The Blind Man of Hoy Page 9

  When I explained that I find it more helpful to have my second directing my feet, because they locate holds less readily than my fingers do, I could sense his discomfort. Expert climbers like Martin feel uneasy underneath amateurs who can be unpredictable and may pull down all sorts of loose material from the face.

  All too soon the technical stuff was done and we were scrambling over a succession of false summits and slopes peppered with boulders and the scent of the juniper that grows between them.

  ‘You’re a hard man to keep up with, you move so fast,’ panted Martin.

  ‘Only on the way up,’ I replied, probably the only one of us hoping for another false summit since the walk-off meant another hour of crab-scrambling along the sides of the gully we’d descended earlier.

  This however did not dampen my elation at reaching the top. The whole of the West Highlands was laid out at my feet, glorious spring sunshine gleaming from the snow capped peaks and the loch below. Even though the detail was lost on my eyes, the scale and the vivid blues and reds were breathtaking.

  ‘How was that then Red?’ Alex’s voice contained a warm satisfaction akin to my own.

  ‘That was absolutely brilliant, a terrific afternoon’s work.’

  ‘It’s looking pretty good for the Old Man of Hoy if you just completed that, I think.’

  ‘If your dad says I can go I’ll be there in June. I can’t wait.’

  ‘What do you think, Dad?’

  ‘Yes, I think you’ve proved you’d be up to it. That was a good climb. Well done.’

  Alex put his arm round my shoulder and whispered. ‘He doesn’t say that very often; he means it!’

  Agony and ecstasy kept each other in check for the next 60 minutes. Walking off a summit, traversing ground strewn with sharp, shattered rocks wearing climbing slippers is a painful experience at the best of times, but when you can’t see what your tightly bunched toes might be about to kick, each dread-filled step registers on a scale of sore to excruciating.

  Martin kept my spirits up with a story of an attempted rescue of some sheep from a narrow ledge overlooking the deep gully below.

  ‘These three must have jumped down and were now stuck with no way back to the path. So when the farmer saw me he asked if I could try to bring them up. I roped down and grabbed the first one and carried it up, but as soon as I let it go the stupid thing jumped back down. I tried again but the same thing happened, except this time the sheep missed the ledge. After that I gave up. The other two weren’t there the next time I came by.’

  In the minibus, my feet throbbing warmly in thermal socks as they expanded to their accustomed volume, I sat back exhausted but elated.

  I was going to Hoy . . . I was actually going to get a crack at climbing The Old Man and fulfilling a 30-year dream! As Matthew’s succinct response to the news put it – ‘Fucking A!’

  And there was a dollop of icing to come to the cake yet – I still had a day’s climbing to go. With the test out of the way we could all relax and have a bit of fun. So Martin took us to a hidden treasure in his own back yard: Diabaig, an outcrop on the shores of Loch Torridon.

  It was another idyllic spring day, with a few wispy clouds and a lot of sunshine. Again I had slept well, woken early and, though a little more stiff than the day before and sporting blackened toenails, I felt good and up for a challenge.

  We were meeting Nick on the way so had a chance to chat during the drive out. Like me Martin had studied at Cambridge, but spent his spare time cutting holds in the brickwork of disused railway bridges to practice his climbing. He had joined the University Mountaineering Club and used the opportunity to make his first forays to the Alps. Even by his sober and unembellished retelling of it, his ascent of the Eiger a few years afterwards had been an epic that only calm, clear thinking had enabled him and his partner to survive. Nowadays he ran his successful business, led clients on expeditions to his favourite winter and summer climbing regions in-between which he wrote well-received books about his climbs and spent significant, quality time with a family he clearly adored. I warmed to him a lot during those 40 minutes.

  ‘I’ve been considering how we’re going to get you up the Old Man’ Martin announced as we bounced down the loch-side road towards the parking area. ‘The best way will be for you to climb between the two of us and then, if your friends want, we can take them up the following day. What do you think Nick?’

  ‘Sounds good,’ was Nick’s typically laid back assessment.

  ‘Um, I think Matthew and Andres were hoping we could all make the ascent together; you know, all stand at the summit and celebrate the success of a team effort.’

