Gwen Moffat is an inspiration. She began climbing just after the war, leaving the army to live a transient life in hills, cliffs and mountains of Cornwall, Wales, Scotland and far beyond. She became the first British female Guide. She lived on a boat with...
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By Hannah Thomson // There has to be no giddier a team than two girls from Hull finding themselves in a rental car on the Spanish coast on a Sunday morning in March on their way to climb in Costa Blanca. Lydia and I had met working at Rockcity Climbing Centre the previous winter and, after hearing rumours of sunny sport climbing abroad, we booked flights to Alicante and worked out the rest afterwards. We found cheap accommodation at the Orange House near the village of Finestrat and hired a rental car from Alicante airport which made getting to the many crags a piece of cake. That, and we had managed to borrow a guidebook (from the 80s) and commandeered a SatNav. Oh, and a brand new 60m rope belonging to one of our friends.
As 2013 draws to a close it may be time to think about the year ahead and your goals. It's all too common to start something with good intentions, but not continue past the first few weeks or the first month. So what motivates us? Interest Choose something...
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When starting out climbing it can be incredibly confusing trying to decipher what people mean when making reference to the types of climbing you can do outside, in winter. Here we try to demystify some of the terms.
Winter Climbing can be defined as climbing, in winter conditions, using
Winter Climbing has its own grading system. The Scottish System is different to the system used in continental Europe. Rather than expanding on this here, I refer you to the Mountaindays website, which has a good clear explanation of Scottish Winter Climbing Grades and Alpine...
Read MoreIn our efforts to give a succinct overview of Winter Climbing, we thought it would be useful to provide other short definitions as follows:
Winter Mountaineering is generally considered to be something different to Winter Climbing and to be larger in scope or scale than ‘climbing’.
Fundamentally, mountaineering most often involves summiting a mountain. It also often refers to longer ‘classic’ lower grade routes – usually no harder than Grade II, very occasionally graded II/III.
It is usual to climb a mountaineering route with a single axe, although on the harder ones many people now carry a second tool ‘just in case’!
You could feel the buzz from the moment you stepped in, instantly spotting all the elite climbers milling about and chatting with other attendees. Initially I was a bit star-struck, but they were so friendly and welcoming it felt like you were just there with a load of mates.
The workshops I attended were Awkward Holds and Dynamic Climbing. I was looking forward to an afternoon of talks including Rebecca Dent’s talk on nutrition and losing weight safely.
Aside from sessions covering the practical care of our bodies there were plenty of inspiring talks at the Women’s Climbing Symposium this year.
The delightful Emma Flaherty talked about how she fitted in her job around climbing. Emma was a bundle of enthusiasm. We learnt about
There’s a certain irony about going to a women’s anything when you have stomach cramps and all you want is to be fed chocolate. Entering a room full of friendly sporty women with a passion for climbing was just the start of a day designed to uplift, excite and inspire climbers from 14 – 70+. The day started with a talk on the history of women climbers by Angela Soper. I managed to get a sneaky photo of Angela climbing – if you think you’re too old for climbing, think again. Back in the day, these amazing women were climbing in skirts and hobnailed boots! More about Angela here.
Beth with Pinnacle Club member at the Women’s Climbing Symposium
The Common Injuries talk by Anne Rigge, a Physiotherapist, tied in well with previous Yoga session and taught us all sorts of facts – like the fact that it takes women 6 weeks to build muscle, 6 weeks! No wonder I’ve been frustrated when coming back from injury. For men, it’s a much shorter time, so if you have a male climbing partner
Angela Soper is a stalwart of the climbing community. She was President of the Pinnacle Club when I was only three years old (1981) and she has inspired a whole generation of UK women climbers through her mixture of consistent climbing spanning a period of 50 years and her work acting as a centre point and bringing women together to climb harder.
Most recently she has been rewarded for her commitment to climbing by being named as an Honorary Member of the BMC alongside Gwen Moffat.
Angela still climbs. Regularly. At the age of 50 she won