What’s it like to hit the ground? Angus Kille finds out.


M


y first big fall. Not the first, or last, sketchy escapade with Tom Fenwick, my climbing partner and fellow teenage misfit. We started climbing


together, having learnt that rock climbing was a thing, and that Nesscliffe was nearby, we would spend almost every weekend messing about at the crag. We taught each other to climb and learnt to do it safely having tried every other way first.


Marlene was bold and ambitious for a couple of lads that didn’t know what they were doing. But that’s what climbing was about: going for it, not knowing what you were going for and not knowing what you didn’t know.


A good route, E4 6a with a typically sandy lower section and slightly less sandy upper section; a bunch of sandy pockets lead you to a corner which allows a safe end to the route, once you’ve clipped the peg.


“I HUNG IN THE AIR THERE FOR AGES, A FEW METRES SHORT OF THE PEG WITH A SLACK ROPE AND ABOUT EIGHT METRES OF NOTHING BELOW ME.”


SUMMIT#90 | SUMMER 2018 | 21


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62