Beginnings...

I got the idea to start this blog on a Sunday afternoon after reading other climbers (inspiring) blogs about Scottish climbing. At the time I was supposed to be reading an article about 7th Century Sicilian Saints (in French), when I'd rather have been outside... My procastinatory research led me to the conclusion that most climbing blogs are written by cranking supermen capable of cruising 8b/E7/IX. As a result I'd thought I'd share my flailings with you, so that you can laugh at my ineptitude, hopefully enjoy tales of my climbing adventures (epics?) and possibly get a wee bit of inspiration. (I Hope that didn't sound too pretentious)

You may have noticed that this blog is entitled Seasonal Affected Disorder, this is because I'm primarily a winter monkey and get very excited when I see ice/rime/blobs of frozen turf, when it all melts away I get a bit sad until the frosts start again in the autumn. That isn't to say I don't enjoy rock climbing, I do, especially long mountain routes, dank gullies, bridging corners, squirmy chimneys and slabs. However, being weak and possessing the finger strength of an eight year old girl (whom I'm probably doing a disservice to), I don't really like anything steep, fingery or burly.

As well as doing a bit of climbing I also like to play records, mainly techno and the more minimal side of house so I decided to include a recent mix for download. It starts off with a Henrik Schwarz remix (who can do no wrong at the moment) and then goes a bit deep and detroity before picking up at the end with the ace Carl Craig remix of X-Press2's Kill 100 and the brutal When the Fever Breaks by Abe Duque. Enjoy...
(scroll down and the download function is at the bottom left)



At the moment I'm writng this in the library when the memories of last weekend seem pretty distant, Chad, Humble and I went on a speculative trip to Assynt (missing out on the 'best weekend of partying™' according to Viv) and came up trumps. Things looked a bit grim when we rocked up at the Stoer lighthouse and hail rocked the car as we listened to the cricket. I was rather enjoying the meliffluous tones of Blowers and the thought of settling down for the rest of the day seemed quite attractive, but it stopped raining and the sun then shone for the rest of the weekend. After the the invigorating swim to the Old Man, we climbed the E1 Diamond Face Route, which takes a crack on the South face before swinging onto the landward one and crossing a roof, finishing with some exposed face climbing and a fine corner. I didn't win many style points, backing off my pitch and then shamelessly stepping in slings to overcome the roof whilst seconding. Oh Well. The atmospheric ab completed the adventure.

After being chased out of Lochinver by a drunken, pyschotic paratrooper the night before, Sunday was spent at the Seal Song area at Reiff, warm in the sun but baltic in the wind. I kept up my recent rich vein of success by failing on Diamond Back which everyone agreed was a complete sandbag at HVS 5a. Humble bagged possibly the worlds softest E1 Street Surfer and Chad successfully tussled with the steep E4 Modern Thinking (above). Despite the sun, the weather was unseasonably cold, the hills from the Fannichs south had a reasonable dusting of new snow above 800m and the car thermometer read one degree at Drumochter on the way home, a bit parky for the end of May.