Its been a while since i last tied on to the sharp end and i struggled with my head a bit for the first few days but soon started to get into the swing of things. No such problem for the other Revolution local Rob Hutton who got straight into the swing of things with ascents of upto 6c meaning he was back on track and on form to make his holiday goal of a 7a onsight. The other members of the trip also started well with Mark Croxall, Danie Rushmere, Ben Read and John Samways all climbing well.
This form continued with Mark and Ben attempting routes upto 8a with Mark making a successful ascents of Helios 8a at the North Cave area and Ben coming very close. Rob climbed as good as Ive ever seen him and came close to his 7a onsight goal. He climbed Kastor at Arhi on his first ascent but could not claim his onsight badge as he had already worked the route on a previous trip but it was a great effort. He did up his game when we visited Kasteli with an ascent of Krotdebiki 7b on his second go after belaying Mark Croxall on the same route giving him some beta.
It was fantastic to watch Mark, Ben and Danie climb making everything they climbed look easy and effortless. After Marks success of Helios he laid his sights on a quick ascent of Gaia 8b at Oddessy. With only a few days to go he started to work the route with good progress making all the moves but struggling on linking them. Next day he was back up at Odessey and tied on for the lead. Marks effort was amazing and he made it half way up the route before peeling off. After speaking with Mark he thinks it will go next time when he plans to go back in October with bit more fitness and stamia in tow.
We finished the week with an evening multi pitch climb. Ben, Rob, John and myself headed upto sector School to attempt the 125m routes of Kalymnos 2000 and Platon. I had previously done Platon on a trip back in 2007 so me and Rob jumped onto Kalynos 2000 will John and Ben went on Platon. The climbing is easy (upto 5c) but the view from the top is fantastic with views across the island and out to sea. The abseil off of the route proved more interesting. Ben and John went first abseiling from the top to the previous pitches anchors and then tying off their 70 meter rope and abseiling down all the way to the bottom. After dropping their rope me and Rob set of on our single 60meter Joker. Because we could only abseil 30 meters at a time we had to ab everything pitch making our descent alot longer. On pulling the rope at the end of the third abseil it became stuck and no amount of pulling would budge it. The decision was made that Rob would climb up on the other end of the rope belayed by myself and try and free it. I came close to dropping my belay device and before we had finished the light had faded. It was a long hot walk out made worst due to having no water. We arrived back in the hotel and hit the bar where we could finally laugh about the experience.
All in all we had a great trip and I'm already looking forward ed to going back. Its been great coming away with such talented climbers and its really pushed me to train harder and focus on becoming stronger. I only hope that the urge to train lasts. There are some photos of the trip in the toolbar to the left.
So its back to work tomorrow fresh with ideas of new routes. The centre will be reset in the next week so be sure to pop by and try them out.
