The Blind Man of Hoy

by Red Szell

  And all the time the weather in The Highlands and Islands remained windy and wet; ensuring that, if I got to climb at all, those ball bearings would be slippery as hell.

  Safety concerns were at the forefront of Lee’s mind when I met her at the BBC Production Equipment Centre. She’d had to fill out a gargantuan risk assessment document and made me promise again that I would abandon the recording should it become an encumbrance.

  The MP3 recorder itself was ideal; big chunky buttons, white-on-black display and so simple even I could operate it after a minute’s tuition. The technician assured me it had ample battery life but gave me a box of AAs just in case. I was about to leave when he handed me the headphones and mike.

  ‘I can’t wear these cans – they’ll never fit under my helmet!’ I protested. ‘Haven’t you got anything smaller?’ Apparently not. I took them but resolved to use my own in-ear set on the day.

  The mike was another matter. It was tiny but had some kind of booster that was the size of a Havana cigar and weighed the best part of a kilo. I hadn’t lost a load of weight to substitute it with that. Again however there seemed no alternative.

  Lee was worried by my concerns and immediately suggested a post-climb interview in the studio instead. I thought it through. I really wanted to make the recording. I love In Touch and Radio 4 and valued the opportunity I was being given to broadcast my belief that disability need not be crippling. I’d said on-air that I’d do the diary and ducking the challenge now, on the eve of the climb, felt wrong. And, having had hopes of it being filmed raised and deflated, I rather fancied the idea of a permanent record to refer to in years to come.

  I weighed the steel tube in my hand again, measured the length of the wire and made up my mind. ‘Okay, it can go in my daypack. I’ll take it.’

  Lee protested all the way to the steps of Broadcasting House; I reassured her that I’d only be operating the equipment between pitches, when I was securely anchored and my hands and mind would be otherwise unoccupied. Reluctantly she agreed but only after she’d joined the lengthening list of people I’d call the moment I was safely back down.

  The very next morning I received an email from Triple Echo, the production company responsible for making The Adventure Show for BBC Scotland, apologising that they had not got back to me earlier, assuring me that they were very keen to feature the climb in the series but could not send an entire film crew to Hoy. Instead they proposed shooting an interview either before or after the ascent, taking some long shots from the cliff opposite and interspersing footage taken with a Go-Pro camera – if I’d wear one. What did I think?

  After picking my jaw up from the floor I rang Matthew.

  ‘What’s not to like?’ he asked. I agreed.

  After that the news just got better. Margaret at Triple Echo was not exaggerating when she wrote next with the news that she’d ‘got a great camera person’ to join us on the trip. Keith Partridge is quite possibly the greatest mountaineering and adventure cameraman there is. His CV includes award-winning films like Touching The Void, Alien vs Predator and ground-breaking documentaries such as The Edge, Lost Land of The Jaguar, Human Planet and the jaw-dropping Beckoning Silence: North Face of The Eiger. And now he was going to be filming me!!

  Having worked with Keith previously, Martin was delighted. He thought that Keith might have been to Hoy before to film Catherine Destival’s ascent, which had Matthew scampering off to find footage . . . for reconnaissance purposes of course.

  It was with some jubilation that Matthew, Andres and I sat round the dinner table at Matthew’s house on the final Thursday before our departure. We had had a last session at Swiss, attacking the seriously overhanging 7a+ route whose final 15 feet run out at 30 degrees off-vertical, and had all nailed it. The gentle warm-down on the bouldering wall had however almost ended in disaster when I’d slipped and trapped the ring finger of my right hand behind a hold. Ice and tape seemed to have reduced the swelling and I could move it again, if a little stiffly. My climbing slippers too had survived and my feet, though rather gnarly after so much abuse, were in good shape.

  The three of us were buzzing with excitement – this time next week we should all have stood at the summit of the Old Man of Hoy and be enjoying a few drinks in the local hostelry. We opened a third bottle of red, flopped onto sofas and turned on the DVD player.

  First up was The Big Climb.