  ‘Mmm. There’s nothing to stop them going up by another route and trying to arrive at about the same time, but unless Andres is happy leading E2 then they’d need another guide to go with them. I could arrange that but it would add to the cost.’

  ‘We couldn’t go up as a group of five?’ Al Alvarez had gone up in a party of six, half of whom were pretty unfit. ‘The three of us first with the others following on behind?’ That certainly was how I’d read Martin’s suggestion that ‘one of the guides can climb the Old Man a second time’.

  ‘Large parties tend to move slowly. Besides, Nick and I need to be on either end of your rope throughout, so the others would be fairly much on their own. Unless they’re confident climbing at that grade, we can’t be worrying about them when we need to concentrate on getting you up safely.’

  It was clear that this was non-negotiable and as I digested the information I saw that at its heart lay a concern for my safety. Still it felt like getting a record contract only to be told that the rest of the band was going to be replaced by session musicians. I didn’t relish breaking the news to Matthew and Andres.

  That however was for another day. More immediate problems lay directly ahead, set in rock with a texture not dissimilar to Yorkshire gritstone. I asked Martin what we were climbing on and he replied with typical precision: ‘It’s Lewisian gneiss, it’s about two billion years old and is the oldest surface rock in Western Europe.’

  It didn’t feel very nice and I prepared myself for leaving a skin graft somewhere on the crag before the day was out.

  The first of the two routes we tackled was Route Three, a three pitch E1 that began easily enough with a 4b loosener, before presenting a tricky left to right traverse across a steep, abrasive slab that gave plenty of scope for testing the friction soles of my climbing shoes (much of whose rubber I left behind as tribute to the wall). A thin crack meandered across the face, disappearing periodically, then re-emerging further along, usually where I least wanted it and invariably just out of reach.

  Martin kept me on a tight rope but I kept having to ask for slack to allow me to flag further out and grasp the few holds on offer. He couldn’t see me from his stance and I was right on the edge of my ability. Had Nick not been there next to me I doubt my nerve would have held. The wisdom of Martin’s strategy for Hoy at once became very apparent.

  We flopped over the bulging lip of a 60-degree slab, from the rear of which Martin was belaying and I tried to coax my trembling arms and legs back to stillness. Two full-on days of climbing were catching up with me; my shoulders and elbows ached with over-exertion. A bonk bar now would have been a good idea, washed down with a couple of ibuprofen, but all were in my rucksack down below.

  ‘Good effort Red. That was a 5b pitch!’ Ever cheerful, Nick wasn’t even out of breath.

  ‘It was something else beginning with F too,’ I muttered, offering him a Polo.

  ‘The next pitch is easier; it’s only a 5a.’

  I groaned, 6a on a climbing wall then, I hoped Martin wouldn’t climb it too quick, I needed time to flush the lactic acid out of my arms. I stretched them out tentatively then ducked at a cry from above.

  ‘What’s that, Martin?’ Nick shouted.

  ‘Looks like someone backed off here and left some gear behind. I’m going to see if I can nab it. Looks like a hex and
a newish crab.’

  ‘Let me know if it’s a 10, I lost one recently and could do with a replacement.’

  I was feeling a bit lost until Nick explained that ‘hexes’ are hexagonal steel nuts, their number denoting their diameter and that ‘crab’ is slang for karabiner.

  Martin was delighted with his trove, ‘Good as new!’ he shouted down as he clipped it to his harness. Soon enough he was calling ‘Off belay’ then ‘Climb’ and I was off again. But the respite had been enough and I attacked the remaining slab and the final steep crack with renewed vigour and the knowledge that painkillers and lunch awaited me back on the ground.

  Numbed and replete I knew I had another climb in me but as we ate a chill wind had started to blow, bringing with it the first spots of rain and leaving me worried that we would have to pack up prematurely.

  ‘I think we’ve got time for one last route before those clouds roll in’ declared Martin. ‘How about Dead Mouse Crack?’

