The Right Choice?

Today Joe, Dave and myself headed up to climb in the Trident area, with some of the lads already on my chosen objective Dave headed up his. He got a belay before the crux and I started up beautiful ice toward him, shortly after though we began to hear blood curdling screams coming from the mist somewhere near us. We had a very short discussion and decided the decent thing to do was go have a look in the general direction to see if we could help.

Dave gearing up while I sort ropes

Me seconding shortly before the screaming began

We descended nearly to the hut then back up into Observatory Gully but never found anything, hopefully it was not as bad as it sounded. I felt somewhat guilty at making the decision to go searching after Dave had put in a good lead in fine conditions but thankfully the boys agreed and I didn't get lynched. Sometimes making rapid decisions under stress can lead to feeling like an arse but had someone needed help I'd have been glad we bailed to try help.Glad is the wrong word, hopefully you know what I meant..........

Climbing Methadone

Yesterday Steve , Joe and myself headed up to the CIC cascades for a bit of filming with Euan who is working on a project for the MC of S. After last weeks news on my ankle I wondered if this would be my last day out, the pain 50 metres from the car seemed to confirm this. After 45 minutes the painkillers lost any effect but by then I could see the North face clearly and knew I 'needed' more than wanted to be there. The main objective was utterly pouring so we settled for a shorter steep line instead.  Being up there did get me thinking though..........

Euan, Steve and Joe

Me on the route-Pic-Final Crux Films

With the walk in and route being short and still ending up in a lot of pain I have to face the prospect that that is what I'll be doing for the forseeable future, it's not enough though. It's like a small methadone hit after full on smack addiction, the craving for the full experience is still there gnawing at me, pretty naive to think it would take the edge off as it only seems to make certain demons hungrier and more terrifying. One problem is that I dont want to recover from my addiction but I'm being forced to by pain and not wanting to let down anymore climbing partners. The other problem is that the main dealer of the drug I crave (The Ben) is right there when I look out my window in the morning, most of my mates are addicts too so my chances of recovery are slim at best and that suits me just fine..........Cant wait for my next hit............. :)

Climbing past Euan-Pic-Vertical Fever