Sweet Day At Forest Ledge In Glendalough

I spent all of last weekend climbing in doors at Naas, trying to work up some stamina, with the rain belting down outside. It was good craic climbing with Martin on Saturday and having a leading session with Kev on the Sunday. My finger felt good and I was crimping hard for the first time in ages. After 3 days on and feeling pretty tired I took a 2 day rest and organised a trip to Glendalough on Wednesday with Ming. The weather was lovely, nice, warm and still, so the midge were out in force in the morning. Ming was prepared for the onslaught, he learned his lesson in The Mournes and was armed with a midge hat. I spent the morning cursing and scratching my face and Ming spent the morning laughing at me from behind his protective veil.

Ming With His Midge Shield On

The climbing in Glendalough was brilliant. We climbed up to Forest Ledge area via the first pitch of Forest Rhapsody. Forest ledge is a great place to chill out for day and it is exactly what it sounds like ... a ledge with a mini forest on it and great views down the valley. Ming led a quality crack line Concret Wall Flower E1, great movement, I followed him up it clean. After this I led a superb crack called Celia VS 3 stars, a nice line in a fine position with the waterfall flowing underneath your feet, up a lovley lay back crack and onto the arete, it was very atmospheric and thouroughly enjoyable !! After this I led Jackie VS, I went the wrong way and ended up getting into trouble before climbing my way back to safety, I had a bit of a scare but once I rejoined the line I felt grand a was really enjoying the route again. I had a go at Ifreann Direct HVS but I backed off the start because I couldn't get my heavily taped finger to fit in the tight finger crack and because I really needed to do a number 2. I will have to go back for this route it looks great. To finish off the day Ming led a lovely face climb called Setanta E1, it was sweet, long and hard on the feet, I fought hard on it but my feet were wrecked so I was forced to have a take and a quick rest. We legged it after this climb because we were pretty tired and another midge storm was brewing up, it was a good day in Glendalough as per usual.