After three consecutive weekends of crap weather and not much outdoor climbing, the forecast finally looked half decent for a trip so with a minibus of 12 top class climbers and Jake, we headed to the Peaks. With Ben on a rogue midterm holiday to Portugal, the command of the trip fell jointly to Ferdie and Ciaran, who are both vying to replace him in the coming AGM. A box of old space wine was found in stores which, along with the poor forecast for Saturday, led to a rather inebriated minibus. I disgraced myself on the bus in ways not suitable for a PG trip report such as this, whilst Fresher George’s nickname was permanently changed to Corridor George after he revisited some of his dinner in the Nelson Arms’ corridor.

Once all the bags were in the Pub, Jake and I hatched a secret plan to sneak off to the nearby Black Rocks for some midnight bouldering. For some reason I was convinced it would be dry, despite the pouring rain that had only just stopped. My disappointment in finding the rock dripping was quelled by the sights of some mega-classic climbs. The combination of being moodily lit from below by headtorches and the excessive amount of port that had been consumed made Gaia (E8 6c) look unreasonably intimidating. By now, everyone else had joined us, and Anna agreed to try leading it next year if she is VP. We all returned to the pub with immense psych for Saturday.

The boozy bus took its toll on everyone come the morning. This was alleviated by a pancake breakfast. Miguel’s French ancestors would be turning in their graves at his scrambled crêpes, however Anna stepped up and corrected the pancakes, which were then perfected by myself by topping it with golden syrup and sugar. My sugar free lent was not going well. The destination for the day was Stanage (which I have run out of funny ways to say is really good). Expecting a soggy hike, we were all surprised to see the crag was mostly dry. Luckily it was so cold that the rain throughout the day froze to hail before hitting the ground, keeping the rock dry, and the wind up the crag prevented most of the rain from even landing. This wind did cause a few false starts with Jake and Ciaran sensibly backing off routes when the hail started.

Despite the hail Corridor George soldiered on and led his first ever trad route, Heaven Crac (VDiff), perhaps cementing his claim to the Keenest Fresher award? Spurred on, Ciaran led the hilarious BAWs Crawl (HVS 5a), which involves inserting yourself into the crag. Psych for trad was low, so most people bouldered for the rest of the day. Dom had the most successful day, sending The Green Traverse (f7a) and Deliverance (f7b+), earning himself the alias: ‘The Dominator’. He proceeded to tell everyone that he had done Deliverance several times, giving credence to the intrinsic hatred for boulderers present in all sentient life. A lack of height proved troublesome for Anna on Thin Slab (f6B) when she couldn’t reach the top from the last existent footholds. Faced with a dyno from no positive hands and after 5 minutes of contemplation, she finally went for it, and ended up in A&E with a very swollen ankle. This marked the end of the day’s climbing, after which we returned to the pub all completely knackered.

A decent dinner and an early night were followed by an early morning and significantly worse than decent breakfast. That being said, the fact that no one ate it allowed us to get on the bus and to the crag quicker. With a clear forecast, we ventured to Froggatt for a day of new milestones. Jake managed to lead Tody’s Wall (HVS 5a) after a great deal of dithering before, during and after the route. This, despite being soft as shit, was his first proper HVS. Izzy meanwhile lead her first HS (Sunset Crack) and Corridor George did the very popular Heather Wall (HVD 3c). It was on this day that Miguel realised that sport climbing is a contrived European exercise in imperfection, and learned to embrace the art of trad, leading a HS offwidth with few enough big cams to make it slightly spicy (probably a Nando’s Lemon and Herb).

Ciaran and I both did Chequers Buttress (HVS 5a), a picturesque route that can be seen on my Instagram (@oliver_tippett (Neil Gresham follows me)), and Sunset Slab (HVS 4b). On the latter we both placed pointless low gear and led the route, even though it is effectively a solo because safety always comes first on ICMC trips. The boulderers spent the day taking pictures of themselves pulling onto impressive looking blocs that they couldn’t get anywhere near sending. This was to be expected as boulderers all love themselves far too much. They did all get some real bouldering done as well apparently.

After a full-on weekend of climbing came the minibus back to London, via the illustrious Pizzeria Loughborough. This time it was Filip’s turn to attempt the third ascent of the double meat junction. His attempt was valiant, yet ultimately ended in defeat after his pizza was pried from his hands for requesting a chunder bucket. No doubt he would have carried on eating until either great success, or great failure. He has since said we will be back to finish what he started, next time with half a bottle of vodka to help. All in all this was a trip that bodes well for next year in the ICMC and proves that we really don’t need Ben (you can stay in Portugal).