Outdoor Rock Climbing

The Tuesday group of outdoor pursuits got to go gorge scrambling so Thursday came around and almost everyone had their swimsuits on underneath their clothes, all ready for gorge scrambling that day. We got into the van only to be told that we were going to go outdoor rock climbing. I think we were all a little disappointed but in the end it was okay. We got to the Conway Center and loaded up all of our stuff and headed to the mountain Fachwen. We hiked a little to get to our climbing area and it ended up being at an area called Scotty Rock. Once we arrived there, our guides (Laura and Garreth (Sally was gone this week)) went up to the top of the climbing area and set up four different climbing stations. It went from left to right: severe, very severe, difficult, and very difficult. We all chose our partners, I went with Ashley and Teresa, and we got our harnesses on and our belaying devices ready. We started with the severe climbing station and I volunteered to go first. It was a straight slant in the beginning of the climb but once I conquered that, it wasn't too difficult to the top. I got to the top and sat there a little while to take in the view of the area. For once it wasn't cloudy and I could actually see the top of Snowdonia!! After a little bit, I told Ashley and Teresa I was ready to come down and they gave me a little slack while I walked myself down. Once all three of us had gone, we took a break and had some lunch. After lunch, I was pumped to do the very severe climbing station. I went first again and it started off again with a steep drop to climb up. I made it to the top in not much time and the view was even better than the first! After a little while all three of us had done the rest of the climbing stations. We were the first group to be done so Garreth had us come to the top and learn how to abseil down the rock face. That was pretty fun because we controlled how fast we wanted to go down the rock face. Once everyone in the entire outdoor pursuits group had gone, we all went to the top again and learned about lead climbing in the outdoors. We didn't do it because it is too dangerous but we were given different sized bolts to put in random cracks we found and see how they worked. Then we finally went down, packed up, and headed back. The day was fun and I found the climbing to be not too difficult for me. I had to go back and pack for Barcelona!