11/04/2019

Unnamed crack leading to boulder bridge

We arrived at the slabby crag just after high tide, the tides being in transition from Spring to Neap tides. Our aim was to climb on a falling tide to give maximum climbing time. When we arrived we set up an abseil rope using two of the stakes at the top as anchors. We waited for a while to check the swell and were surprised to find some quite large waves still hitting some of the rocks, especially as the forecast had been for a lower swell that day. One area of the slab was unaffected by the waves, so we decided to climb there, even though I knew the climb in question had limited gear placement opportunities. Due to this lack of gear, I had initially planned to climb this route later in the day if we were going well, the grade probably around HS. I started to lead the climb, placed a good cam at about 10ft, the first viable placement, with my feet on a decent sized ledge then continued up to around 14 ft, looking for a second gear placement. At this point my right foot was on a smear and suddenly slipped away from me. I fell, caught my right foot on the aforementioned ledge and tipped upside down. The gear held and my belayer did a good job and the fall stopped just above the deck. However the force of catching my right foot on the ledge was enough to dislocate and fracture the Talus bone in the foot. We had no phone signal, so I managed to prussik up the abseil rope, belay my partner out and hop/crawl out of the cliff top area and to the walking path. Walkers nearby contacted the emergency services. Air ambulance crew were first to arrive. I was transferred to North Devon District Hospital for treatment, via Coastguard stretcher and land Ambulance.

06/01/2017

Lost Horizon

Abbing off lost horizon, I found part way down that I'd put the belay device on my leg loop. Felt a bit unbalanced, but otherwise OK. But I felt very lucky that the leg loop held. I did have a prussik on, which might have held, had the leg loop gone, but I don't really recommend this as a way of descending.