  ‘Fuckin‘ell guys this film is so ancient, it’s like what the 1940’s or something?’

  ‘Watch it pal,’ I growled, ‘you’re sitting next to someone who was alive when this was shot.’ I received a thump from Matthew for pointing that out.

  Like Kate, Meg and Laura though, their mirth was quelled by the sheer size of the rock and by the time Bonington was edging out of The Coffin they too were seeing themselves there.

  Next we loaded The Long Hope, a film of Dave MacLeod’s ascent of Britain’s toughest climb, a gruelling 23-pitch, 500-metre E8 6a route on St John’s Head which is the highest point on the cliffs that run behind the Old Man. Close-ups of crumbling rock, projectile-vomiting fulmars and vast overhangs left all three of us feeling queasy and glad we were attacking its little brother. The fact that MacLeod and his partner decided to climb the Old Man afterwards, just for kicks, didn’t belittle our task, merely put it into context.

  I left my two climbing partners surfing the Web in pursuit of Ms Destival and headed home; a bit pissed, a bit trepidatious, a long way from where I had been a year before and on the brink of achieving a lifelong dream with two recently made but already very important friends.

  17

  Day 1, Journey to Hoy

  ‘Sometimes the best gear for a climb is a good excuse.’

  – John Sherman

  I’d packed, unpacked, double-checked and repacked at least half-a-dozen times over the weekend. Matthew and I had compared lists, hoarded chocolate and bonk bars and, all the time, kept a wary eye on the weather forecast – which was improving.

  Flights had been booked, passports found (Andres panicked when told he needed to produce one, fearing he should have got a visa to leave the country and travel to Scotland!) and, on the basis that our young Colombian friend was a student and therefore highly likely to oversleep, Matthew had insisted that Andres stay with him the night before we flew. That way he could also check Andres had remembered his harness.

  As my house was en-route to the airport, the taxi with the other two in it was due to pick me up just after 7.00 am. Anticipation woke me before the alarm and, unable to go back to sleep I headed downstairs. It felt odd shuffling round the kitchen before Kate or the girls were up and I was halfway down a second cup of coffee and checking the weather forecast on Hoy for the umpteenth time before they appeared.

  Never at my most communicative in the mornings, I found myself lost for words and gratefully accepting a piece of toast I didn’t really want, to provide my mouth with alternative employment.

  A sensitive child, Laura gave me a hug and said, ‘Don’t worry Dad, whatever happens you’ll be the first blind person to attempt the Old Man and I’m proud of you.’

  The taxi arrived promptly to take me out of limbo, and final farewells and hugs seemed suddenly all too brief and hurried. Matthew hefted my 70-kilo rucksack into the already groaning boot of the car and stuck me into the passenger seat next to the driver, and then we were off.

  Huddled in the back and cradling his iPhone, Andres was moaning that this was no time of day to be awake – or if he had to be he should be heading for bed with a girl. Matthew pulled out his Blackberry and embarked on a stream of client calls that lasted three-quarters of the way to Luton, leaving me to talk vanilla to the driver. Eventually a lull in electronic chatter allowed me to ask what the two of them had got up to the night before at Matthew’s house.

  ‘Oh you missed out’ Matthew enthused. ‘We watched Catherine Destival soloing the Old Man. So much more exciting than watching Bonington or even MacLeod doing it!’

 
; ‘Yeah, she looked really hot,’ sleazed Andres, ‘you know, really sexy. You’re gonna be such a disappointment for that cameraman after her.’

  They carried on waxing lyrical all the way to the airport where I pretty much switched off, allowing myself to become a piece of hand luggage to be processed and fed through the system and into my seat on the plane. At least with Matthew taking responsibility for me this time there was no question of being stuck into a one-size-fits-all-disabled-people wheelchair to satisfy airline Health and Safety legislation. It’s rather perverse to be chair-bound when I’m jetting off to climb a rock-face.

  Only as the plane was taxiing to the runway, did Andres reveal his fear of flying. I felt suddenly guilty. All the focus had been on getting me aboard; there had been no space for this to come out or opportunity for him to nip off for a quick smoke to quell his nerves. As a former fellow sufferer, I babbled away for the next hour to take his mind off it and fed him Polos to stop his ears popping.

