'pizza guy' always comes to the door with about ten pizzas stacked up!? ... that was us tonight =]

Rach stopped by to pick me up to go to Bex's and Adam's, as Rach is doing her music A level we listened to Chopin in the car, which inevitabley inspired us to marvel at the nice houses down Waterloo road on the jorney lol. Arrived at Bex's and found that Frazier (the family dog) was glad to see me, and greeted me by licking my legs ... ordered pizzas and all gathered in the front room (how we managed to fit about 15 people in there I'll never know!) Had a mosey around on facebook with Emma and witnessed Adam harrassing Jon ... lets say there was touching ...

we decided to watch 'i am legend' which resulted in alot of sceraming, on and off film, pity we only saw half of it :( there was also an incident involving claire's foot ... had hot choc too which reasured me a little bit.

evaluation - i have the best strange friends =]

Summer days on the grass =]

Summer!!! It’s finally here!! Weather (haha) or not its here to stay is another issue though! Had a really good day on Thursday! I decided to be daring ... and wore a dress to college, served me right when it blew up just as the college bus came round the corner. Got to college and made my way to geology to have some fun looking at ‘dead biology’ as Rachy-babe put it. I, Becky, Alice, Sarah, Danielle, Shawnee and Pauline discussed the usual issue of ‘cake Friday’ as Mr. Clowes handed out work on ... coal. Toby also broke the coal ... somehow. Were still trying to get that field trip to Southport to see the ‘interesting’ rock waterstones is made out of organised, will be quite an achievement if it happens as we only have three weeks left! Bex, Rach and me decided to go to Tesco in our free next to get Bex an outfit for her interview! It was really nice ... until I got barbed wire stuck in my toe!! Moving on ... got Bex a dress and Rach had beans on toast in the cafe and bought me a random hash brown =] got back to college and met up with Emma.
We decided to have CU (Christian union) on the field! Playing a game of splat and building a human pyramid are excellent ways of attracting the attention of about a hundred people. The donuts were good that day and sent me and Bex hyper! We did something we hadn’t done since primary school ... TWIZZIES! This ended with both of us on the ground laughing so hard I thought I was going to be sick ... ah the fun of being immature... Jon, David and Tom came to visit us too =]

Also went to visit Mrs. Meadows – my legendary dancing teacher who I haven’t seen for a good few weeks! It was great to be back in the studio and join in a bit of tap ... must go back again soon. Can’t wait for summer to arrive properly! I think its going to be a memorable one!

Church walk, Band night out and Network Ramble

A very hectic weekend began bright and early on saturday morning. Me and and the rest of the Cairns crew packed up the car and headed down to church to collect Peter, Ian, Mike, Katheryn and Andy for an adventure in minature up Pen-y-gent. had a quick dance around the carpark with Kathryn with one shoe ... and donated the sat-nav to Peter and embarked on our jorney.

Arrived at 10.00am, had a quick brief of the plan and left Vicky and Kathryn to navigate for D of E practice. Mike and me found some interesting abuse of limestone and took a quick pic for Mr Clowes. Reached the sumit in good time and stopped for a quick break, after rescuing a group of old ladies stuck on the scramble bit near the top! Headed down to the pot hole where we had lunch and some interesting gymnastic moves from Andy... Stopped at cafe for a quick pint of tea and scones! before having a daisy collecting competition in the carpark.

Got home 5.00pm and did some revision, then went out to pizza hut with 'the band'. Had a bit of fun parking Mike and Andy's cars at the front, then ordered far too much food causing me to throw my fone repeatedly across the room! (the second time was to demonstrait the first ...) Discussed T'shirts for the band and how to go about ice cream factories! All in all a good day enjoyed by all .. must do it again soon.

5.30am sunday morning! waaay too early. Yet again me and dad packed up the car and started out for Capel Curig in wales. attempted to revise chemistry on the way, but fell asleep at about St,Asph (spelling?) Met Matt, Smiler and Lucy and the others at the campsite and managed to eat something. conditions were quite good to start with, and we all enjoyed the scramble to the top of Tryfan including one v.diff! Also found a stray boot on the hill ... can't imagen how someone would loose such a thing! A quick snack at the summit before making a quick escape attempt as the weather deterioated into mist, rain and awfull visability. decided to skip Bristly Ridge and headed down to the road.

A while later once everyone had dryed off, we headed for the Bryn Tyrch pub for a quick drink and a discussion with Ash about my ice climbing in the Cairngorms on snow and ice!

Weather took a turn for the worst on the homeward jorney which made it hard for dad to teach me how to 'read corners'. found out the sat-nav lies and adds on time no matter how fast you drive! Got home a good few hours later and had a gear sort out in the celler before eating alot and going to bed!

Conclusion ... a very good weekend, felt like i achieved something ... an excellent de-stress from exams =] xXx