Stanage

Well we had lovely end of lockdown climbing sessions at Harboro Rocks (Wed eve 31st Mar) and Stanage (Sat 3rd April). At Harboro it was positively balmy with people climbing in tee shirts until the sun went down at which point we had a celebration drink. Quite unexpected and completely the opposite of last year when it snowed (Tony dug out the photos to prove it!). Stanage started very cold, too cold for my fingers to grip confidently but then late morning the weather quietly changed the sun came out and the wind dropped and it turned into a Summer’s day. Quite amazing.

It was so lovely seeing people, to enjoy the banter without the zoom embarrassing pauses and of course to get on the rock. For my part I felt so rusty but slowly confidence comes back .. wish strength would come back too.

The rock was great too as if the lack of climbing over the last year had improved the grip and exaggerated the wonderfully weird shapes that the very contrasting dolomitic limestone and pure grit produces.

For the record, we had 10 people at Harboro (9 climbers and a well wisher) and 7 at Stanage. We of course climbed in 2s or 3s to be Covid rules compliant.

Harboro was v busy (Oread were there too) but at no time did it feel too crowded and you could choose the climb of your choice. Stanage was surprisingly much quieter than a normal weekend perhaps reflecting the unfriendly, but incorrect, weather forecast.

We parked at the Plantation car park and climbed between Dover Wall and Mississippi Buttress well away from the slightly busier popular end.