by Red Szell
It was beautiful. The water had a cold bite but was fresh and soft. The surroundings, as anyone who has watched the opening scene of the 2011 film of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy knows, idyllic.
I swam two 330-metre circuits of breaststroke, surrounded on all sides by the others who cheerfully shouted out directions for me to avoid buoys, the perimeter rope and the occasional swan. ‘Hey, it’s like being on Presidential protection detail,’ remarked one American wag.
I got out shivering but utterly invigorated. Every part of my body felt alive and buzzed with sensation. I dressed quickly, glad of Matthew’s advice and savoured the tea and the moment as I was made an honorary member and presented with my own EGLST cap. For the rest of the day I was infused with a glorious calm and clarity, as when I’ve climbed well.
22
What Goes Up . . .
‘Getting to the top is optional. Getting down is mandatory.’
– Ed Viesturs, No Shortcuts to the Top:
Climbing the World’s 14 Highest Peaks
I must have been about five; Mum was pregnant with my sister and probably had her feet up. I was in the garden, up the highest tree I could find – it seemed like a giant but was probably under 15 feet tall. Having summited I had inched my way down and was preparing for the final traverse, along a bough to the pedal car I’d tipped on its side to access the lower branches.
Then for some reason I decided to stop and hang upside down on the bough from the backs of my knees.
Arguably the blood had already rushed to my head before I discovered that this made me dizzy and that I couldn’t pull myself back to sitting. I hung there, yelling for Mum, increasingly desperate as the ground loomed then receded before my eyes. At that moment I realised that what people called a fear of heights was actually a terror of falling.
My jelly legs slid their grip and I hit the lawn head first with a sickening crunch. Mum scooped me up a minute later. I was bawling and indignant. Why hadn’t she come when I’d called?
Eventually I was pacified with a Walnut Whip. As she checked for signs of concussion Mum explained that she’d thought my shouting was part of a game.
‘If you’re going to climb things you’ve got to remember there might not always be someone to help. You need to plan how you’re going to get back down again and not do anything silly.’
Though it had started well enough the period following my return from Hoy demonstrated a distinct lack of descent management, with predictably messy results.
The fall came in the middle of a glorious summer of boozy parties. I was spending more time reliving the climb than actually climbing, knocking back a couple more drinks each time I retold the story, then feeling too groggy the next day to do much training.
It all came to a head one night surrounded by other parents from school (again) and began with a mojito that turned into a litre. It culminated with some destructive dancing and someone passing me a spliff . . . after which Matthew and another dad from school had to pour me into a car and take me home. Kate had long since preceded me, feeling under par and no doubt fed up with hearing the same story told for the umpteenth time.
I woke up with a headache and the crushing sense of having let myself down. Just when people were celebrating my success in climbing so high and telling me what an inspiration I was, I had yet again hit the self-destruct button.
An email from Matthew, subject ‘the hard man of Hoy’ bore testament to this:
now i know what you mean when you talk about ‘kicking the arse out of the weekend’
it’s brutal and as usual I struggle to keep up with you.
in the meanwhile I guess our next session is still good on Thursday?
Worse was to come. The spectre that had always lurked in the background, of an earlier blind ascent of the Old Man, seemed to materialise a few days later. The email I received was from an individual who claimed to have done so in 1978 and, like me, to have RP. I congratulated him and for a day or two took the news in my stride. Although he could produce no evidence, he then began contacting all the organisations and magazines that had published articles or reported the news of my climb, telling them they must set the record straight. Suddenly it seemed as if my whole effort, which after all had started only as a personal challenge, was being negated; the achievement poisoned.
I got in touch with Keith and Margaret at Triple Echo, to warn them that they may need to amend the script for The Adventure Show. Keith wrote straight back to tell me that ‘this shouldn’t take away from your achievement in my mind!’
Andres was more scathing. ‘Just ignore it, man. It’s just some sad fucking troll who’s got nothing better to do that make up stories.’
‘Yeah, now that you’re a star you’ve got to learn to live with these weirdoes. You’ve probably got a stalker too,’ added Matthew.
‘What about groupies?’ I asked hopefully.
‘We are your groupies, pal.’
Another email from this individual suggesting we might meet seemed to confirm Andres’ opinion, as did inconsistencies in the dates and descriptions he sent to various websites and people. Finally, he posted a message saying he had been registered as partially sighted when he made his ascent – which as someone else replied is very different to being blind. My claim stood but the experience left me battered and bruised and wondering exactly what the nature of my achievement was.
I began to write about it, as the best way of processing the information. Recalling where I had been and what I had gained put things in perspective. Whether or not my expedition to the summit of the Old Man was a first; other achievements stood unchallenged by anything but my own behaviour. My personal ascent, from an unhealthy rut to a physical and mental peak, better relationships with those I love and strong new friendships, particularly with Matthew, meant far more than a footnote in the record books.
I eased up on my celebrations and made sure that I kept up with my Cole Styron Fitness Programme and weekly sessions at Swiss. This however was not enough to keep my newly reinvigorated rat well fed. Because it was school summer holidays my duties as a househusband precluded me from getting away on another climbing trip. I needed to find something that gave me the same physical freedom and sense of wellbeing.
