Chee Tor Classics

Today I met Pete Harris, Pete Brown, Dave and Ben at the usual spot to come up with a plan. Chee Tor was decided, so we bundled into one car and made are way across. It was much drier today than last week, so I was pretty keen to get on something tricky. There was also a lot of other folks at the crag today which was great to see.

Mr Harris started us off coolly leading Meditation E1 5b***, whilst Ben led Approaching E2 5b*.

Above: Ben on Approaching

Below: Me on Midnight Summer Dream

It had started to warm up so I decided to get straight on Midnight Summer Dream E5 6a** before it was too warm. It also looked slabby, so I thought that I would be warmed up enough. I was very wrong about the slabby part. The climbing was excellent, but extremely dirty. I had to clean pretty much every hold of dirt, dust, leaves and cobwebs as I went, which meant I was over gripping and getting more pumped than I should have. After the tricky bold start the gear was excellent all the way, as was the continually sustained and technical climbing. I did take a good fall off the crux when I missed the small pocket I was going to and my hand slipped of the poor dirty nob I was holding, gutted. It went fine the next go as it was not that hard, just dirty.

Mr Brown then cruised Sergeyenna E1 5b** and Dave Hergiani E2 5b*. I lost track of Ben and Dave after this but think that they climbed Spintered Perspex E3 6a** and Match of the Day E2 5c*.

Above: Dave on Hergiani

My focus had switched to the Numbers as he was trying to onsight pitch 1 of Apocalypse E4 6a,5c*** which gets E3 in its own right. Unfortunately, the body was not as willing as the mind today, which is normally how it is for me. So Pete retreated from the crux . We needed the gear back, so I set off. Longer legs and reach deffinately makes the crux a little easier. The climbing was not that physical, so I cracked on up the second pitch as well. This was outstanding and committing climbing with the gear hard won. This was pretty clean as a team had climbed it

before us.

Above & Below: Me on Apocalypse

Completely knackered we made the walk back to the car with a few good routes in the bag.