The valley of St Johns in the Vale winds it way along the bottom of a very steep valley linking Thirlmere and the road to Penrith together. Part way down this in the insanely steep hillside is a huge gorge carved from the rock. This is Sandbed Gill. It’s a huge ‘v’ shaped cleft in the hillside as if someone has swung an axe into the ground. So, given it’s so bleeding obvious, why did we drive past it twice before finding it and then almost go up the wrong river? I may have my Mountain Leader, but it doesn’t teach people how to navigate while driving along twisty roads. Reaching Castle Rock was our hint we’d probably gone wrong.

The other problem was that it contained no water. We expected huge waterfalls and running water, not a dry streambed and a few stagnant pools of green goo. It starts from the road though which is nice - just hop over the barbed-wire fence and off up the rocks.For the first few hundred metres it’s simple scrambling with a fence to negotiate. After that simple introduction the fun begins. The sides tower above and close in, and it doesn’t relent until an hour and a half later you escape its clutches at the top of the hill. I’ve seen places like this before and they’ve scared the crap out of me as I’ve always seen them from the top.

The climbing is excellent typical ghyll scrambing. That means greasy rounded rock, exposed climbing with the potential for really nasty falls into places nobody can get into. Climbing E3 might be technically hard and potentially dangerous, but unroped scrambing on loose rock in a ravine can be more fatal - as the various decomposing sheep corpses demonstrated. One sheep saw fit to decompose in a pool right at the top of a hard climb, and it wasn’t until pulling up on the large boulder at the end that we realised just why it was so sticky and slippy. Suddenly coming eyeball to eyesocket with a dead sheep is quite a surprise, not as surprising as finding a leech suckering its way up your arm though.

Some parts couldn’t be climbed directly and we had to escape up the sides and traverse along the hillside. At the time it was fairly straight forward - the simple climbing mentality of “I have to go this way because it’s the only way” takes over. Grass becomes a valid load bearing substance, loose things get pulled on very carefully and fingers become primed for the next hold. Once on safe ground it’s quite amazing at what someone clueless will totter around on quite happily without a care. It’s not that we don’t realise what we’re doing it’s more that by ignoring the obvious danger of falling off the task of staying attached becomes easier. Climbing’s all in your head - think about falling off and it probably will. Anyone can stand at the edge of a kerb with their toes poking over and not fall onto the road, so anyone can stand at the top of a 70m crag with their toes poking over the edge and not fall. The only difference is the height.

The top was interesting. Most ghylls gradually fade into the hillside and become swamp. This one ends in a small network of mini streams and then steep hillside. To get down there’s two options - go the direct route and fall down the crags around the sides of the ghyll, or walk right around the top of the hill to a large grassy bank. The long way has an exposed traverse across the top of a gully that now we know it exists, would make a good way off.

I can’t work out why I like ghyll scrambing. I think it’s the feeling of adventure. With a rock climb it’s either obvious where to go, or the guidebook will explain where the pitches go. In a ghyll I’m free to decide my own route, making it as hard or easy as I feel, getting wet or staying dry. Since I choose my own route, I’m never in a position of suddenly looking down and going “oh cack, how did I get here?”. I do like rock climbing, but again it needs to be more than wrenching myself up a hard route that I can see from the ground.

A huge storm has just finished blowing over us. All day the weather has been exceptionally hot, sunny, hazy and strangely windy. The kind of weather that makes people tired, sticky and want to go to sleep - or, if you’re English, to strip off and expose white flesh to the elements. I came outside this evening to a black sky and the most spectacular light show going on up in the clouds. The electrical imbalance in the sky was being discharged as giant swathes of sheet lightning and, when it got too near the tops of the mountains, real lightning. Naturally, armed with my camera I have lots of images of just after a particularly good show - i.e blackness. Photographing random events requires some kind of skill I don’t have it would seem.

The air was so hot that when the storm passed over us, emptying quite a lot of rain onto my head I felt like I was stood in a warm shower. I stayed out for a good five minutes getting wet watching the sky completely failing to capture any of it on my camera, but by the time I went in I was dry again it was that warm. It was quite a novel experience being rained on with warm rain, much more agreeable than the usual icy cold stuff that tries to strip skin off. Big fat raindrops that splash when they land and soak to the skin.

