Written by Sofia Srdanovic.

From the get-go, the odds were stacked against us. Minibuses acquired, but not intact. To our disappointment, the front headlight wasn’t working. Fortunately, old man Miguel was still around to save the day. Having found a spare headlight bulb, the next challenge was our lack of tools. And so began the hunt for the elusive Allen key. A passing cyclist had one key and it was exactly the one we needed. Amy’s key promptly snapped, Gil got a toolkit from Aero but none fit, and neither did Scuba’s. Eventually the uni contractors came with a proper toolkit and helped Miguel disassemble the entire headlight to access the bulb. Success!

Headlight fixed, we thought we were good to go. Upsettingly for Amar, having both Scuba and ICMC leaving at the same time led to an unfortunate case of misplaced luggage. Amar’s bag, and all his gear, had set off for Cornwall. After an impressive attempt at cyber stalking through social media, the bag was intercepted before it had made it to the M25.

Meanwhile, oblivious to the chaos occurring in Beit Quad, Elliot and Sofia were busy buying Tesco out of all of their food. An obscene number of veggie sausages (would never have been allowed during pandemic rationing times) and 300 club card points later, it was go time. The journey to the Peak District was uneventful, although Sophia’s minibus had no heating or radio which made for a somewhat unpleasant 3 hours.

Arriving at the village hall at midnight, we had a bit of a shock when we saw the “kitchen facilities”: a singular oven, a microwave and a boiling water tap. Not ideal for Chef Elliot who had planned a delicious dinner of bangers and mash, crispy cabbage, peas and red onion gravy. He went to bed that night, cogs turning, trying to work out how he’d pull it off - but not before making overnight oats for 30 people.

Having assessed the weather the night before (not good), we decided that Saturday would start with a lie in. Overnight oats proved to be a huge success (would recommend to all future trips). It was then time for a theory lesson from Gil and Miguel, top tier trad dads. We then set off for New Mills Tor, which UKC assured us would, “stay dry, even in monsoon weather”.

Splitting into our teaching pairs, we spent the rest of the day learning gear placements, abseiling, and most people managed to get their first second in! The crag was very well protected, and had a decent range of trad, bouldering and sport routes for an aqueduct bridge in the middle of a village. Tom Mills (Tom Tom) sent Grim Reaper Direct (f7A+), a spicy little no-topout problem.

No fireworks for us, as half the group decided to stay for some night climbing (thank you street lamps), and the other returned to get started on the ordeal that would be Saturday night dinner. It was a real team effort beautifully conducted by Chef Elliot - with Maja microwaving kilos upon kilos of potatoes, Sean stacking sausages beautifully, MORE

The night’s activities involves a competitive cereal box game, followed by the sling game, where two players have to pass through a knotted sling placed around their feet on the floor. Sean and Wilson got very VERY close, Sofia was kicked in the face by Amy, lots of spotting practice occured.

On the second day, Amy sent her first HVS (second ever trad lead!) on Tody’s Wall. Despite some very neat mantle and crack climbing, the highlight was definitely setting a nut so aggressively that the club’s president wasn’t sure what she was doing (eyewitnesses report it looking like a baby shaking a rattle), and then promptly raining nuts down the route. A good learning experience! Amy was also then filmed shouting, “I’M FINE!”, at onlookers warning her that she was runout halfway up the crack. Still a send.

Many other climbers got their first taste of the sharp end of trad, without any major incidents as far as we have heard!