Weekend play

During the Bank Holiday weekend Rory and I went to the slate quarries, and I was excited about climbing on one of my favorite rock types, unfortunately the part I had underestimated was that my toes would not be use to it as I have been mainly in ski boots of fully rigid boots since October last year.

We started with Fresh Air (f6a and really nice - a route I helped with bolting a while ago), then moved onto my own route called 362 (named after the number of quarry men who died working there. Graded at f5c).
Following this we strolled up to the Zippy Level of Australia and Rory led the pumpy and sustained Ziplock (f7b) - I could give many reasons for not completing this route, but that would be boring!

On the Monday, Alun came over and we only had a few hours and climbed at the Gorbals Level, and started on Harri Back Llanrug (graded f6a), then put a rope on Toe be or not Toe be (graded f7b). Once again failed to do the last move, and managed to blame the pain in my toes.
We then headed over to finish off on Clash of the Titan (a 40m f6a).

This week I went out with Rich, and had a blast at Stand Up Paddle-boarding, and took a journey around the Little Orme. I was interested to see the Diamond area, and we took a lunch break on the boulders below and viewed the crag - its very impressive. That afternoon Tanya and I went up to Castle-Inn quarry do a couple of quick routes in the evening sun before heading home.

Bryn
National Development Officer MLTW

Workshop and moderation visit

Last week I travelled down to Mid Wales to Moderate a new MLT Wales Provider on his first Single Pitch Award training course. Discussions took place in the morning, then the group headed out to Craig yr Ogof, in Trawsfynydd. A nice little crag in a stunning location (well apart form the nuclear power station - but thats been decommissioned back in 1991, and should be safe for demolishing by 2098. Makes you question if the 26 years it was there producing power was worth it!).

Following the Moderation visit I went on to South Wales for a meeting with the MLTW Chair, to discuss the objectives for the future. That evening I met up with Mal Creasey from MLTE to discuss and plan the following days workshop.

On the Friday we ran a joint MLTW / MLTE Provider and staff workshop, based from the Storey Arms outdoor centre. We had a good turn out and discussed various issues throughout the morning and the afternoon was spent with Sunita Welch from the Brecon Beacons National Park.


A good few days.
Bryn

April news round up from the Chief Officer

As we prepare the papers for the AGM and Board meeting to be held at Tollymore in mid-May, a whole series of threads are gradually coming together. As always the day-to-day running of the office is a full-time job in its own right and I can only say that it will be a huge relief when the new Executive Officer starts in post in June. For those of you who are wondering who this is, I can reveal that it is John Cousins, who was my predecessor at MLT so it is fair to say that he already has a good understanding of the various organisations that constitute MLT! Currently our executive are so busy dealing with many issues as well as getting on with their own lives that there hasn't been a statement forthcoming about the appointment, but this appointment will make an enormous difference and will enable me to focus on core issues such as quality assurance at national and international levels, the design and implementation of the coaching scheme and the publishing house, which is after all our main income strand. In any other business these 3 areas would be regarded as a pretty ambitious work plan, so it's not as if I will now be putting my feet up!

The CWLA has been well received, MLTE and MLTW ran a joint providers' workshop on Friday, and registrations levels are very healthy. There are a lot of success stories to celebrate but we also face some real challenges as the reality is that we are still several different organisations all working towards a shared vision but with different infra-structures, largely built on out-dated technology. One example of recent development is the new website, which is database driven. The first indication of the power of this system is the searchable list of courses, which will be a great service for providers and students alike, but until all the home nations join into this database it will not achieve its full potential. I have every confidence that we will bring all this information together during 2010. However the biggest frustration is the cumbersome process involved in registrations; I spend an average of an hour per day dealing with registration enquiries! I can't even begin to express how much I would like to see a simple one-stop shop for all the home nation boards; there are undestandable reservations about a possible loss of autonomy but we need to resolve these and make the registration process work properly. Right now we can be sure that anybody who gets as far as completing the registration process is really committed - this probably adds to the kudos of the ML schemes but it doesn't make good business sense.