  As he set off with a jangle of hexes and cams, Nick observed, ‘This one’s much more thuggy. It’s got a steep corner start followed by an awkward chimney and overhang out to the right. I think I’ll jug up beside you, there’s not a lot of room even for one.’

  The first thing I did at the foot of the wall was stand in a puddle of brackish water that seeped from a wide, wet, smelly crack.

  ‘Ooh, just like Harrison’s,’ I remarked. I slithered around a bit, found a deep fissure to lever myself up on and worked my way round the tight corner into what was indeed an awkward chimney, that had me twisting and turning like a pipe-cleaner as I wriggled up beneath the square-cut roof of a jutting overhang.

  ‘You need to emerge front right, round that corner and up.’ Nick stood in mid-air ahead of me like some mountaineering genie.

  ‘Marvellous’ I muttered. I was back-to-front for the manoeuvre, with two and a half points of contact and slipping.

  Contrary to his instructions I buried myself deeper into the back of the chimney. The position allowed me to brace my right leg against the far side of the flue and rest on my left, which was folded under me and toe-hooked into a pocket by my backside.

  Twisting my upper body through 150 degrees I groped round the corner till, at full stretch, the fingers of my right hand closed round a solid side-pull. I took a deep breath, swung my right foot across me, round the corner and up, using the momentum to pivot on my left toes and rise to standing. Face hard against the rock now I fought for purchase with my right foot.

  ‘Up, up at hip height there’s a ledge.’ Nick’s voice from above was full of urgency.

  I heel-hooked it at the second attempt, dislodging my left in the process. Supported now only by my left hand crimping the corner of the overhang, my left side began to sag. I needed more height to rock over onto my right leg so planted the sole of my left shoe firmly on the abrasive face and tried to smear up on it, groping high overhead for the crack.

  ‘Further out to your right, Red, two more inches. That’s it! You’ll find a nice deep groove at the back for your fingers. Good. Now pull up!’ he urged.

  I looped quivering fingers under a lip in the groove and wrenched myself up and past the snout of the overhang, hugging the wall, leaning into its slight angle, wired on adrenalin.

  ‘Well that’s one way to do it’ Nick grinned. ‘Not very orthodox but nonetheless pretty impressive.’

  I was on a roll now. The crack above was packed with knobbly holds and chock stones, allowing me to climb up the middle of it on hand and foot jams as I’d learned at Brunel. But all the time the rock was getting steeper and I was getting weaker.

  ‘Last few moves now,’ Nick called. ‘Go on, nearly there.’

  The final few feet bulged out above my head, steep and with no holds apart from the crack. I dropped into a long-reach lay-back and hauled myself arm over arm upwards.

  Martin had protected this section well. There was a Friend (a type of cam) embedded in the crack as it ran in from the right to minimise my swing should I fall on the approach, and a medium-sized hex wedged into the base of the overhanging crack. I worked them both out and clipped them to my harness, drew a deep breath and got my feet nice and high to gain maximum height when I pushed up. Another deep breath and I rose, the rock pushing me out and away, my fingers fumbled for purchase in the crack but the rope lay tight in the groove and there were no other holds. I hooked a finger under the rope, grabbed a tuft of heather in my other fist, raised my left leg high and smeared up and over. Just as I felt my balance shift to safety there was a tug at my waist, pulling me back to the void. I slapped my palms down on the rock, friction holding me in check from toppling backwards.

  Heart pounding I tried a tentative jerk up, hoping the rope was merely snagged in the crack. Again it tugged me back. My left foot was tucked underneath me, bent like a chicken wing, safely wedged in the crack but the sole bearer of the majority of my weight. The right flailed about for purchase but found little.

  ‘You’ve got a piece of protection below you, you need to take out’ called Nick, also from below.

  ‘Bollocks! It must be stuck under the rope. It’s tight in the crack’ I called back. It was obvious he couldn’t remove it for me unless I came back down again and I felt too pumped and too tired after so much climbing to feel totally confident of getting over again. Equally I had done a lot to exorcise my daemons about overhangs over the past couple of days and was damned if one of them was going to send me home on a low note.

  ‘Do you need a hand, Red?’ Nick asked.

