Rob - Why I Love Climbing

Climbing saved me from a downward spiral which, when I look back on it, worries me how it could have ended. I had just gone through a very messy break up with a girlfriend of seven years. My heart was broken, I was angry all the time and I was drinking far too much and far too often.

I was also suddenly quite lonely living in London. I knew I had to get away for a bit, so I phoned a good friend who had recently moved to Bristol and asked if I could come down and see him for the weekend. He didn’t have any plans apart from climbing, which he said I was welcome to come to. What did I have to lose?

I headed down and got my first taste of climbing in the Wye valley. I know that these days it is probably rare to climb outdoors before you ever climb indoors, but that is how it happened for me. We top roped a few routes at Ban-y-gor and then did a four pitch severe at Wintour’s leap.


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Gogarth, School Bullies and White Horses

I visited Gogarth this weekend, for the first time in over 30 years. This place holds special memories for me; climbing here as a teenager for the first time was one of the most exhilarating and terrifying experiences I have ever had. It is a special place. Beautiful, iconic, intimidating, atmospheric, one can feel the climbing history of the place and to climb here is both an adventure and a privilege.

My partner for the day, Alison, and I had planned to do a route called A Dream of White Horses. Neither of us had done this iconic route, a route which is surely on the tick list of every trad climber in the UK if not the world – that is how famous this route is. I’ve wanted to do it ever since seeing the famous Ed Drummond picture from his first ascent, the waves (or white horses) crashing below him as he makes his way airily across the Wen Zawn slab.

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Ellie West - Just Let Go

It feels like a bit of a taboo subject, to be a climber and suffer from vertigo.

I've always suffered from vertigo, a debilitating if fairly rational (to a certain point) fear of falling and heights. Put me on a precipice and watch me tremble. Even writing this makes me feel a little strange. I feel like I am coming clean and admitting to a drug addiction. My work counts on me being able to cope in and be at ease in mountainous areas, so vertigo is my dirty little secret that I keep hidden away, buried deep inside.

At the time in my life that I decided to learn to climb I was looking for something - I hadn’t a clue what, maybe it was a challenge I needed, something to take me away from a job I was disillusioned with, in a city where I was feeling increasingly alone. I needed something to make me feel alive. Confronting my fear, I decided, was a sure fire way of hitting the nail on the head - plus much cheaper than alcohol.

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