sleeping systems

Outlined below are some systems that I have tested or observed being used during a couple of my holidays.

Warm Climate eg Turkey
The first part of the system is the Qeuncha 2 second simple tent, small and light enough to be packed as hold luggage. An interesting feature of this tent design is its ability to look like a two man tent in the shop while only actually being a one and a half man tent. The second part of the system is sleeping bag and mat.
Danny's version of this system was just a wool jumper. I took tent, mat, bag and pillow danny didn't! No problem as Josito camp site loaned a blanket and mat and we used beer to overcome the smallness of the tent. We were advised that the mat might have a hole, yes, it didn't stay inflated. By the light of day it looked like a tea bag.

Temperate climate eg Font
My mate rocked up for a quick blast at the worlds best climbing venue and as I was car camping he borrowed the renowned 2 second simple. After the first night there was a bit of grumbling about the thermarest not being comfortable, after the third I had a good listen to the mat and located a hole. He had been sleeping on the freezing ground!

Brassmonkey climate eg Font
see through bag. no box wall here just a couple of feathers in each pocket
blanket from mister bed folded in half so dont move during the night
foam mat to soak up and mature the milk spilled on to the tarpaulin below the leaking ground sheet
sleep fully clothed
make sure the other occupant of the tent has a 900 fill Marnot bag so they keep openoing the tent due to being too hot

Gear

BMC International Meet

So this is the driest spring on record! There has been sunny weather for months. Then when I commit to try a bit of climbing………. it rained. (actually the other time I tried to climb in the UK in 2011 it also rained which, on that occasion, precipitated prussiking out of the Ruckle! Twice! in one evening)

But this is my story of the international meet……. Sunday: as I drove West along that flat straight section of the A5 the sun was setting behind moody cloud shrouded Snowdonian peaks reminding me of a scene from Lord of the rings and giving a premonition of the apocalyptic weather waiting in the mountains.

True to form it was a wet Monday morning so my Finnish guest, Perttu, and I headed to the North coast on Calum’s advice, thanks, you saved us the soaking most of the other climbing teams got. Sport climbing from the beach of LPT was good and we got a couple of routes ticked before the tide chased us back up to Marine Drive where I dug deep and enjoyed a 6c retro-flash.

Perttu at LPT

Tremadog. I had never climbed there before so when we arrived I, as usual, didn’t have a clue what to climb so finding a route called Helsinki Wall in the guide was obviously a good omen. Strolling to the top of the crag to start climbing was unusual and more walking than I would have preferred but I finally located the descent gully and some extremely unappealing looking rock that must have been Helsinki wall. Brilliant! Perttu had travelled all the way to North Wales for me to show him some sport routes and a chossy looking gully wall. Worse was to follow……. as we were now at the foot of the crag I instigated plan b and tried to locate the second pitch of Stromboli, to my embarrassment this actually resulted with me climbing a tree, slinging a branch for protection as I ascended loose rock and brambles to reach the grass. Cool. Later on Perttu made short work of the good E2 Plastic Nerve but that’s not so surprising considering he has climbed Fr8a on gear (~E8).

Alex on the Ramp

On Wednesday all the climbing teams swapped round and I was with a different guest. Alex had led a handful of routes on gear before the meet but had been happy on an E1 he had strayed on to! so I pointed out Gauntlet on the upper tier at Gogarth and he was psyched for the lead. No dramas with this line or The Ramp so we had a go at Central Park, as Gogarth cracks don’t exist in Serbia to practice on Alex had been training on a campus board. Maybe this is why he had a bit of a moment as he quickly learnt about rapid down-climbing for a shake out. From my hanging belay below I was trying to explain about my aversion of shock loading any gear when Alex stepped back up and finished the awkward crack in good style.

Alex on Central Park

I had a good week, I hope the guests did too!

