Wallowbarrow, Pillar & Scafell

Just back from a weekend of climbing in the western Lake District. Friday night myself an Ash left soon after work managing to get to Wallowbarrow, a small crag in the Duddon Valley just above Seathwaite that neither of us had climbed at before. The crag is of a southern aspect so the rock was nice and warm from having the sun all day, the approach is also fairly tame being perhaps 10-15 minutes from the car park at the farm.

As a bit of a warm up for the weekend we jumped on Digitation, VS 4b**. The route first follows a large slab for 36m with some lovely climbing, at about 2/3rds height there is a slightely move bold which both he guidebook states and we inferred from the grade, its actually fine though. There then a small walk up a grassy terrace which leads to the final pitch; up a crack line on a steep wall, and then a series of ledges to the top of the crag. Some guides give the route MVS, while other give it VS. I don't think I've done enough MVSs (simply because the grade is fairly modern so not many exist) to know what one feels like however if it is VS, I'd say its certainly a soft touch at that.

Shamrock and Pillar Rock, Grooved Wall follows a line of weakness up the large smooth looking wall on the right.

Sunday we headed into Pillar Rock, on the backside of Pillar from Wasdale with primary objective of doing a reconnaissance of Slab an Notch route, the scramble/climbers descent that we'll be using when we take the late Dave Ridout's ashes up there in a few weeks time. After some careful placing of sacks at different points on the crag we headed round to the North East face of the massive rock bastion and set off up Grooved Wall, VS 5a***. Ash did the first pitch, which the guidebook does make apologies for and states is out of character with the rest of the route as its an awkwards series of moist grassy ledges which eventually lead up to the base of the groove, the only significant line of weakness of the fairly blank face. I took the second pitch which is the 5a crux, and wastes not time as after a few moves its time to pull through the overhang and into the groove proper. The move is superbly well protected, ideally by no9. hexcentric or a big cam (probably a friend 3.5 or BD 2) and actually feels pretty easy for 5a, although the bomber gear by your waist is a big comforting factor. 20m Of crack climbing with the odd bit of bridging then follow, of which most of it can be almost exclusively protected by slinging chock-stones in the crack before a belay is reached. Ash joined me after doing sterling job of pulling through the crux with our team sack, and then lead off up the final pitches, running the next 4b and final 4c pitch together in one. The final 4c pitch which follows the groove up its steep termination has some lovely climbing on it.

The evening was spent in the Wasdale Head Inn, which pleasantly had a beer festival on including an outside BBQ which was superb. Apparently this is an annual thing so the date has gone in the diary for next year.

Sunday, while Ash an Phil headed up to the Napes on Great Gable to do some classic rock ticking myself and Tom headed up Scafell. Neither of us had climbed on Scafell, and its somewhere I've really wanted to climb for a long time now. Its big for a start, high, being the highest crag in England or thereabout, clean, steep and imposing and a whole host of other things that make a good crag. Its fair slog up from Wasdale Head, taking us about 1.5hours to the base of the crag. It was fairly windy and the rock was pretty cold so we decided to start off up Moss Ghyll Grooves MVS 4c***. Tom led the first short pitch out of Moss Ghyll and up to the grooves where I took over for the 4c crux, which certainly feels 4c and I don't think would be out of place on any regular VS. This first follows a corner crack in the groove before a delicate traverse out onto the arete which is followed for a few meters until a steep move leads out of the groove and into the sentry box. Tom did the next pitch which had a lovely combination of crack an slab before the final pitch that led us to the top. A really good route.

Scafell Crag, Botteril's Slab is the obvious leftwards slanting line in the center.

After the descent down Broad Stand we went for Botteril's Slab VS 4c***, which I'd had my eye on since getting to the crag as its a very obvious and compelling line. Tom did the 4b pitch that approaches the slab and then I led off up the meat of the route, the 4c slab pitch. I found it a bit stuff for VS 4c I have to say, with the climbing being very delicate and yet sustained on small holds as you teeter up the steep slab (its probably 75-80 degrees) this could be because I was pretty tried bythis point, it was quite cold and some of the holds were a little damp. The gear is good on the route, however I though the there was some distance between some of the bomber placements. Tom finished up the final 4a pitch to the top. Anyhow the pitch is superb, and one of the best I've climbed in absolutely fantastic situation. Go and do it, its well worth it.