Box Bay

by Calum McClune

Saturday arrived, and with a few rays of sunshine our hopes were raised. After a quick diversion for the lead car (to pick up half the kit I had forgotten) we made it to Box Bay with minimal casualties. Meeting up with the advance party of Matt, Sam, Will, Henry and Rupert, (who had arrived early to get back in time for the rugby) we realized the guide book was impossible to read. Rapidly giving up with established routes we instead made it up as we went along, which brought with it varying degrees of success. We also found out Henry had forgotten his harness and had been faffing for the past hour.
A further hour passed before Henry’s knight in shining arrived, Hugo crested the hill holding a harness triumphantly. Alongside him; Matt, Phil and our adventuring picnicker Angie, joined us after a failed Kayaking trip. Hugo promptly got bored of protection and soloed a HS or VS, or perhaps Severe honestly no one had a clue what they were climbing, with Matt seconding. The only thing stopping him from soloing himself was the half eaten baguette in one hand.
A short lunch break later Bertrand had finally made progress with deciphering the guide book, revealing an E1 and E2 just around the corner. Henry had a crack at the E1 before half his protecting fell out and he down climbed to safety, immediately afterwards punching a rock and spilling the first, and thankfully last, blood. While this was occurring, Ellie was learning how to create an anchor and is now happy with trad.
The rest of the afternoon was a mixture of attempts at the two climbs we actually knew and some interesting crack problems. As the air temperature started to drop, the number of climbers dwindled before we were eventually all driven out by the approaching tide.