  ‘Nah, bugger it. I’ve come this far; let’s get this thing out. Any idea what it is?’

  ‘Another Friend I think.’

  I swore. With their spring-loaded open and close action, placing and freeing them is much like depressing a syringe. The problem was finding the end of this syringe to depress. I asked Martin for some slack, wobbled scarily against gravity in spite of my best efforts to hold myself steady, then fumbled between my legs to lift the rope and free the cam.

  It was well and truly embedded and I would dearly have loved to see it to work out the angle it had been slipped in at, but I’m used to seeing with my fingers so, with the seconds ticking past and the shakes trembling in my left leg and threatening to dislodge my only solid point of contact, I ran my fingertips along the line of the groove trying to build a mental picture.

  Sweat-slick, my right hand began to slip. My left had worked its way along the shaft of the Friend and located the finger grip. I fought to control my breathing and focus only on the job in hand. Nick too was silent. I depressed the bar, felt the cam’s teeth close and wiggled the mechanism up and right. It grated all the way then popped out, briefly snagging on the rope before a final yank freed it and I was able to clip it safely to my harness.

  Within two minutes I was clambering into a crenellated crow’s nest belay stance with Martin, breathlessly telling him of my tribulations five metres below and suffused with a sense of really having achieved something that trumped even my jubilation of the day before.

  Martin let me jabber on while he relieved me of the offending ironmongery and its companion pieces before suggesting that it might be time to abseil off.

  I felt as if I could float down. Not only had I completed an E1 5b, the same grade as The Old Man, but I’d also conquered a pair of nasty overhangs and kept my nerve and maintained my balance to overcome a problem along the way. If Martin had set out that morning to test my abilities to the limit, he couldn’t have chosen a better pair of routes.

  I think all three of us left Diabaig more confident that the Old Man lay within my grasp. Certainly we were barely in the minibus before talk turned to press coverage and preserving the event for posterity.

  ‘Alex and I got some good footage of you on the Cioch yesterday and I’ve taken more today. He’s thinking he could pass it to his girlfriend, who’s in her final year of a Film and Media course, to make a promotional film with, which would be good for any charity fundraising you were thinki
ng of, and possibly for getting wider interest. I don’t know whether you’ve heard of The Adventure Show?’

  ‘It’s a rugged Scottish version of Countryfile isn’t it?’

  ‘That sort of thing I suppose, yes. We’ve worked with them in the past and Nick’s in touch with Meg Wicks, one of the producers. They might be interested in featuring your story.’

  I had dropped her an email a month or so before and had a polite, prompt but discouraging reply citing a limited number of programmes and an excess of potential items, but wishing me well for the climb. However with Martin’s support, Nick’s charm and film footage of me in action to whet her appetite it was certainly worth another try.

  ‘Right, while Nick gets in touch with Meg, I’ll go ahead and start booking ferries and accommodation in Stromness. If you can email me with names and final numbers of who will be coming that would be good.’

  ‘Anything else I should do, or work on before June?’

  ‘Your routine sounds good. Just make sure you climb as much as possible and keep up the training.’

  With that we shook hands and I climbed into Nick’s car to head back to Inverness.

  ‘I’m afraid the B&B I booked you into doesn’t do an evening meal but I’ve been telling Amy about you and she was wondering whether you’d like to join us for supper. It won’t be anything special, but she and Lily would really like to meet you.’

  My heart leapt. I’d been secretly dreading wandering round an unfamiliar town looking for somewhere to have a meal for one then trying to retrace my steps to the B&B. Also, I genuinely liked Nick, not only was he an excellent climber and intuitive guide but his calm, thoughtful character was full of warmth and humour. I thoroughly looked forward to meeting the wife and daughter he had already described with unselfconscious love and pride.

  They were just as charming in reality – both were elfin, with a ready wit and convivial spirit. Over an excellent lasagne washed down with the most-welcome gin and tonic I’ve ever enjoyed we chatted about books, weddings and the rewards of spending time at home with your children. Amy, who is a GP, and Nick each work part-time so that one of them is always at home for Lily.