@ night

The opportunity came yesterday to go bouldering at night in Glendalough and I thought all my birthdays had come at once! I knew it would add a totally new dimension to the experience of bouldering.

In the car on the way Diarmuid warned me that the rock just looked different when lit by headtorch and that everything about bouldering in the dark would feel a little dodgy at first... and it did!

For me, The adventure started long before we got to the boulders. The guys cycle in and out of Glendalough at night. It makes perfect sense - it's way quicker and the last thing you'd want to be doing late at night is walking out for 20-25 mins. Only thing was I hadn't cycled a bike in about a year... I don't own a bike and the prospect of cycling in the dark over rocky ground kind of freaked me out during the day... Once we got going though, it was just fantastic.

So we stashed the bikes once it got too rocky and set off on foot. We were down at the ruins crossing the small stream and out of the darkness a small voice cried out 'we're over here!'...

Ehhh...

So we looked over the stream with our headtorches and saw what appeared to be a father and son lost in the middle of Glendalough at about 7.30pm in the pitch black with absolutely no idea how to get out. It was so dark you couldn't see your hand in front of you!

Diarmuid offered the guy his torch but he refused, asking only for directions out to the path. Off they went and off we went, we were absolutely bemused at finding two stragglers out and about in the dark!

Bizaar!

We arrived at the pathside boulders and started on the easy warm ups and it turns out Diarmuid was right - the rock looks different and it was easy to second guess myself even though I'd done these problems lots of times before - I found though that as each problem passed I became more confident and trusting that my hands and feet knew what they were doing!!

So down to the egg boulder we went and Diarmuid was keen to check out the Egg Traverse. We started with 'Tim's Mantel' (6c) and Diarmuid sent it first go. I tried it and felt pretty strong, but popped off while trying to turn my hand. Second go, and my heel just stuck in place, I turned my left hand, absolutely cranked as hard as I could up to the rail with my eyes shut in desperate hope that nothing would pop, and nothing did... at last, I sent it.

I was delighted! Not only was I climbing at night in what was a pretty stunning setting when lit by torch, I'd just sent a long standing project of mine!

So we moved on to the Egg Traverse and it was the same old same old really: Love the problem, can't do it! We tried every which way, and Diarmuid was making good progress, while I played with trying silly stuff like heel hooking and one arm lock offs that were not working!!

It was around then that James and Dave arrived and as they warmed up, we tried Superstars of BMX (7a+) and Diarmuid had it wired. He made it look so easy, I thought, right this should be no problem...

Couldn't get off the ground... and as a parting gift, my right side was hurting bad!

After that, we went around the other side of the Egg boulder and we tried the traverse (6b+). I had done the two seperate problems that make it up, but could never link them together... I linked them last night though! Delighted with my progress. Unfortunately I popped off the last move of the problem to Diarmuid and James' disgust!

Looking back I'm disappointed but at the time I was over the moon to have pretty much completed the traverse that I couldn't get before. It should go easy, whenever I'm out again.

Pascals (7a+) was next on the list and we all had a go at the opening move, but it seemed a bit beyond us so we moved on to a new problem for me! Dave introduced me to this low ball overhanging boulder problem called 'Squamish' (6a+). This can't be too bad I thought!

It's extremely sequencey and there's a heel toe cam thing at the start that won't work if you've small feet - but I worked out away around that and after about 10 attempts I was reaching for the jug at the top and my left foot popped. As Dave said: 'Unlucky'.

Diarmuid sent it and James got as far as I did twice, but slipped the same way. Lovely little problem, can't wait to get back to it! Last problem we tried was new to me too. It was called Beachball and was a fight or fall mantel that I nearly topped out on first go, but just fell off the end. The first thing I thought was 'WHY did I come off that.... now I'm going to have to try it again! Try it again I did, and send it I did... in the most ungraceful way possible... still though - I'd like to see any boulderer make that problem look pretty!!

It was then that Dave announced that as a right of passage I'd have to send this chimney thing beside Beachball. At first I refused explaining that I like my back without scratches all the way down it... Never wanting to disappoint though, I was quickly talked into it and made it up the top before a dodgy top out that at the end of the night was almost too much of an ask for my arms, but desperation got me over...

It was a long way down!!

We did a couple of other little problems too, including a little slab eliminate that was great fun. The wind had really picked up as the night went on and as we walked back to the bikes it occured to me that the cycle out was not going to be easy!

The wind tried it's best to knock me right off the path and finally got it's way as the bike veered towards the edge of the path and I fell crouching to stop myself falling completely down the side of the path. Conditions improved as we got into the sheltered part of the path and I really enjoyed the cycle out from there on.

Really beautiful nights bouldering. The most fun I've had in ages!

Cheers Diarmuid!