The air is now cleaner, fresher and feels somehow thinner. It’s not like it was this morning where you had to force your way through the hot stickyness. It’ll save me having to water the newly sprouted grass I sowed earlier last week.

Of course, while watching a particularly intense bit of the X-Files my room was plunged into total blackness. The timing of the powercut couldn’t have been more precise.

It was so hot today! Instead of going climbing or something as usual, some of us decided to go ghyll scrambling. This wasn’t the same as what we do with groups though. This was more interesting. For a start we were going up the river not down with the flow of water.

Originally we set off to do Sour Milk Gill (seems there’s more than one way to spell Ghyll), which is supposed to be a good grade 2 scramble with many ways to escape should the slippery rocks start to get too slippy for comfort. Driving along the road under Cat Bells we noticed the sun wouldn’t be shining on us, making the water rather cold. Just across the lake though we could see Ashness Ghyll shining in the sun (well, it wasn’t since it’s not rained properly for a while now). Deciding sunshine was good when getting wet, we drove around the lake to have a go.

It was a fairly unique experience, totally unlike other things I’ve done. Normally when doing this sort of thing you peruse the guidebook, decide if you like it, ask someone who’s done it before and generally have some clue about where you’re going and what to expect. All we’d been told about Ashness Ghyll was that “It’s a good thing if you like that sort of thing, yeah go up it if you want”. Ropes? do we need them? Nah, probably not, it’ll be right.

The first several hundred metres are fairly straight forward wanderings over the rather dry river bed. Nothing too taxing. There were a few small waterfalls to scramble up, but even those were quite tame. Slippery as ice, but quite tame and doable if you took the obvious routes up them. Quite doable if you purposefully chose the most difficult ways also. You’re about now wondering whether there’s anything more fun you could be doing as it’s all a bit boring.

Then we came to the big one. It first comes into view as a big crag in the distance. When you get next to it it starts to take form. Overall it must be 60-70m high with water running down in two tiers. The water splashing down the rocks causing them to be covered in the most slippery black slime imaginable. One look at this stuff had you slipping over. Some slime scratches off the rock with your feet, revealing fresh grippy rock below. Other slime sticks to your feet making your boots have extra grip. The black stuff we found has you almost looking for a Teflon logo on each rock. Up in the distance we spotted two other people who’d also decided to come and have a go. They had ropes.

Hmm… things were starting to look serious now. They had ropes, we didn’t. Were they being overly safe or were we trying to become another entry in this year’s Mountain Rescue report? After a little decision, some thinking, the realisation we were rock climbers and that this was rock and that it had to be climbed, we did what thousands of other people have done over the years when presented with new rock to climb and no guidebook. We took the line of least resistance to the nearest ledge. If we’d had a piece of hemp rope it’d probably have matched the first ascent of the ghyll.

And it was all fairly simple climbing and quite possible to avoid the death slime. We climbed quite easily to the top of the first waterfall, and with a bit of careful balancing and bum-shuffling, made it across the flow and onto the other side. The right-hand side being less vertical than the left now.

A short scramble of quite exposed, but easy ground lead us to a very slippy ledge where the belayer from the other group was stood. Nothing sharpens the senses like standing on a slimy ledge 30m from the ground next to a person tied to a tree. After a short exchange of pleasentaries we managed to learn that he’d never done this before and that he thought the route went upwards (duh!) and to the left. Seeing his rope go that way, and not hearing any shouts from his lead, we shuffled around and followed the rope.

What we saw was quite interesting. First there was the other end of the rope, attached to which was a drenched and slightly scared looking person. There was also the cause for her current state too - a big trench that runs back into the hillside for 20m with a 2m high step half way along. Just at the entrance of this trench (which is walled in by the same Teflon coated rocks previously mentioned) is another step formed by some large stones blocking the thing up. Unless you have Spiderman-like qualities you need to climb up the sides. This bit was actually pretty hard, requiring some very fine footwork (in waterlogged walking boots clinging to rounded holds coated in slime) and that ability of a worried climber to hold onto anything very very tightly. A few short off-balance moves performed very quickly make you end up on the top of the first step, feeling a bit happier. It helps that now when you look behind you there’s a floor, and not the area’s largest water slide with free broken legs attraction.

