A short history of
Dove Crag from
Climber Magazine December 2003
by Steve Crowe
It was reported in the local newspaper at the time that a doctor and ambulance
were on stand-by during the first ascent of Westmorland’s Route (MS) by H
Westmorland, J Mounsey and W A North in 1910. While the route is still a popular
outing 90 years later, nowadays a mobile phone gets a good signal on the route
so even today help need not necessarily be too far away! The next major line to
be climbed was Hangover (HVS 5a) in May 1939 which sought out a weakness
up the very centre of the crag “the only possible line of ascent and must rank
as one of the purest lines in the country.” Arthur Dolphin. Don Whillans and Joe
Brown with D Cowan climbed Dovedale Groove in May 1954 with one
point of aid. It was 9 years before Pete Crew and Bas Ingle made the second
ascent of this now popular E1 5b.
Don returned with Colin Mortlock in 1960 to climb the timeless classic Extol
(E2 5b), again with one point of aid, which is still a much sought after
Hard Rock tick. It has been said that on the first ascent, on account of the
long run out, both the leader and second were climbing extreme rock
simultaneously! It was a team of raiders from the North East, Chris Woodall and
Ritchie Clarke, that took up the challenge of ‘The North Buttress of Dove Crag’
during a cold Easter day in 1969. It was generally rumoured that Pete Crewe had
tackled the wall sometime in the early 60’s and never got round to completing
the project. Chris Woodall recalls the day “We simply climbed up to and then
followed the existing gear until it ran out at about half height. We treated the
route as any steep pegging line; wholeheartedly using the rusting pegs, and
still found it quite strenuous. Above the stance we trended left to climb a
steep fingery wall and I recall resting on a small sharp spike. The right facing
groove below the top was green so I came down and stepped right to struggle up a
smaller, steep but protectable, slimy groove. We used no aid pegs above the
belay but placed two for protection. (Nuts, apart from the odd MOAC, were hardly
used in those days).” Many of those pegs placed during the 1960’s still form the
crucial protection for the many free climbs that followed! One of the ascents
that is not well documented was that by Pete Livesey who climbed the original
North Buttress route as far as the ledges with a couple of points of
aid. He probably followed the line that Martin Berzins and Chris Hamper took a
couple of years later (in 1977) with about the same amount of aid. Martin
recalls “We carried on to the top of the cliff - probably the first time the top
pitch was free climbed, a scary lead by Chris Hamper. It was hard to find out
from Livesey exactly what he had done. I think that he stopped at the ledges but
don't know.” It wasn’t until 1991 that Steve Mayers unlocked the final (6c)
sequence and was able to free climb the original aided line in its entirety and
protected only by the ageing fixed equipment.
In 1976 Pete Botterill climbed Explosion (E4 5c) with Pete Whillance;
this bold line tackles the right edge of North Buttress and although it is not
so steep it is ran out and it does not pay to contemplate the protection (or
lack of it). Martin Berzins and Ed Cleasby climbed the first and part of the
second pitch of Problem Child (E4 6a) in May 1976 thus commencing
Martin’s long association with the new route development at Dove Crag. Martin
remembers the day well “Ed Cleasby had climbed the first pitch with an aid point
previously. I led this pitch free and Ed continued up on the next pitch. We were
climbing ground up. Ed wanted to finish up Mordor but our ground-up attempt
petered out and we finished up Extol. Jeff lamb and Pete Botterill returned to
complete Problem Child in June 1979. The top pitches they added were much harder
and better than the bottom ones and have been unjustifiably neglected.”
Bill Birkett visited the crag in May 1980 with Rick Graham to explore the
possibility of a free line up the centre of the buttress. Some direct aid from a
nut and a precarious move off a hand placed peg was needed to climb Broken
Arrow (E5 5c, A1) “Absolutely at the limit and beyond.” Bill Birkett. Rick
Graham swapped leads with Bill in June 1980 to produce the first free route to
tackle the centre of North Buttress, the well named Fear and Fascination (E5
6a) a bold and pumpy route that still commands respect today. “Fear and
Fascination was the first all free route up that wall, and it still takes
scalps to this day - a quite visionary effort by Rick, in my opinion.” Neil
Foster. They revisited the crag with Dave Lyle in 1981 to climb Asolo (E3 6a)
which tackles a difficult line up the left side of the North Buttress (Asolo
attracted a lot of controversy at the time as it was a blatent sponsorship route
name). Rick and Bill returned again in 1982 to produce the popular Fast and
Furious (E5 6a) that climbs a steep and pumpy line to the right. It is
amazing that their pair of E5’s were not included in Ken Wilson’s Extreme Rock
and they would certainly make the cut for any future edition. Martin Berzins and
Neil Foster had not climbed Bucket City (E6 6b) until after
Extreme Rock was published in 1987 but it would also be a contender for Extreme
Rock II – The Return of Trad. Martin coerced Al Manson to join him in 1989 and
went on to continue the bucket theme producing Beyond the Pail (E6 6b)
with a hard crux on the first pitch and a complimentary serious (6a) run out
section on the second. “A very worried looking Alan Manson was belaying while I
climbed quite a long run out on crap gear from what wasn't a great belay on the
first ascent late in the evening. The route was cleaned and climbed in a day.”