I'm currently recovering from an inflamed elbow; it's not the dreaded golfer's or tennis elbow but it was pretty bad by the end of last week, when I could neither bend nor straighten the arm. This was caused entirely by pulling too hard on small holds every evening and weekend! I saw the warning signs, but with a bunch of new routes to squeeze into the Tremadog guide, as well as photo shoots and a couple of days climbing at Montserrat, there were too many goodies around so I decided to pay the price later, when the rains arrived.

Early last week I took a morning out to join the BMC/RSPB crag inspection of Cilan Head on the Lleyn peninsular. This resulted in a new access agreement, and a good chance to document the whole coastline photographically (perhaps a future guide book project?) We were accompanied by a pod of dolphins, who proved very difficult to photograph.

Ski touring holiday

After a few hectic weeks of work, Tanya and I were en-route to Chamonix in the French Alps for a 2 week break. We were to meet Rob out there and the plan was for some ski touring action.

The first few days were spent on great powder conditions on the Grand Montets and then Rob and I skinned up to the Col des Dards on the Aiguille Rouge and had excellent powder for the descent back to Lac Blanc.

The following day we drove around to Italy and skinned up to the Emanuele Hut (2732m) in the Grand Paradiso National Park.

We woke at 5.30am to fresh snow outside and clearing skies so after some coffee and bread we started the long skin uphill towards the Grand Paradiso (4026m). After over five hours of slogging uphill against altitude and freezing temperatures we arrived at the rock ridge, which led to the summit. We took skis off and made the last scramble to the summit on foot.


The fun them began with the ski down – in an hour we were back at the hut for a coke and some food, then another hour got us back to the car in the valley (1960m), very sweaty and stinky and looking forward to a shower and a beer.

Rest rest of the trip included another trip up the Aig Rouge for some touring and also some late season resort skiing and gentle touring.


Back in the office now and looking forward to some rock climbing action.

Bryn

Gadding about

Lots of activity on the moderating scene at the moment with three visits over last week. On the first visit it was good to see father and son team operating with Andy and Ian Boorman delivering an excellent SPA training course in the sunshine. Three days later it was off in the sunshine again with day 1 of the Llanrug ML training course, again a great day out before finally, and with the sun still shining it was off on the early train to visit Jack Griffiths running a CWA training course at the Castle in London. Another excellent course so well done all! Picture on the left is Ian Boorman enjoying the sunshine above Betws y Coed.
Mal

New routing at Tremadog

A great weekend in the UK - I feel sorry for the people stranded in Spain! Climbed with Jon Garside, the BMC/MLTE Technical Officer this weekend. On Saturday evening we climbed Zangorilla on Carreg Wastad, and on Sunday we had a fulfilling but tiring day, with a new route up the centre of the Castle at Craig y Gesail, weighing in at about E4 6a, followed by a successful tussle with Vulture on Bwlch y Moch (hard E4 6a). A good start to the trad climbing season, and the Tremadog guidebook is now almost finished. We want to get more action shots at the Tremadog climbing festival next weekend.

Business as usual

As indicated in my "Twitter" report, the recent UIAA meeting was very successful. The UIAA will be launching full support for the Training Standard label, which is set to take off in much the same way that the Equipment label has over the last few years. The UIAA is the only organisation with the history, representation and kudos to take on a project of this scope and ambition. The UK quality assessment team are in an excellent position to help service the anticipated demand, because we have several decade's experience of guilding and ensuring that 4 home nations work to the same standards.

This week 2 of the MLT Board members joined a group piloting a proposed RLSS water safety management course at Plas y Brenin.

It's been a great week for in-depth discussions with several organisations, including BAIML, AMI, SLUK, skillsactive, BOS and the Scout Association. But one more day in Spain and I would have missed the whole thing as I would have been stranded on the wrong side of the volcanic ash.

Apart from that it's been a pretty active week in my own time, including several towers at Montserrat, SS Special and Brant Direct yesterday evening and a solo ascent of the esoteric Canyon Rib this evening as research for the Tremadog guidebook.