Bludgered

Since my car died a couple of months ago I've begun to realise how useful one is to take you climbing (funny that) and without one you've got to be flagrant lift whore in order to get away. As a result I'm going to be sitting on my arse in Edinburgh this weekend whilst the West coast is bathed in sun, the mountain crags are nice and dry and my flatmates take advantage of it (last time I offer any lifts). Not that I'm bitter or anything...
Anyway, earlier on this week Konnie and I got the bus to the Kingshouse and spent 3 days climbing on the Buachaille. At least not having a car gains me to gain some green points, allowing me to assuage my conscience about trips in the volvo with only two people in it to the North West.


Despite the Geoffcast's assertion of 90% chance of cloud free munro's, Tuesday was surprisingly overcast and the previous days of rain led us to the reliably quick drying Rannoch Wall. The problem about the Buachaille is that most of the butressess face East so unless you get an early start you spend most of the day climbing in the shade which is always quite galling when Rannoch Moor is bathed in sunlight, unless you're hard enough for Tunnel Wall. I started on the VS Fracture Route before Konnie cruised up Engineer's Crack an E1 just to the left with steady gear and a couple of steeper moves near the top, judging by the number muttered fucks at that point. We finished up Grooved Arete, which takes a delicate shallow diedre up the edge of Rannoch Wall, perhaps a tad overgraded at VS but a great way to finish the day and as the guide book eulogises on the 'world's best rock'.



After spending the evening eavesdropping in on the hardcore travails of the West Highland Wayers we were back for round 2, camping at the Kingshouse rather reduces your options to the Buachaille but that's not too much of an issue with so much rock and variety on offer. The walk up was pretty sweaty and the quick bath at the waterslide welcomingly refreshing. We settled on the East face of North Buttress and a slightly earlier arrival time allowed some climbing in the sun which inevitably led to a hefty dose of sunburn. We had a bit of a faffy day especially on Mainbrace Crack (HVS 5a) and enjoyed Crows Nest Crack and the superb bridging corner of Hangmans Crack, the latter looking a bit goey at VI/7 in winter. I can also report that the midgies are now coming out in force, I got murdered having a bbq on Wednesday and I've been itching since.


When you first see Slime Wall from across Great Gully it really knocks you for six, you don't get the sense of scale from below despite the intimidating sweep of steep, clean rock towering over you. We'd come to do Bludger's Revelation , a route that we had walked in for the previous summer only to find it occupied, which led an interesting day on Raven's Gully , fully living up to its billing as 'a route for connisseur of Scottish gully climbing'. Highly reccomended if you want a good giggle. The Wall was fairly dry, a wee wet patch at the start of Bludger's you could easily bridge around, the crux of Shibboleth looked damp, but in three visits I've only seen it dry in winter during a failed attempt on Raven's.

The climbiing on Bludger's is simply brilliant, beginning with a fairly sustained groove on the first pitch which is probably the technical crux but a stitch up, then the bold link pitch - a brilliant piece of route finding by Jimmy Marshall and finally the breathtakingly exposed flake pitch. Undercutting the flake must be one of the great positions in Scottish climbing, certainly at HVS. The hundreds of feet of feet of air lapping at your feet as you move up the flake on the most positive of foot and handholds is more than exhilarating and elicited a genuine whoop of joy from a mouth more used to muttering nervous profanties. There can't be many better at the grade in the UK and its probably gone it at number two in my personal list, edging in front of Centurion but marginally behind Moonraker at Berry Head. A cracking day out, only slightly marred by getting a soaking on the walk out.



On another positive note I'm hopefully getting a new car in the next week or so, so I can play at being the lift-fuhrer once again...