OFF THE WALL

Feed from OFF THE WALL

Parsley

Here I am again, pressing the parsley between my fingertips and sniffing its sweet sharpness. I still don’t understand how it grows here. All summer I’ve moaned and groaned about missed opportunities and in the last gaspings of the season the flow seems to be moving again. I’m seconding hard routes like I like to – to see how much better my climbing is; to check I’m as good as I was last year; to argue with the ‘I can’t’, and to put away fears of decrepitude. No pressure then.

I’m at the bottom of Limbo (E1 5B), on the large lump of rock that holds up the Bristol Suspension Bridge. ‘Best bit of climbing in the Gorge’, declares Barry, who demonstrates this conviction by re-doing the buttress routes every year.

So here I am again, looking up at the black stains, the buttonholed quartz, and the blocky mess, remembering last years parsley and last years fall on this route. This time I want to solve the puzzle and I want to climb with absorption and delight- with none of that old fashioned doubt and anxiety.
I watch powerful and graceful Barry carefully as he steadily makes his way up. The big blank wall halfway up threw me off last time, so I’m looking for clues to beat it. Barry looks like he’s doing an absorbing job of enjoyable work. Lead climbing is one of the few times he stops talking. Then he’s gone from sight.

Time to put the new shoes on. There’s parsley under my feet for the first few metres and then I forget about it as I find a flow and rhythm. Hand and footholds arrive without a search party. My body seems to know more about how to do this than my head – a change from last year. I’m soon on the ledge, removing gear that would hold up a tank, and ready to step out and across on to the blank bit. It suddenly seems very steep and very smooth.

I get to a tiny foothold that from below had seemed huge, and looking up, see the way signposted by chalk – and the one bit of polish on the route: the only available foot (toe) hold. I’m used to the hundred and one ways to do a severe, not the 5 move wonders of an E1.Deep breathing becomes necessary while I follow the holes and edges, and although it feels precarious and although my fingers and toes don’t have much to work with, I don’t fall off this time. I avoid the seductive lure of the deep groove above, just using it for a rest before climbing out and around. Really enjoying it now, I tiptoe across the traverse and after a few thrutchy moves I’m with Barry, looking at the Avon tide flowing in over the mud.

Job done - with a remarkable absence of ‘I can’t’ and with remarkable pleasure.

Posted by fishinwater