To climb the second step you could probably hand-jam and grunt your way up the flow of water… if you can hold your breath long enough. My attempts resulted in getting half way, looking up to see where the route went, and getting my nose rinsed out. The other people had joined me at this point and with a lot of shuffling, one of them managed to lean on one side and shuffle his knees up the other side and escape out the top. I tried this but didn’t fit. Instead, after faffing around for five minutes, I climbed out the side at the top of the previous step. This is the advantage of not having a rope. If you’re tied to each other, you have to follow where the first person went. If you can’t actually climb the way they went you have a small problem that quickly turns into a big problem.

Climbing is weird. No person made the rock I was climbing on, and the natural process of erosion doesn’t take into account the loonacy of people wanting to climb rocks. However, when you climb an otherwise unclimbable slippy wall using the only foot-hold and only hand-holds that exist - holds that are in the exact right place to ensure you are balanced and well attached to the rock - you can’t help wonder if someone before you had a hammer and chisel.

Once you’ve clawed your way out the top of the trench there’s a short crawl (literally, you’re still in climbing mode at this point - three points of contact remember!) up a slab that’d make a great slide if it weren’t for the large drop below it and onto the top. Once on the top you can stand and admire the sun setting behind Cat Bells and the nice view of Skiddaw.

According to a guidebook I have, Ashness Ghyll is a Grade 3(s) scramble, with the book describing it with a series of pitches, all of which mention ropes and belays. In perfect conditions with dry rock and rock boots, the climbing parts would be probably graded at Moderate. With the actual conditions and the random footwear worn by people ghyll scrambling, it’d push the grade up to V.Diff.

Now I want to go and do some more. It’s good training for when it starts to rain part way up a proper rock route. Next time we’ll take a piece of rope and a few bits of climbing gear.

It didn’t rain yesterday so we did go climbing. We went to Twistleton Scar which is in Ingleton. And what a nice place it is too, it’s like Stanage but without the hoards of other people and the nasty gritstone.

Limestone is a funny rock, it’s either smooth and quite grippy, polished like glass, or razor sharp. When it gets wet it’s lethally slippy - afterall, as we all learnt at school - limestone dissolves in water.

Topping out on the routes (which were all quite short 10m efforts) was a surprise, there’s so much choice to belay from. You can pretty much climb onto the top, sit down and within arm’s reach are enough knobbles of rock or holes in the rock to tie yourself and the rest of the planet down.

Different climbing techniques though. Lots of laybacks and mantleshelf moves, but hand-jamming wasn’t always necessary.

New group of kids arrive in 20 minutes, I’d best go and get ready…

Went to the Lake District for the bank holiday. Weather was very warm and still. The kind of weather that sucks moisture out of your body, but then doesn’t take it away. At one point it started raining, but I was so wet anyway and it wasn’t cold that I couldn’t be bothered putting my coat on.

On Saturday we went around the Fairfield Horseshoe. Sunday was a bit more interesting, we did the Crinkle Crags in Langdale. This starts off with a long walk along the valley floor, through a farm, and then straight up the side of the valley. Deciding it looked interesting, I bought some Kendal Mint Cake and stuffed it in my pocket, chewing the odd square on my way up (wondering what the sugar was doing to my loose filling).

We walked along the tops, stopping for the odd cup of tea and a bite to eat, watching the view, having a rest before going up The Bad Step…

The Bad Step is a 10 foot high notch cut into the side of the rock, and is a lot easier going up than coming down. Upon climbing up onto the ledge above it we were met by a group of people apparently eating their dinner, watching the view. Only one of them was sat in a space-blanket. Upon futher conversation it turned out the bloke in the blanket had just fallen about fifty feet onto the Bad Step, and was bleeding…

Just then we heard the sound of a helicopter in the distance, and a bright yellow RAF Mountain Rescue helicopter started homing in on our position. Deciding it would be wise to get out the way, I went and sat on a rock to watch the proceedings. Also, after the encounter with the last helicopter, I made sure I wasn’t going to get blown off anything.

