Towards Cape Wrath

We three sit enjoying the evening sun, dangling our feet over the top of Dental Slab, a bold rock climb on the rough gritstone crag forming the western edge of a moor in the Yorkshire Dales just north of Bradford. Someone shares a thought ‘eh up, we were at work today’. Which seems improbable because climbing two fifteen or twenty metres routes on gritstone has made work and other day to day problems disappear and seem distant fading memories. That is due to the visceral immediacy and frankly the risk of a dangerous fall leading to severe injury or even death that gritstone climbing often entails. The close friendship and constant banter also distract us from everyday worries. The gritstone is rough and gives good grip on our ‘sticky rubber’ climbing shoes, which is just as well because it usually does not have so many holds, at least it has holds ‘but not as we know them’. There are vertical and horizontal cracks scarring the steep face of the gritstone cliff but both sets of cracks tend to be smoothly rounded and weathered so that they do not make perfect grips and require a bold approach by the climber. Fortunately, many of the vertical cracks are very deep, disappearing into the dark inner depths of the crag, so that the climber can jam a hand, fist or even arm or leg into the crack to gain a grip. Novice gritstone climbers return home with the backs of their hands scarred and bleeding, the trick is to pull the thumb fiercely across the palm so that the hand becomes firmly jammed in before you put any weight on it. The deep vertical cracks also offer some chance of placing protection so that the leader can clip in the rope and know that they may fall but only as far as the protection and an equal distance below it before the rope brings them to a halt. Their mate at the base of the crag feeds the rope out through a special ‘belay’ device, as the lead climber makes their way up the face, and is ready at any time to lock off the rope in the belay device and hold a fall. Often the protection is hard to find and so the leader is facing a ‘sand bag’ meaning a fall to the ground, which clearly can be painful or even fatal. On Dental slab there are no vertical cracks and the shallow horizontal cracks offer rounded holds and only poor placements for protection, so the whole thing feels somewhat scary as you pad up the grippy rock relying almost entirely on your sticky rubber soles to defy gravity. Once at the top the first lead climber attaches themselves to the mountain and is then able to offer a much safer and more reassuring safety rope for their mates coming up next as ‘seconds’. The adventure stories in this book flashback to different times, places and faces and are not in any sort of time order, but I am part of a group of three friends, I have been enjoying half a dozen adventures every year. Tongue in cheek we call ourselves the ‘Bradford Lads’ – always pronounced in a broad West Yorkshire accent as ‘bratfod lads’, because we first met when we all lived in Bradford. However, the real Bradford Lads were a loose group of working-class rock-climbers of the 1950s based in Bradford that included outstanding hard core leading climbers of the era such Arthur Dolphin.

The adventures of our modest version of the Bradford Lads began with after work summer evening gritstoning in Yorkshire but soon expanded to include summer rock-climbing weekends in Snowdonia and the Lake District to winter ice climbing in Scotland and even mountaineering trips to the Alps. We also became increasingly keen mountain-bikers and this kept us adventuring even when one of our original trio decided that climbing was beyond their comfort level. During one of the most memorable periods of Bradford Lads adventuring we became obsessed with climbing sea stacks off the coast of Scotland. We first climbed the relatively well-known and easy Old Man of Stoer but smaller more obscure stacks gave us the most exciting expeditions. One such trip involved getting the tourist boat and minibus to visit the lighthouse at Cape Wrath, but we asked the minibus driver to drop us off on the track a couple of kilometres short of the lighthouse. We wandered down the rough moorland slope to reach the top of the 20 metre sea cliffs to discover a large swell rolling in from the North Atlantic that made our target stack seem practically unassailable. The thing with a sea stack is that it often involves at least one climber having to swim. Mike and I arrived a couple of minutes before Nigel, and Mike promptly declared the risk of the swim as unacceptable due to the huge swell swirling in and around the base of our target stack and sharply pointed surrounding rocks. In a moment of bravado I declared that if Nigel did not fancy it then I would do the swim. We had come a long way and it seemed too disappointing to abandon our attempt having by chance arrived on a such a warm sunny and midge free windy day. I am not sure if I was completely serious about this determination but fortunately Nigel arrived and despite our pointing out of the dangers was unhesitating and began to put on his wetsuit. I sighed a breath of relief and started to set up the land side belays on which to attach the cold caving rope we bring for this purpose.

