Old Wrecks Day Out

Although I have been climbing in the South West for over twenty years, until recently I had never sampled the esoteric delights of the Culm Coast - the cliffs on the North coast of Devon and Cornwall around Hartland Point and Bude where the rock is metamorphosed shale. Climbing on shale had always seemed only suitable for masochists with small brains and large life assurance policies, but after my first visit I was pleasantly surprised, so perhaps this article might encourage others to go and see for themselves.

For those who judge a route’s quality in terms of its death potential, the guidebook features plenty of horrendous sounding extremes (mostly courtesy of Mick Fowler), but for ordinary mortals the obvious place to start is Wrecker's Slab, a 400 foot VS on Cornakey Cliff which now seems to be recognised as the best of the easier shale routes and is described in the guide as ‘a Culm classic which should not be missed by those who still possess the spirit of adventure’.  A further attraction, if you are interested in the history of the sport, is that the first ascent was made by the legendary Scottish climber, Tom Patey.

When I first started climbing in the early seventies, Patey was something of an icon to the group I climbed with, not because we had ever met him or even tried any of his routes, but because we were captivated by his book One Man's Mountains which was a constant source of inspiration and amusement.  The book is a collection of Patey's writing, published after his death in an abseiling accident in 1970, and is a mixture of satire (a sort of mountaineering Private Eye), conventional narratives and songs. I read most of the book again recently, looking to compare experiences after an unsavoury encounter with a puking fulmar, and while the satirical pieces seem rather dated after almost thirty years, the narrative articles are as fresh and entertaining as ever. Well worth a read if you can get hold of a copy.

Although most of Patey's climbing was in Scotland, he spent some time on National Service in Devon with the Royal Marines, and his most significant contributions to South West climbing were the first big routes on the Culm Coast - Wrecker's Slab and its neighbour Smuggler's Slab. For the first ascent of these routes in 1959 he was joined by two other distinguished nautical mountaineers - Zeke Deacon was the leading climber from the Commando climbing instructors, pioneer of many Cornish classics such as Bishop's Rib, and Keith Lawder was a retired Admiral whose finest hour was to come two years later when he led the first ascent of the Devil's Slide on Lundy at the age of 68.

I had been meaning to try Wrecker's for some time, but attempts to persuade various Wessex luminaries to join me had proved unsuccessful. Then having spent the previous weekend risking the curse of Viveash by plodding up a few Munros in the North of Scotland, it seemed time to do some proper climbing, so I recruited an unsuspecting Chris Bristow and we drove down from Weymouth on a perfect summer morning. The guide book instructed us to drive down a private track to a nearby farm, park in the yard, and ask the farmer's permission to walk across his land to the coast path. Much to my surprise, the farmer seemed perfectly happy with this arrangement and cheerfully showed us the way to the crag, situated in a perfect setting on an unspoiled and spectacular stretch of coastline.

As we sorted out our gear, it appeared that Chris had come equipped to re-create the conditions of the first ascent, as he produced his collection of ancient heavyweight steel karabiners. He was reluctantly persuaded to leave them behind, apart from an extra large screw-gate needed to anchor the tangle of faded tape which forms the Bristow patent full body harness. I have heard some people doubt the security of this arrangement, but I should point out that I was holding the other end of the rope when it was successfully field tested at the Dewerstone last year. Indeed, a small patch on the backside of Chris's shorts bore evidence to the minor collateral damage which was suffered during this test.

My first visit to a sea cliff usually involves a major epic to locate the way down, but for once there was no problem as an obvious path and a short scramble led down to sea level. (In fact the epic came later in the day when we tried to descend to the nearby Gull Rock over terrain that had the consistency and stability of a pile of corn flakes, but that's another story.) The crag is a collection of enormous overlapping slabs above a beach of smooth pebbles, and Wrecker's follows the largest slab, rising straight from the beach to the cliff top for over four hundred feet.

We roped up while Chris muttered about assorted injuries which he had acquired during dangerous pastimes such as DIY and badminton. I interpreted this as a suggestion that I should lead, so I set off up an awkward step off the beach, followed by seventy feet of simple slab climbing when the first runner conveniently appeared to protect a more tricky section to a stance in a grassy groove. The next pitch was supposed to be the crux and looked more challenging, as the slab steepened into an overlap that had to be circumvented by a shallow groove of shattered rock whose stability looked questionable. In fact it was much easier than it looked, for the technical grade was only Severe and although the groove contained a few throwaway holds, it was just as solid as the Ruckle at Swanage and about thirty degrees further from the vertical. There were even some good runners, with a wonderfully reassuring Friend placement to protect a long stride out of the groove and back onto the slab above the overlap. The rest of the pitch was pure joy; no protection for sixty feet, just perfectly easy slab climbing on sound rock with huge exposure, ending at a tiny ledge, belayed hopefully to a couple of in-situ pegs in the middle of the vast sweep of slab.

Chris led through on the next pitch - more slab climbing followed by a short steep crack that gave painful toe jams and a chance to stretch the arm muscles. Another long easy pitch, taken slowly to savour the exposure, and we could relax at the top of the cliff. Our first reaction was that the route had proved much easier and less serious than the guide book would suggest, for now that most of the loose rock has been removed, the VS grade is exceedingly generous. Not that this matters, for the route's attraction lies not in the difficulty of the climbing, but in other less tangible qualities - the sense of adventure on a big sea cliff, the enormous exposure in the upper part of the climb, the wonderful location, and the chance to follow in the footsteps of one of the great pioneers of British climbing.

Incidentally there are a couple of other Patey classics near the top of my wish-list, but the logistics of climbing them may prove more difficult. The Old Man of Stoer (VS) is a spectacular sea stack on the coast of North West Scotland near Lochinver, and Squareface is a V. Diff in the Garbh Coire of Beinn a Bhuird, one of the remotest parts of the Cairngorms, a mere ten miles from the nearest road. Anyone interested out there?