Study Break In The Cooleys

 

I took a well earned break from studying today to take advantage of a dry weather window and make a trip up north to The Cooley Mountains, with Pat, to grab some gabbro for the day.

We headed to the Windy Gap and windy it was indeed. It was nice and hot when the sun came out through breaks in the cloud cover and the coarse nature of the rock meant the friction was really good. The gabbro in The Cooleys is lovely rock, like well featured black granite, but a little sharper in places. Not as sharp as I thought it was gonna be, given the warnings of the sharpness in the guide.

We kicked things off on The Myth boulder doing the lovely Cuchullain's Cave 5+. Then we did the two nice lip traverses beside this boulder, both 6a's. Nicely warmed up at this stage I hopped on a nice steep SS 6b around the front of The Myth boulder and after figuring out a sequence got it no bother, nice steep start, easy enough finish on jugs.

 

We finished up the day on a super problem called Angelina Jolie 6b. A lovely sequential, rising traverse on slopey ledges. It's a brilliant problem. This however was a problem which was sharp, not to sharp to hang the slopers, the sharp parts of the rock was what made hanging them possible, however sliding off the slopers continually shredded our skin in no time at all. Took some time to figure out the moves. Figured them all out bar one. This problem just made it onto my project list, really fun I can't wait to get back to it.

 

Savage day out and the big study weekend broken up nicely. I didn't make the effort to walk up the hill and search for the problem Once Upon A Time In Mexico 7a, there is a picture of it in the guide and it looks brilliant and I saw a sweet 6c line on The Myth boulder. When I go back for Angelina Jolie I'll give them both a go for sure and I am also keen to check out The White Bog area next time I'm up there. Back to the books now, psychology exam on Tuesday !! Happy climbing folks :)