Swastika Stones

On saturday afternoon I headed up to Swastika Stones (named after this) to meet up with Matt and Jim - who'd travelled all the way from Sheffield to visit this quality bit of esoteric grit. I'd only been there once before on a sunny evening not long after moving to Burley so was keen to see what it was like in colder conditions. It was grey and windy and although a lot of the rock looked damp it was in pretty good condition.

After warming up we spent a load of time working out the sequence on a 6A arete which I thought I hadn't done before but according to my ticklist on yorkshiregrit apparently had and even more time working out the sequence on Christmas Day arete which I'd also apparently done before. I hadn't done this on the right-hand side though and couldn't use the lank method Matt and Jim worked out and so after many skin-ripping slaps for the sloper that Matt and Jim could get statically we moved onto something else.

I had said to Nicky that I'd come back in time to watch the rugby but we soon got sucked into trying the dyno Swastika Eyes that gets 7B in the latest Yorkshire bouldering guide. The top of this was pretty damp giving a limited area to catch:



Matt got his hand over the top after a couple of jumps and soon had it ticked - although topping out pulling on clumps of heather looked pretty exciting! A lot of tries later I also managed to stick the top and opted for a scary mantle on the 2 inches of dry rock on the lip instead of the heather option. Unfortunately I'm pretty sure that this isn't 7B and I wouldn't argue with the 6C this gets on yorkshiregrit. Whatever grade it is it's a great fun dyno - kind've like an easier version of Jet Set.

I headed home to find that Nicky's grumpiness that I'd not made it back in time for the match was partly defused by the fact that Wales had beaten England!