Martin Berzins.
1990 was a productive year for Martin and Neil. Martin’s powerful and technical
Pail Face (E6 6b), along with Neil’s two very steep and spectacular
variation finishes, The Flying Fissure Finish (E5 6b) and the photogenic
Outside Edge (E5 6b), were all popular route during 2003. The
Outside Edge however should not be under estimated as it continues to
take many scalps; E9 was proposed after two spectacular falls in 2003 the second
fall from the top of the route ended 60ft down and only 4ft short of the ground,
with five pieces of gear sliding down the rope to thwack into the unfortunate
Flying machine, Chris Hope as he swung silently to a rest! The fact that
Martin’s ascent of Vlad the Impailer (E7 6b) was unrepeated for 13
years says it all, hard, pumpy and committing. “Although the route was
extensively cleaned on abseil it was climbed ground up getting more gear in on
each try. On the different attempts that took place over a number of days I took
several falls (they seemed pretty safe though as the gear is good but spaced)
before eventually leading it red-point style. Typically no sooner had I done it
than Neil seconded it flawlessly! The day that we successfully climbed the route
it poured with rain.” remembers Martin. I asked Martin if he was confident
before venturing out on such a bold lead? “I was far from sure that I could do
the route and had to resort to lots of midweek hand traversing on the Henry
Price buildering wall at Leeds University to get fit enough.”
Martin and Neil added one more fantastic and under rated route in 1991.
Bucket Dynasty (E6 6b) was repeated soon after by Dougie Hall, as Ian Carr
recalls “It was a funny day, Dougie turned up at the crag short of some gear,
Charlotte volunteered to go back for it. By the time she got back to the crag,
we'd done three routes, one of them being Bucket City. I had my
eyes closed for most of the time, as he was in one of his "go for it" moods. He
only got 3 or 4 pieces in the whole Bucket Dynasty pitch, and on a
tatty single 9mm rope. We definitely ended up at the Asolo belay as we did it
afterwards (as a warm down!) so we could get some gear back.”
During the poor summer of 2002 Al Wilson cleaned off Pail Face and
The Flying Fissure Finish while the rest of his team
took shelter from the rain in the Priest Hole, the bivvy cave above the North
Buttress. They were all ready to go home when Awesome Al enthusiastically geared
up and set off up Fast and Furious only to find himself too
pumped to tackle the Flying Fissure and elected to continue
directly up the easier (but dirtier) original finish! James McHaffie
subsequently onsighted Pail Face declaring himself pumped after
the crux – a scary thought. James then decided to have a look at freeing the aid
pitch on Broken Arrow. A very hard (6c) sequence was needed to pass the poor
insitu peg, then Caff continued with an extremely daunting runout above which
eventually joined Bucket City part way up the headwall to produce Fear of
Failure (E8 6c).
The first new line to fall in 2003 was the bold Fetish for Fear (E7 6b),
which is effectively a direct start to the Flying Fissure Finish,
being led by both Chris Hope and Duncan Booth, seconded by Alan Wilson and Jimmy
Beveridge. This saw a quick repeat by myself then subsequent on-sights by James
(Caff) McHaffie and Dave Birkett.
Initially abseiling in to clean off Vlad the Impailer, Alan Wilson was
distracted by a line of holds that led up the leaning headwall above Vlad. Al
left Chris and Duncan to sort out Fetish for Fear and started to clean off a
line that was soon to become his stunning Dusk till Dawn (E7 6b). His
belayer Chris Hope was straight in for the flashed second ascent of the
incredibly pumpy (F7c+) line, confirming the grade and quality. Neil conceded
that was one amazing line that the Berzins/Foster team had missed out on!
Karin and I climbed several links between existing routes, with Inside Out
(E5 6b) (Fast and Furious into the hard Outside Edge)
providing a very pumpy but possibly a safer way of tackling the soaring arête of
Outside Edge. This was followed quickly by a sweeping girdle traverse. The
Brasov Incident (E6 6b) starts as for Bucket Dynasty before
breaking out right below the roof to then take in the crux’s of both Fear and
Fascination and Fast and Furious before finishing either up the Outside
Edge or the Flying Fissure Finish, the choice
is yours.
The hardest route on the crag, Caff’s route from 2002, Fear of Failure (E8
6c) was quickly repeated by Chris ‘The Flying Machine’ Hope. After powering
through the technical crux, on his second attempt, Chris went very quiet on the
“harrowing” traverse above! Meanwhile, while Al was looking for holds to brush
in the exit niche on Vlad the Impailer (E7 6b), he became frustrated when
it wasn’t obvious how to climb it or even what needed cleaning! No beta could
been gleaned from Berzins or Foster despite numerous emails the following week.
