I’m sitting in Front of my fire here in France on Sunday afternoon after a whirl wind 36 hours in Scotland. I arrived late Fir afternoon in Edinburgh and hooked up with my old uni pal Mike Rudden, after a quick bite at his place we hit the town. True to form we both woke with hangovers on Sat but it was a lovely day so we got ourselves together and went out climbing.
The crag of Dunkeld is hidden in the woods above the village and is a lovely spot with fantastic views from the top looking South down the Glen. There was already a group of climbers from Aberdeen there, this combined with the fact that much of the crag was wet meant that we quickly climbed an E1 and moved on to Poolney crag. There we climbed a couple of routes in the afternoon sun. It wasn’t the best days climbing but it was really cool to hang out with Mike again and as ever the level of Banter was high.
Sat night was the last talk of the Vertigo tour, the lecture tour that I had been doing with Ian Parnell. The talks have given me a chance to spend time with my old expedition partner and we’ve had a few laughs over the last few weeks. It was kinda sad to close the door on a great month of traveling round the country talking, but the night went really. I’d like to say a huge thanks to folk that came last night and also those who came to the other venues and who made the nights so good.
Not too much to report from Dream Guides right now. Guy and Steph are still at large in Thailand getting strong rock climbing and tanned at the same time and I'm hoping they may be taking cooking courses as I love that food (hint guys). Meanwhile I’ve been dodging rain in France by swinging on Ice Axes at Le Fayet Dry tooling crag while dreaming of some real ice forming soon.
There is just one thing I wanted to share and thats a short email I got from my old geology department at Leeds Uni but I’ll just set the scene first. Back in the summer when I got married, Jazz and I decided to mount some rock from the summit of Everest as a necklace and give them to the brides maids as a thank you. We had the rock cut and polished at Leeds and I stated that it was limestone. The technician got back saying that it wasn’t limestone but he would cut a thin section of the sample to check under the microscope. The sample I gave him turns out to be a type of biotite schist and not limestone like I always thought it was, well they say you learn something everyday.
The necklaces looked fab and we both thought made a for a personal special gift.
There is more snow forecasted this week in Chamonix so look out for a snowy post later this week folks, its time to get excited by the winter!!
Kenton
Photos 1) The finished necklace and 2) The thin section of Everest summit rock
I’m sitting in Front of my fire here in France on Sunday afternoon after a whirl wind 36 hours in Scotland. I arrived late Fir afternoon in Edinburgh and hooked up with my old uni pal Mike Rudden, after a quick bite at his place we hit the town. True to form we both woke with hangovers on Sat but it was a lovely day so we got ourselves together and went out climbing.
The crag of Dunkeld is hidden in the woods above the village and is a lovely spot with fantastic views from the top looking South down the Glen. There was already a group of climbers from Aberdeen there, this combined with the fact that much of the crag was wet meant that we quickly climbed an E1 and moved on to Poolney crag. There we climbed a couple of routes in the afternoon sun. It wasn’t the best days climbing but it was really cool to hang out with Mike again and as ever the level of Banter was high.
Sat night was the last talk of the Vertigo tour, the lecture tour that I had been doing with Ian Parnell. The talks have given me a chance to spend time with my old expedition partner and we’ve had a few laughs over the last few weeks. It was kinda sad to close the door on a great month of traveling round the country talking, but the night went really. I’d like to say a huge thanks to folk that came last night and also those who came to the other venues and who made the nights so good.
Not too much to report from Dream Guides right now. Guy and Steph are still at large in Thailand getting strong rock climbing and tanned at the same time and I'm hoping they may be taking cooking courses as I love that food (hint guys). Meanwhile I’ve been dodging rain in France by swinging on Ice Axes at Le Fayet Dry tooling crag while dreaming of some real ice forming soon.
There is just one thing I wanted to share and thats a short email I got from my old geology department at Leeds Uni but I’ll just set the scene first. Back in the summer when I got married, Jazz and I decided to mount some rock from the summit of Everest as a necklace and give them to the brides maids as a thank you. We had the rock cut and polished at Leeds and I stated that it was limestone. The technician got back saying that it wasn’t limestone but he would cut a thin section of the sample to check under the microscope. The sample I gave him turns out to be a type of biotite schist and not limestone like I always thought it was, well they say you learn something everyday.
The necklaces looked fab and we both thought made a for a personal special gift.
There is more snow forecasted this week in Chamonix so look out for a snowy post later this week folks, its time to get excited by the winter!!
Kenton
Photos 1) The finished necklace and 2) The thin section of Everest summit rock