The helicopter came closer and hovered over the grassy coll just before The Bad Step, scaring off all the sheep. Inside the ‘copter much hand waving was going on as the pilot was directed towards us.

Then they flew off…

And returned. This time they flew over my head and hovered about 20ft from it! The experience was not unlike sticking your head out of a car window doing 80MPH. Only it wasn’t your head, it was your entire body. Very loud too. Slowly a man started to be lowered down a few feet from me. He landed, disconnected his harness and, with the help of my dad, carried his big bag o’ stuff to the casualty. Meanwhile the helicopter took off again and landed on the opposite mountain out the way.

I too took off and went further up the mountain out the way. Some time later the helicopter came back and hovered over the people below. Slowly a cable with harness was lowered and the friend of the injured person with all his baggage was lifted into the helicopter. Again the line was lowered and this time the injured person and the man from the helicopter were winched upwards, spinning in the downdraught from the propellers. After steadying themselves on a rail under the helicopter’s belly the two men were lifted inside. After this, with everyone safely on board, the helicopter flew past us all and off into the cloud.

Being some of the closest people to the incident, we satisfied everyone else’s curiosity by explaining what’d happened and set off down towards The Band.

Walking down mountains is often a very slow, painful process, with tired feet and aching knees. Not this time. All of a sudden my pack felt lighter, and after eating half my Mint Cake in one go, I had a desire to get down the mountain quickly and set off at a mild jog. I managed to pass everybody who had left the top before me, and made it down in just under an hour. Raw sugar may play hell with your teeth, but your body knows exactly what to do with it. I could have run down, but my boots were rubbing and I didn’t want to have first-hand experience of being air-lifted off a mountain

On Monday we went for a nice little walk up Wandsfell Pike. A low mountain that looks deceptively simple. However it soon proved to be a right evil sod. Very steep, with a path running straight up it. Arriving half-dead and dripping with sweat we made the top and sat in the sun.

Oh, I didn’t get the job in London… they gave me some weird faffle about not having a “certain something” they were looking for and that they’d “know when they saw it” but couldn’t explain what it was. In other words “we realised we don’t need someone else just yet”.

Well, probably. The weather people keep coming out with rubbish like that. It has been rather warm though, I’m sat here melting which is a little strange since I spent 3 weeks in the US where I went walking round Hollywood in 50c temperatures and I felt fine.

There’s lots of nasty biting flies around too.

I’ve not updated the code to this site, or written any code at home. Why? well I just can’t be bothered I write code all day, and I think I’m suffering from coder’s block (that’ll be C-Coder’s block, {} :-).

I’m going to Ireland for 4 days in July. RyanAir are doing incredibly cheap flights to there for 11! (no, that wasn’t advertising, but anyone who does cheap flights are doing something right :).

It is sunday, it is sunny outside, and oddly enough for this part of the country it is also warm. I went out on my bike for a while, found the path along the top of the hill behind our house is open and went along it. 30 degree slopes with potholes in are quite fun to zoom down.

I also managed to compile kernel 2.4.5 with the crypto stuff. It took some effort. First I applied the 2.4.4->2.4.5 patch, then the international patch from kerneli, but the kernel failed to build (it moaned about the loopback fs code). I then patched my 2.4.4 kernel with the crypto stuff, then patched that to 2.4.5. It built!… but I forgot to enable ReiserFS so my machine didn’t boot. Eventually I got 2.4.5, the crypto stuff, and a booting machine! Now for some reason my joystick has stopped working. Typical.

I’m slowly updating the code behind this website. The copy on my machine lets you filter diary entries by month. I’m trying to work out the best way to restructure the downloads/code pages. I’d also like something that lets me visually draw HTML tables. Or I could learn CSS (that being “Cascading Style Sheets”, not the stupid DVD encoding algorithm that can be broken with 3 lines of Perl. OpenDVD!). I could make the effort to learn php_fasttemplate or something, but they look really complicated.

Freshmeat seems to be dead. This is a bit inconvenient…

Wish I had a permanent net connection, my modem doesn’t seem to be able to sustain two things at once. I might have buggered my firewall up though, I really should look into that.