Was it that they couldn’t remember or just that they didn’t want to make it too
easy for us? On his first attempt on Vlad, Al just jumped off,
frustrated, unable to unlock the crux sequence. Next up was Karin who soon made
it to Al’s high point where she shook out below the crux for nearly an hour,
unable to either climb up any further, or reverse to the ground but reluctant
just to give up! She eventually spotted the crucial hold, which was in need of
the brush treatment, just as she fell off from exhaustion. This hidden hold
proved to be the key. Promptly returning mid week Alan Wilson clinched the
second ascent of Vlad and I flashed the third. Karin claimed the 4th
ascent the following weekend. Chris Hope also led Vlad but not without
falling frustrated out of the demanding and problematic niche on his first
attempt. Chris made up for his disappointment by flashing the 3rd ascent of
Bucket Dynasty (E6 6b) thinking it to be top end E6. Personally, I’m
sure that Bucket Dynasty deserves E7, its in the same league as Vlad the
Impailer and Dusk till Dawn for sure! Awesome Al had one last linkup
in mind by climbing the headwall of Dusk till Dawn starting up Vlad
to give the biggest, pumpiest E7 on the North Buttress. Two routes not repeated
during 2003 due to the poor condition of the insitu protection were Beyond
the Pail (E6 6b) and North Buttress (E6 6c) and they
would probably both merit E7 in their current state as well.
The world of the internet meant that news of our activities travelled fast and
soon queues formed on Fast and Furious but curiously not for Fear and
Fascination, whereas Bucket City must have been the most
climbed E6 in the Lake District in 2003. Bizarrely many of the team commented
that the walk in felt further and harder as time went by (53 minutes was the
record for the walk in, 1¼ hours the norm) however the climbing was a different
matter as we would take turns leading the Flying Fissure so that every one else
could warm up on it. Towards the end of the summer our knowledge of the cliff
grew and our aims became more specific so we would meet out at the Beetham Hut
to sort out a specific and light weight rack for the team for the day. The North
Buttress comprises of a unique matrix of routes which share only three common
starts and the team shared their increasing insight and knowledge along with a
combined Trad experience of over 100 years, and as our fitness grew so did our
confidence. It wasn’t all plain sailing however and some spectacular falls were
taken off the Outside Edge (E5 6b). Expectant father Duncan Booth
took a 40ft swoop from the crux luckily suffering no more than a bad headache.
Not to be out done Chris (The Flying Machine) Hope took the previously mentioned
60ft fall, the maximum possible. Everyone else on the crag decided that was it
for the day and were discussing abseiling Fast and Furious to retrieve some gear
when Chris just dusted himself down and offered to climb up and strip the route
for them.
Where was Dave we asked, could this be the end of the Birkett Dynasty?
Well, Dave Birkett arrived on Dove Crag late in the summer but soon worked his
way through the routes flashing everything he tried, including Fetish for
Fear a very serious E7; also Vlad the Impailer and the Vlad into
Dusk link, two very hard and pumpy E7’s. After abseiling off the incredibly
steep Vlad the Impailer Dave’s body language expressed the effort that
the ascent had taken as he quietly shrugged his shoulders, sighed and rolling
himself tab he acknowledged “Aye, that was hard”. Dave topped all that with a
stunning onsight ascent of James McHaffies route from 2002, the hard and serious
Fear of Failure E8 6c after finding a painful knee bar rest that enabled
him to recover below the crux after sorting out the crucial gear.
The ferocity of the steep and strenuous lines, the extreme sustained and
technical difficulties, the long runouts and the overpowering atmosphere of the
place all combine to make climbing on Dove Crag an unforgettable experience. But
what I will always remember most from the summer of 2003 up on Dove will be
Awesome Al’s insatiable enthusiasm (especially with a brush), the tremendous
team spirit and the shared Trad experience. Oh and the bottle of Jack Daniels
that we found in the Priest Hole. Cheers.
Steve Crowe 29th August 2003
GRADED LIST
Fear of Failure E8 6c (F7c+)
Vlad into Dusk E7 6b (F7c+)
Dusk till Dawn E7 6b (F7c+)
Vlad the Impailer E7 6b (F7c)
Bucket Dynasty E6 6b (F7c) probably E7
Fetish for Fear E7 6b (F7b) serious
Beyond the Pail E6 6b
(F7b+) certainly E7 even after being cleaned (first pitch) in 2005!
Brasov Incident E6 6b (F7b+)
Pail Face E6 6b (F7b+)
Bucket City E6 6b (F7b)
Inside Out E5 6b (F7b)
Outside Edge E5 6b (F7a+ bloc!)
Fear and Fascination E5 6a (F7a+) probably E6
Flying Fissure Finish E5 6b (F7a+)
Fast and Furious E5 6a (F7a)
Problem Child E4 6a
Expolsion E4 5c
Asolo E3 6a
Extol E2 5b
Dovedale Groove E1 5b
Hangover Over HVS 5a