Wearing the cheap wet suit and buoyancy aid and his climbing harness, we tied Nigel onto the no-stretch caving rope and sent him swimming out towards the target sea stack armed with a couple of rock pegs and a hammer. We had learned early on to also provide Nigel with a pair of Marigold washing up gloves. As he climbed out of the water in this big swell, onto barnacle covered rocks, the rising wave lifted him up and he grabbed some rounded rock holds, but as the wave retreated it left him hanging on for dear life and without the Marigolds he would have ended up with bloody hands. Having gained a hold Nigel scrambled up a little to dry land and found a suitable crack to bang in a big rock peg. Mike and I would set up a Tyrolean crossing in the hope of staying dry and crossing in a normal climbing gear. We would tightened the rope across the yawning chasm and clipper onto it with an old steel Karabiner (a climbing clip now most often made of less hard-wearing alloy to reduce its weight). In turn we pulled ourselves along the rope staying above the water. However, the inevitable sag in the middle of the traverse required us to time that section carefully to try and align with a gap in the rollers. As usual, we both ended up with a soaking wet backside. It is easier to slide down the rope but comes as a shock when you have to haul yourself back up the rising rope towards the sea stack. Once the three of us were ensconced on the stack we did some sorting and then climbed it as a standard rock climb. After an all too brief moment of congratulations on the summit, we faced a gut wrenchingly hairy abseil off the top, leaving behind a marginally placed bit of protection to back up a loop of old climbing role that encircled the top of the stack. Sometimes we could double the rope on the Tyrolean traverse so we could retrieve it from the land side, but more often, including on this occasion, Nigel had to take down the rope and simply swim back with us two hauling on the rope to draw him back to land. All this messing about had taken a few hours and we ran back up to the track to fortunately catch the driver heading back from Cape Wrath towards the end of the afternoon with just enough space for three damp but elated Bradford Lads to squeeze in. It is a privilege to enjoy such a lifelong friendship based on shared adventures and we have been able to adjust our ambitions to suit our changing levels of fitness and openness to risk. Above all our gritstone and sea stack adventures were relatively cheap and cheerful and reasonably local, avoiding the large carbon footprint of flights. Having an adventure after work or within a weekend trip makes it more family friendly and affordable. More recent Bradford Lads trips to snowy summits in the Alps, downhill mountain biking and via ferrattas in the Dolomites all have their appeal and fond memories, but the tough local gritstone summer evening climbs and the truly adventurous sea stacks of our relative youth were our cheap and cheerful ‘glory days’ as Bruce would have it.

I have also visited Cape Wrath as a tourist. When our two boys were perhaps 6 and 8 years old we shared a holiday house with my mum and dad in Durness. As a day trip from there we caught the little ferry and the minibus to visit the lighthouse. We have a family , which mum must have taken, of Toni, the boys and I sitting in the sun by a mossy rock below the lighthouse, with the vast expanse of sea behind us stretching off in to the north and west. If we make it that far then it will be great to sail across that vast expanse of sea and look up towards the cliff top on which that photo was taken. One thing about outdoor adventures is that get you to go to places. A particular pleasure of having a enjoyed a lifetime of outdoor adventures is that you sometimes get to join the dots by revisiting places but also by looking at a familiar place from a new perspective. 

Today we travelled from Peterhead to Whitehills. The winds were light and we were mostly motor sailing into the wind although we tried our best to sail around midday when the wind picked up and veered a little to the east. There was a considerable swell coming from the north and we went out a couple of miles to avoid the overfalls, or 'roost' as it is called in Scotland, off Rattray Head. It was great to return to Whitehills where the welcoming harbour master Bertie is a real character and we enjoyed good food in the village pub. The harbour was crowded with yachts because there is a race to Kirkwall setting off late tomorrow. A year ago, Mark and I approached Whitehills from the west as part of our trip sailing round the UK. On this year’s trip we have been sailing on familiar seas by returning along our round UK route. Tomorrow, by heading north, we will be entering new seas. 

Mark and I will now part from our sister ship Tami Nori and say farewell to Peter and Nuala who are sailing west to Inverness. We will continue our journey towards Cape Wrath.