
Teaching trad climbing with 2 mock clients. One with some seconding experience (Julie), one with a couple of lead climbs (Vicki). Both do lots of indoor climbing and a bit of sport climbing. Climbed cuticle crack in series with the pair swinging leads. Julie took the first 'lead' and attached to my anchor and placed an additional piece (out of reach style), we used ideas to check the anchor was appropriate and discussed best practice for stance management whilst swinging leads. Vicki lead second pitch and built the anchor out of gear she had selected. This took a bit more assistance than I had hoped given her experience but stringing the pieces together and managing the stance was fairly independent. Carefully walked to the top of the gully and lowered here for speed.
Continued on Holly tree groove in series, this time Vicki leading first and making a good anchor out of rock gear. We looked at in reach anchors here to add some new content for Vicki. Julie 'lead' the final pitch and set using a tree (discussion on single point anchors).
Stacked abseil from the ledge. Julie helped set this up as she expressed an interest in doing this. Discussed what is required for safe retrievable abseil and used a top to bottom approach to check our work (from the anchor, down to us, down to knots at the bottom.
The ladies were slow moving so not as much achieved as planned/hoped despite trying to add an emphasis on efficiency.
Area :
Highland Outcrops: Pitlochry to Dunkeld
The Pitlochry to Dunkeld area covers the crags bordering or close to the A9 between the two villages. They are very popular climbing destinations with climbs to suit all abilities, with a very pleasant environment and sunny aspects. The trad climbs on these crags should be entered here, but the sport climbs on the mixed discipline Dunkeld and Rockdust crags should be entered in the sport climbing section of DLOG.