Martin Scrowston and friends have been active on the crag and he has submitted this report.
The approach description in the introduction on page 89 is correct but the approach time is rather generous, even at our pensioners’ pace it has never taken us more than 15 minutes rather than the suggested 40. We are puzzled as to why the crag has been awarded a Danger symbol, the only real danger is the proximity to the pub!
Following the last-named storm “Dave” sadly several trees were felled on both the approach and around the south-west face of the crag, this has improved and opened the aspect to some of the routes on the south-west face.
An enthusiastic team has cleaned and climbed all the routes apart from route (26) Citadel (now well above our pay grade) and has also managed to sneak in a few new lines. Our intention is to draw attention to the quality of the lines and to hopefully address some of the errors in the current guide book and, importantly, to encourage people to visit and enjoy the climbing on this fine crag.
We all agree that route (16) Velvet Underground should be upgraded to E2 5b due to the very bold start.
On the current guidebook topo (p 93) route (23) is incorrectly named as Penetrate it is in fact (22) Jim Slip Direct; Penetrate is not shown on the topo.
We think the following routes each deserve one star; Ball Point, Penned in No More, Quiet Noise and Penetrate.
Route (24) Rampart has an obvious start but then becomes lost in heavy vegetation left of Penetrate. The vegetated climbing is mentioned in the 1994 guide book. We would suggest the route is best archived.
Route (28) Woodwind has succumbed to heavy vegetation and is not worth the extensive gardening that would be required to exhume it, another one for the archives. Woodwind is somewhere in/under there!
The Outlying Outcrops described on page 96 (three routes) have all been reclaimed by the woodland and best left to the rewilding project.