Tag Archives: friends

The February/March Report

Good Skills

I’m still amazed at how easy the winters are in Scotland. Sure it’s cold and wet, but it’s not a patch on a miserable Canadian maritime winter. It doesn’t have the big snowfalls of New Brunswick or the stinging -15 … Continue reading

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Weekend Warriors

On Belay

The skin on my hands is quite sore at the moment. It feels like I’ve using a belt sander on my palms. Strangely enough, I also feel quite satisfied to feel this way. It means I had a great weekend. … Continue reading

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Climbing in January

Meme on Lead - Photo by Ryan Slater

That’s right. It is warm enough and dry enough to climb in January! Amazing. One weekend we headed out with Ryan and Piotr for some climbing on the Red Wall in the Longhaven Quarries area. It’s about an hour north … Continue reading

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Hogmanay in the Lake District

Brant Fells traverse

Our cancelled christmas meant we were unexpectedly here for Hogmanay (that’s scottish for new year’s eve). It’s a very popular holiday here and things tend to book up quickly, so we weren’t sure what to do. We’d tentatively decided to … Continue reading

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An Unexpected Christmas

Christmas table

Christmas this year didn’t go according to plan, but we made the best of it really. We had planned to visit family and friends in Canada. It was a good plan and we were psyched. Then unprecedented amounts of snow … Continue reading

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A Visit from the Megasar!

A fine crew.

It now seems like ages ago that Dan, Linda and their baby Viva visited. Man we had a good time, we sure hope they come back again soon. They arrived on Halloween, flying into Edinburgh and taking the train to … Continue reading

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Coastal Cragging Season Begins

Pete on Silent Partner

It seems that summer has moved on in the north east of Scotland, some might wonder if it was ever here at all, but I know it happened. It may not get real hot, or real dry, but the super long days and the many weekends of traveling far and wide testify to the summer’s existence. Continue reading

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West Coast Summer Finale Part 2: Coastal Cragging at Reiff

P9050406

Day two of our excellent climbing trip to the West Coast of Scotland had superb weather, stunning vistas, friendly faces and of course, superb climbing adventure. Continue reading

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West Coast Summer Finale: Multi-pitch on Stac Pollaidh

P9040205

The first weekend of September proved to be one of the best weekends of the summer. We made plans to go climbing with our friend Dan the previous Wednesday. For some reason Scotland had been enjoying a few days of consistently excellent weather and for once the long range forecast promised more of the same. We looked at the forecast for Ullapool and lo-and-behold, wall to wall sun and warm temps. Continue reading

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The Smuggler’s Waltz

P9010199-wordpress

Today was quite the day! I had the pleasure of climbing with my good friend Johannes, which, sadly, is a rare thing these days. We’d made plans to go climbing this morning weeks ago, and luckily the weather cooperated. I didn’t have any particular goals in mind, but Johannes has a few so today we set off to Collieston to have a look at The Smuggler’s Waltz, a 2 pitch, 50 meter traverse at HVS 5a (safe 5.9). Collieston is about 40 minutes north of Aberdeen and is the first cliff in long series of excellent sea cliffs that make up the “north of Aberdeen” stretch of coastal climbing. Continue reading

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