So I became an EGLST regular and have found in its characterful ranks much the same humanity and camaraderie as exists in the climbing community. I still emerge from the water shivering but have bought Cole’s bright yellow down jacket from him in the hope that it will help me survive the colder months. Maybe I’ll wear it on an outdoor winter climb soon too.
As I’ve written this account one thing has become abundantly clear to me. When I face a vertical wall of problems or an overhanging bulge of grief and frustration my instinct is to try and get over it as quickly as possible, to fight the wall and flail blindly about for something to haul myself up on. If I take my time to search out the route and break the wall into pitches, I am more likely to remain in balance and rise above it. When, inevitably, the falls and setbacks do occur, far better to be relaxed and in a state to resume the climb out of the shadows. Repeated blind frustration invariably results either in self-loathing or resentment of others . . . or both. Either way it eats at you from the inside.
Though some climbers appear to do it solo, there is always support behind them somewhere. Without Matthew, the Old Man of Hoy would still be my pipedream. He, like Mo Anthoine, provided the selfless dedication and meticulous planning that got me to the summit and back, only to become an unsung hero, cut out of the picture in the media coverage.
Neither he nor Andres feature in The Adventure Show film aired early that autumn. I hope this book goes some way to setting the record straight.
‘You’re in so much of a better place than you were this time last year,’ he told me at the beginning of October. ‘God, you were a miserable git, skulking into Swiss, really angry with the world, moaning, ‘I hate this time of year because they put the bloody clocks back’ and then going off o
n some rant about Scottish farmers and the First World War. You’re a changed man.’
‘I still have my moments’ I assured him. But he was right. I wasn’t exactly looking forward to losing an hour’s daylight at school pick-up time but it wasn’t filling me with its customary dread. I walked taller, felt fitter and healthier and more equal to the world than any time since my diagnosis at 19. And that was in no small part down to him.
‘How would you fancy coming out to Sardinia and doing a spot of sport climbing? I’ve been looking at a guidebook and there look to be some great bolted routes out there.’
‘That would be great! Yes please.’
‘Well, I thought you’d like something to look forward to at this time of year.’
I was speechless. The weather had begun to turn and I’d assumed the climbing season was over for the year. I knew he had a place over there that they rented as a holiday home but . . . ‘Yeah, sure, thanks.’
‘I thought you might like a little sunshine to look forward to before the long nights set in. I’ll ask Andres too. You can fly direct and cheap to Cagliari from Stansted. I’m going to be out there anyway organising a mountain biking holiday for some guys so after that we can have some fun exploring the routes.’
‘Thanks Matthew.’
‘My job in life is to make you as happy as possible without actually touching you. That’s Kate’s job.’ He replied.
So it was that a couple of weeks later Matthew and Andres met me at Cagliari Airport. I was in high spirits. Total donations to my JustGiving page had just topped £15,000; I’d left London in a cold thunderstorm and arrived to 26 degrees C and bright sunshine.
Andres too was in bullish mood. Unencumbered by childcare duties he had flown out a few days before to recce the local rock.
‘You’re going to have such a great time,’ he enthused. ‘We found some amazing routes for you to climb.’
He unfortunately was not sticking around, having decided to make the most of his visa and head off to Brussels for the weekend in the hope of getting his Queen’s jewels polished by an ex-girlfriend. (He returned, sceptre tucked between his legs, on the day of my departure.)
But he and Matthew had certainly done their homework and I was glad I’d kept in shape – Matthew was taking no prisoners.
Having waved Andres off, we spent the first afternoon warming up on a nearby crag before heading down to Castello dell’Iride which is described by Planetmountain.com as:
‘one of the most popular crags in southern Sardinia, and now offers more than 60 routes of all grades with a magnificent view onto the Masua sea. The crag faces SE and is comprised of a vertical, sharp whiteish yellow limestone. Many of the newer routes require a 70m rope and plenty of quickdraws. Route names are written on the base of the crag.’
It failed to mention that the area was populated almost entirely by young Polish women in short shorts and bikini tops, tackling only routes graded 6c and above. This was one area of climbing where my failing eyesight was clearly a major disadvantage. I told Matthew of a quote I had seen years before taken from a Cosmopolitan article:
‘When a woman hunts for a partner, she is instinctively looking for one who would provide her with a good strong gene pool . . . If he has a tendency to hang from cliffs by his fingertips . . . it’s a pretty safe bet he’s fit and healthy.’
He snorted. We’d been setting up to climb a 6a called Down By Law; 25 metres of sheer white limestone, virtually featureless in places with a fat blocky overhand two-thirds of the way up. As Matthew made a tentative start a young German couple came over to watch.
Skitter, scrape, smack, ‘Shit!’
‘Ja. I fell off in exactly the same place und made the same noise too,’ said the young man approvingly. This did not improve Matthew’s mood.
‘How old do you reckon he was?’ I asked after lowering Matthew back down from his very fluid and successful conquest of the route 20 minutes later. The couple had departed shortly after Matthew had solved the problem the youngster had been unable to pass.