  Perhaps the flight landed early, or Martin and Nick were a few minutes late – either way Matthew was getting twitchy by the time they found us in Inverness’s tiny arrivals hall. The sun was out and the temperature a few degrees warmer than it had been in London as we trooped across the car park to the minibus that was to be our transport for the next five days.

  There we were introduced to Keith Partridge whose crates of camera equipment took up two-thirds of the back of the van. He was about my age, had a South of England accent and an air of calm capability that immediately put me at my ease. As we were also to discover, beneath his affable and highly entertaining good nature he possessed a rugged self-sufficiency that had kept him alive in the most inhospitable environments on the planet.

  We loaded up and were on the road within a matter of minutes. As I sat back in the seat between Matthew and Keith I felt the stress slough from me. This was actually going to happen. From now on it was Martin’s gig, he’d done this before. All I had to do was climb.

  Martin had planned an afternoon’s sea cliff climbing at Latheronwheel. As I understood it, to blow away the cobwebs, check I was still in shape and assess the abilities of Matthew and Andres.

  As we sped through the Caithness countryside Keith kept us amused with tales from his latest gig – filming a downhill mountain-bike race in the Himalayas from the back of a motorbike, while Andres dozed in the back, propped up by rucksacks and camera paraphernalia.

  After about 90 minutes we pulled into a little seaside car park and had a quick bite to eat from the provisions Martin had brought, before loading up with climbing gear and setting out along the cliff-top path. A light drizzle fell but the sun burnt hot behind it so that a heady aroma rose from the heather and flowers that brushed our boots as we trooped in single-file. London’s bustle and traffic seemed centuries distant.

  Martin found an anchor for the top rope and began to set up. Matthew, who had been bringing up the rear with Andres, approached him and asked what they should do.

  Martin seemed surprised. ‘Er, there’s a couple of VDiffs over there if Andres feels up to leading them.’

  I only half took this in. Keith was telling me that he wanted to get some footage showing me in action before Hoy, to give people an idea of the challenges I faced as a blind climber and to introduce the team.

  Putting these two conversations together in retrospect makes it perfectly clear what was happening, but the penny only dropped much later, by which time Matthew and Andres had been written out of the picture.

  My mind was elsewhere. What I love most about climbing is that it requires total concentration. If you have other things on your mind you’d better shelve them or you’re heading for a fall. My blindness becomes merely another problem to be overcome, like the absence of a good hold when you need to pass a bulge – if I let it become an issue I’ll never get past it.

  The routes I climbed that afternoon were pretty straightforward, a VDiff and a couple of VS’s, all on the kind of rock I love, hard sandstone with juggy holds and good long cracks to wedge fingers and toes into. The cliffs face east so we had the sun at our backs most of the time but idyllic as it was, I was troubled by the occasional flicker of worry. I put it down to caution; after all I hadn’t come this far to get injured now.

  I guess that’s why, when Martin and I had a mix-up, I reacted the way I did. Nick had led the route and Martin was climbing slightly above me. I’d already mentioned I prefer a guide to climb beside and slightly below me, but Martin clearly preferred his way and this seemed also to suit Keith and the camera.

  I was resting as he made his next couple of moves. He began by treading on my fingers for the second time that afternoon. I stifled a yelp and shook out the pain. Six feet above he stopped, turned and looked down to me. ‘Climb when you’re ready.’

  I started to feel my way up.

  Martin and Nick were of course using the opportunity to reacquaint themselves with climbing with me – it’s a head-fuck for most people. At Easter Martin had led most of the routes, leaving Nick (or on the Cioch Nose, Alex) to climb with me.

