Hiking, Scrambling, Mountaineering, and Climbing

One of the people said it was far worse than when he took high doses of Larium and he thought that was bad

Jana was on a flight back from Mauritania for work last year and somebody jumped out of their seat and tried to open the plane door because of a Larium dream!

But maybe I was asleep. Who knows.

The boundaries definitely get blurred.

I was pretty suprised how hard I found it to go to deep sleep at 2800m when i've been sleeping at 2,000 and have been over 3,000m at least 12 times in the last three weeks.

There was a reason it was mass administered at Guantanamo to detainees

There was a reason it was mass administered at Guantanamo to detainees

I did not know that. Thats grim.

52k in two days is a lot, I usually sleep worse when I'm overtired. Nowadays I always bring a good sleeping mask and earplugs which helps a bit.

Climbing Hochwilde next week. After smashing Wildspitze I'm not worried about fitness but now I'm just a bit anxious about the 400m "super exposed" grade II ridge involved 😅

Speaking of fitness...found out that my guide has a resing pulse of 34 bpm. Or at least thats what garmin connect says his average resting pulse is over a month. On wildspitze I drank 3 litres of water....he drank less than 500ml. Superhuman!

Does anyone have any leads on a walking trip with the following attributes:

• 2 nights / 3 days walking by people who are essentially city slickers but have done enough day trips that we have reasonable gear/gear confidence.
  
• Accessible from London via public transport
  
• Has accommodation (the bougier the better) on the route (so no camping)
  
• Not guaranteed miserable in late October, like some possibility of pleasancy.
  
  

Would really like to do a point to point or giant loop rather than just rent an airbnb and do 3 day walks, but if we have to we have to. Any ideas? Was thinking part of Suffolk Coastal walk but wondered if anyone else had some leads.

Section of the Jurassic Coast path?

Ridgeway / Icknield Way from Goring to Tring. You can't turn a corner without bumping into a gastropub or glamping hub. Beech woods will be nice colours in October. Mists in the valleys, red kites circling etc etc

Thanks @rhb and @el_presidente I will look into both, very much appreciated. Sometimes I find planning things like this very difficult so these ideas are extremely valuable.

Anyone been walking/hiking in Portugal? We've got 10 days in the Algarve, 5 nights in Taveira but then we're looking for 5 nights somewhere to base ourselves for some costal hiking etc.

Fun weekend mucking around in Winspit Quarry in dorset. Haven’t been sport climbing in years. Enjoyed some easy routes, got in an argument with a tourist letting his dog run wild leaping up at me while belaying and fell off a spicy 6b and took a chunk out my finger.
Great stuff

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A few nights ago I was staying in a mountain hut in Tyrol before a day of easy climbing and thought a great way to make conversation with one of the guides I was with would be asking him to tell me about his "most extreme" mountain experience.

What followed next was a gripping story of spending over 20 hours on the north face of the Weisshorn with a client, being caught in an unforecasted snow storm, and trying to ring his Mum and wife to say goodbye to them but dropping his phone because his fingers were frozen. They summited and made it back down without assistance but needed hospital treatment for dehydration and exhaustion.

Now I know why his wife is so happy that he is spending time with me doing baby stuff!

Not sure where best to share to discuss, turns out W3w isn't so good afterall.

https://twitter.com/cybergibbons/status/1565251281043836928

My primary annoyance about w3w is that is a private for profit initiative. You have to pay a license fee to use it in an app. I discovered this when I wanted to use it at a company a few years ago...the quote I recieved was eye watering.

Secondary to that is that it's just a mild reworking of already existing open source global grid identifier systems.

This sort of shit shouldn't be monetiised.

If their software is not great either, then fuck those guys.

^ agreed, I've never bothered with it as OS Locate is good enough.

Not a difficult route but pretty long and also rather spicy in terms of exposure 😂

It's the klettersteig that goes up the North East face of the Schwärzenkamm. Really well designed. Big stretches without artificial holds to force you onto the rock. 350m of up too so it's a proper arm burner.

My hands are in shreds.

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It's up this basically.

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350m, so a little over 2 ditchlings? Nice.

That's the one. A smidge over one Shard or seven Nelson's Columns. Not sure in double decker buses. Or Swaynes Lanes.

f that so much Dan.

If it was a straight vertical climb then fuck yes I’m in. It’s all that loose rock, tufty grass and endless bloody walking that freaks me out!

It does look like a very nice hill though.

I actually ebiked to the base and back.
Took about an hour to cover the 6km with 500m of up. Thatt in itself has wrecked me. First time ever on an MTB for me. The descent was awesome fun though. I do have claw hands from riding the brakes so much!

It's basically three vertical sections with short rocky (as in solid rock) traverses inbetween. Didn't touch any grass or earth at all as I bypassed the rest area halfway up.

Link: https://www.via-ferrata.de/klettersteige/topo/klettersteig-schwaerzenkamm-obergurgl

Interesting, for some reason I’d not clocked you were on via, assumed you were on mountaineering kit.
It’s something I’ve wanted to try but never got round to doing. I’ve been regaled with some hair raising stories(loosely translated by my pa) from some of the old boys in their village in France near the alps of what doing via was like back in the 70s on rusted out WW2 steps and ladders. Sounded very niche indeed but I guess you’ve got to keep busy when it’s not ski season..

Also, combining bikes and climbing is something I’ve wanted to do for a while but loaded up my bob trailer on top of a full touring setup and then riding up to Gogarth or the Lakes is prob a bit bleak in reality. That and I have visions of looking down to see some little scrote making off with my bike while I’m up ;)

I thought I'd give the bike approach thing a go because the mountain guide I climb with tends to prefer it if it's an option. Some of the approaches are a bit of a grind. I'm climbing Hochwilde in a few days and a bike should save about two hours of trudging.

Via Ferrata is great. Trad and sport climbers can be extremely snobby about it but they're misguided. I know a professional climber who not only loved his first route but also found it to be much more challenging than they expected. You're covering lots of vert in some cases after all. You also don't have to use the provided aids if you don't want to. It just opens up batty routes that you couldn't climb trad tbh.

It also has a dangerous reputation for being "safe". You can only fall once on via Ferrata. Your screamer will only deploy once and then you have to be rescued. The fall factor can be huge if you're unlucky. Backs can be broken. Especially if you're one of the wallies who does it on a sling and some carabiners. This is why via Ferrata has a fair few serious accidents compared to other climbing types...people underestimating it.

That said, in Italy and Austria you can find routes suitable for ages 9+ all the way to brutally difficult routes. They are well maintained now days.

On balance I prefer trad, but for working on climbing fitness...blasting 350m+ up a face is quite a workout.