‘Dunno, but his girlfriend was gorgeous.’
‘Probably doesn’t think so much of him now,’ I assured him.
Half an hour later I too was descending with a broad grin on my face, to be greeted by Matthew bellowing, ‘So Mr. Szell, another optimal result. How sick do you think young Fritz would feel to know he’s been outclimbed by two guys twice his age, one of whom is blind!’
‘It’s all in the genes you know,’ I yelled back.
Appendix A
Glossary of some of the more commonly used rock climbing terms
Abseil/Ab – to self-belay down a rope; also known as a rappel.
Aid climbing – (as opposed to free climbing) in which the climber relies on artificial aids inserted into the rock to support his weight. Mostly used on otherwise inaccessible routes.
Anchor – the arrangement of as many items of protection as possible to make the belayer or the top rope secure so preventing them from being dragged from the stance should the climber fall.
Approach – the journey to the base of a crag or route; also known as the walk-in.
Arête – a narrow, vertical ridge of rock.
Arm bar – technique in which the forearm is jammed into a wide crack in the rock to give stability and support.
Ascent – a completed climb.
Barn door – when the body swings out away from the wall because all the holds are on one side, leaving you hanging from one hand and one foot like an open door. Difficult to recover from and often the precursor to a fall.
Belaying – the process of manually paying out the rope to the lead climber, or taking-in rope for the second, while he or she climbs, so minimizing the extent of a fall. The rope is fed through a metal belay device attached to the belayer’s harness that, in conjunction with a karabiner, creates friction on the rope. The belayer keeps firm grip on the dead rope (slack), close to the belay device, at all times to act as a brake in the event of a fall.
Bolt – a solid metal shaft ¼–½ inch thick with a clip hole for a karabiner at one end, fixed permanently into a hole drilled in the rock to act as protection (typically on sport routes but controversially sometimes as anchors on trad climbs).
Booty – gear left behind by a previous party (usually because they backed or fell off) and is ripe for the taking. Also known as Crag Swag.
Bouldering – un-roped route climbing on large outdoor boulders or problems set on indoor walls, usually to a height of no more than about ten feet. In either case it pays to have a crash mat and a partner ‘spotting’ for you (i.e. standing at your back ready to break any fall).
Bridging – technique that involves splaying your legs across a gap to create pressure on two opposing holds or walls; also known as stemming.
Bucket – a big, easy-to-grip, in-cut handhold.
Buildering – practicing your climbing skills on manmade structures.
Bulge – a small rounded overhang.
Buttress – a rock formation that juts out from the main face.
Cam – shorthand for Spring Loaded Camming Device (SLCD), a portable, removable form of protection with a trigger mechanism that draws closed opposing serrated lobes allowing it to be fitted into an aperture. When the trigger is released the lobes splay and hold the device firmly in place.
Chalk – usually applied in powder form to keep a climber’s hands dry and grippy. Sometimes referred to as ‘white courage’ and kept close at hand in a stiff-rimmed dip bag clipped to the harness.
Chicken wing – a technique for climbing wide cracks in which you place your palm on one side and brace your shoulder against the other, creating a friction hold.
Chimney – a cleft in the rock face with parallel sides more than shoulder-width apart.
Chockstone – a piece of rock that has become immovably wedged in a crack and may be used as a hold or to thread a sling behind for protection. Some climbers carry small stones with them to place as chockstones.
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br /> Choss – loose material on a route: soil, stones, rotten rock, vegetation etc; adj: chossy.
Clean – i) to remove all loose material from a route making it safe to climb; ii) to remove all gear placed by the lead climber (the job of the last person in a party to ascend the route): iii) to complete a climb without falling or resting on the rope.
Clipping – attaching a karabiner to a bolt, rope, or piece of protection.
Clove hitch – a knot often used to tie a rope to a karabiner.
Cow’s tail – a short sling tied to the harness attachment point with a lark’s foot knot and used in conjunction with a Karabiner to clip into protection allowing you to take a rest.
Crack – a split or fissure in the rock face. Depending on how wide they are bigger cracks are classed as off-width or chimneys. Horizontal cracks are known as breaks.
Crag – a rock outcrop with climbing routes on it.
Crag Swag – See ‘Booty’.
Crampon – a grid of metal spikes strapped to the sole of a climbing boot to provide grip on snow or ice.
Crimp – a small hold you can only grip with your fingertips.
Crux – the most difficult move or section of the climb.
Dead rope – the slack section of the rope on the far side of the belay device to the climber, on which the belayer must keep a firm brake hand at all times, preventing it from running-out in the event of a fall. The live rope is the section between the belay device and the climber.
Dihedral – a concave corner formation in the rock.
Disco leg – the uncontrollable shaking you get in one or both legs when the muscles are tired and you are on very tenuous footholds. Also known as ‘sewing machine leg’ or ‘doing an Elvis’.
Dogging – short for hang-dogging. The, often significant, amount of time spent hanging in your harness while you try and fail to conquer a route at the limit of your paygrade. Because of its association with unconventional spectator sport, the term is increasingly being replaced by Yo-Yoing.