  In my mind the guide is there to keep me from straying too far off the route and to locate hand, or more usually foot, holds when I’m beginning to struggle. Martin had a pre-planned route in mind that he wanted me to adhere to – I suppose because he felt that this is what I am used to at the climbing wall. It didn’t help that from his perspective my left was his right. At the base of an off-width crack with an awkward little bulge, I asked twice whether he really meant me to move my left foot. It was bearing most of my weight so was the only thing keeping me in balance. He assured me that wriggling it a couple of inches further out would give me a better position. As I fell my left big toe was wrenched back 90 degrees and I heard him mutter ‘no, the other left.’

  Trust is a big part of climbing. I snapped, ‘It WAS my sodding left!’ and climbed the remainder of the route in silent fury following my instincts. Ten minutes later, sitting on the cliff top massaging my throbbing toe, Matthew and Andres sidled back to ask whether Martin might leave the top rope in place so they could use it. Catching the edge in Matthew’s voice and feeling a bit mutinous, I piped up that of course this was their climbing trip too and I was sure we had another rope that we could set up further along the cliff. At that point I would happily have climbed with them instead, but had just agreed to do a final route for the camera.

  Keith fancied something a little more dramatic to round off the afternoon’s filming and, notwithstanding my toe, so did I. Leaving the rope for Matthew and Andres we set off in search of an HVS described by the (admittedly ancient) guidebook. This section of the cliff was overgrown and proved to be a bit loose in places but something that looked like it might fit the bill, with some steep rock leading up to an overhanging bulge, caught Nick’s eye and we abseiled down to its base. With the waves ten feet below spattering us with foam, Martin and I waited as Nick cleaned the route and laid protection. He grunted a bit at the top, disappeared over the bulge then shouted down ‘Off belay!’ A minute or two later we heard the command ‘Climb’ and I was off, ahead of Martin this time.

  It was a chossy, loose and vegetated climb that got a bit hairy in the final ten to twelve feet especially when the chockstones wedged in the narrow overhanging crack decided to give way under pressure. But I had momentum and was up and over the ledge at the top and grinning stupidly at the camera lens within minutes.

  ‘I reckon that’s a new route,’ Nick said. ‘It’s got to be an HVS 5a or b, that bulge was a bit more bold than I expected. I’ll check with the SMC but if it is a first ascent what do you want to call it Red?’

  It was a nice problem to have on a sunny afternoon. Martin had joined us by now and we tossed names around for a few minutes before settling on 3 Blind Mice. (Sadly it had been climbed before but gratifyingly had been logged as an E1).

  ‘You certainly motored up that one,’ said Keith. He had been pretty quiet up to now. ‘The trouble is, Red, and I mean no disrespect here
, you climb so fast and make it look so straightforward, that anyone looking at the film won’t know that you can’t see.’

  ‘Aye, it’s difficult to keep pace with him on the rock sometimes,’ Martin agreed.

  Keith was too amiable for this remark to have been made with any side. He clearly loved his job and went about it with such assuredness that most of the time I’d forgotten he was there.

  ‘I suppose I could use the white stick . . .’

  ‘Or we could get a guide dog,’ Matthew, who’d joined us, chipped in acidly.

  ‘Um, no. I was thinking we just need more footage of when it’s a struggle to get around. Like with the walk-in over the cliffs.’

  ‘You wait till you see me trying to clamber down the cliffs to the Old Man’ I said ruefully ‘No one’ll be in any doubt then.’

  ‘I’ll be short-roping him, in case he takes a tumble,’ Martin confirmed.

  ‘Too right, but I’m more worried about turning an ankle or cracking a shin than breaking my neck – especially crossing those boulders on the causeway.’

  ‘I think I’ll come down the cliff with you then and get some footage to set the scene.’

  It was agreed, as, somehow without my noticing, had been the consensus that Nick should lead all five pitches up the Old Man and Martin climb with me.

  Back on the road again, Matthew and Andres simmered with discontent. They’d had a rubbish afternoon’s climbing, stuck firmly on the sidelines. Slower on the uptake, I hadn’t fully appreciated the ramifications of the latter point, yet.

  The bleak outskirts of Scrabster matched the atmosphere inside the minibus as we approached the ferry terminal and it was a relief to get out on deck and feel the sea breeze on the crossing to Stromness.