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Bad Landing

As I was driving I saw a strange thing:
From the trees blew a leaf that bounced off the radiator grille and landed in the middle of the bonnet with a thud that was slightly too loud to be the noise of a leaf landing on a bonnet?
Still driving, I squinted through the windscreen at the leaf caught motionless in that eddy caused by the sleek Landrover streamlining, once stopped I cautiously prodded the bat hoping it was not bleeding (or would make me bleed in revenge for driving in to it then poking it).  Happily nothing other happened than the furry matchbox shuffled its wings back in to order.  Studying it by the light of a torch beam I could see a delicate transparent membrane poking from below its nose, the membrane was part of the bats precise ultrasonic echo location, I guessed. Incorrectly. As the bat came to its senses it finished chewing the insect it had been chasing and ate the wing that was hanging from its mouth.
Unblinking, it fixed me with tiny black crystal eyes then maybe because I had just blinded the nocturnal creature it started off on a circuit of the bonnet moving with a surprisingly efficient shouldery crawl on its elbows (wrists? or some other anatomical adaption).  After I picked up the bat its hooked ‘feet’ helped make rapid and determined progress up my arm until I couldn’t hold my nerve any longer and scooped it off my shoulder.  I’m not sure what passing drivers thought about the figure standing in the dark with one arm raised like a Nazi salute but the bat hung upside down from my finger for a while then flapped off back in to the trees.

Normandy House

10 days away in France and I didn't even see a cloud! The trip started fiery hot when Graeme persuaded me to try some chili sauce, Dragons blood or something. Extreme, and that was just a trace of a taste, luckily the dangerous Naga chemicals were forgotten back in the car and didn't have to be explained to any customs officials looking for chemical weapons. Waking up the morning after the drive south it felt good to be back in springtime Font and I was sort of keen to try some problems, when I did find a suitably easy problem to attempt it was, as I expected, hard work. Several months away from climbing was bound to lead to a drop in performance so to try and get back to climbing at somewhere near my previous level I left Font and headed to the Normandy coast.

While I was away Pete and Graeme set about some good problems and projects, Graeme getting fingers that are more used to plastic a bit thrashed on his projects while Pete went for mileage on his 7a quest. When I returned everyone was happy with the problems they had climbed but I'm sure their wafer thin skin was deeply happy that the chili sauce never made it over the channel.

My west coast training consisted of large streak barbecue's, beer, sitting around and, although I'm usually not a fan of sea food, very tasty scallops. It was cool to see my family and afterwards, luckily, there was enough time to get back to Font and give my fingers some exercise. The weekend I arived back in Font was a bank holiday and lots of UK boulderers had descended on Isatis, Sabot, Cuvier etc, car parks were full with GB, D, B and E plated vehicles but few French! Lots of chalk had been slapped over the usual problems and not brushed off, I hope this level of use is sustainable. Luckily we could still find some quieter problems to try and I enjoyed hauling myself up a 6c.

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Ansteys Cove

Ansteys Cove in the sun, fantastic! Andre, Dan and I headed to the coast for a quick Sunday/Monday blast, them climbing, me snapping away........

Andre quickly ticked Cider Soak (8a, 3rd rp over two days) he also red pointed Just Revenge 7c+ and "flashed" Empire of the Sun 7b with a tiny amount of beta (not forgetting the interesting looking 7b slab event).

Dan got his project route Just Revenge.

On Sunday a couple of other teams were providing me with some entertainment.....
The Dawson brothers (12 and 14yrs) warmed up on Empire then worked their projects: Cider Soak and Fishermans Tale (8b). Not bad!
Tim and Grant were going well, as were the Castle team.

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Brands Hatch

Well this is different.

It was a steep learning curve trying to pick Matt out from the other riders with enough time to be able to get him in the centre of my cameras view finder then keep him there while Canon works its magic. The grindingly slow autofocus of my 100 quid lens (mainly brought for it's macro ability!) didn't really help but just as the shadows extended across the track I had some shots that looked ok on the camera.

Unfortunately, fortunately? I have never ridden a bike so I'm not sure what subtle details to try and capture on film and maybe something that I've photographed because it appeals to me will not look good to a rider? sorry! I do know that getting your knee down is a good thing...........




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More last shots