The Climbing Clubs

In a few weeks' time we will have our last Senior Climbing Club session of the academic year. We have run this term's sessions outside, despite what turned out to be a terribly wet and windy one a couple of weeks ago. It only took a few days to dry out the ropes, equipment and pupils!! We have recently climbed at Craigmore, Auchinstarry and Cambusbaron, giving the pupils a great opportunity to get a taste for climbing on different rock types at a variety of crags. The Climbing Clubs for Juniors (P6 and P7 pupils) and Senior pupils (S1 to S6) have proved popular once again and have amounted to 988 session places this academic year (654 Senior and 334 Juniors). These wouldn't be possible without the wonderful support of our fantastic team of instructors (Tim Miller, Melissa Sleigh, Iain Smith and Brian Goodman), the staff who accompany our Junior pupils (Mr Milne and Mrs David) and of course, the pupils - well done, everyone!


Here are a few photos from last week's session at Cambusbarron on a beautifully sunny evening.

Jamie starting up a challenging crack route, a two star E1 5b called the 'Doobie Brothers' which entails either hand jamming or some finesse of lay backing.

Angus warming up on a lay backing corner crack called 'Here Come the Mini-Monks'.

Mairi enjoying the warmth (in a down jacket!) and sunshine after last week's thoroughly soggy session!

Mairi's full attention is directed to her fellow climber, Angus.

Angus next tackles the steep route 'Easy Contract' at HVS 5b.

Angus showing some fine footwork.

This is Harrison's (bottom left) third-ever session of rock climbing. He has shown a really positive approach to quite technically challenging climbing crags so far. Jamie (top right) nears the top of her route.

Mairi giving Easy Contract a go...

...And manages. Well done, Mairi!

Bank holiday magic

Isn't a sunny day so much sweeter when it arrives despite a less than glorious weather forecast? We have had a run of this luck for two weekends now. Bliss! This weekend was a lovely voyage with S1 and S2 pupils off to an island on Loch Lomond. The team's cooking skills were fab and their swimming and playing from the canoes even surpassed those of last weekend's pupils. But then, the water was a whole week warmer (which was still Baltic in my experience!). I was inspired enough by the pupils' antics to take the plunge myself - lovely!

So we set 'sail' and the girls take to the canoes like...like nimble, noisy canoeists that don't mind wellies full of water for a whole weekend!

These two teams seemed to go for the dry welly approach.

The group choose their ingredients and cook up a feast.

The girls prepare to join the others for some after breakfast canoeing and swimming off 'our' beach.

 



Later Lucy and Hannah even managed a simultaneous headstand in their canoe on the journey home, before towing some of their friends!

And we're off!

It's the start of the summer Outdoor Education weekends again. Eight intrepid P7 boys set off for a weekend on one of the loch Lomond islands. The boys did a great job of cooking for themselves and really developing their canoeing skills. Some even braved a morning dip.....a couple of them spontaneously by falling out of their canoe! Never have two boys got back in to another canoe faster, and thankfully without capsizing their friends.

The boys tuck in to their self-selected concoction of grub. Mmmmm!

One of the boys waits to board.

The boys work on their solo paddling skills - no mean feat in a canoe this size.

The solo paddler/canoeist gets a greater level of control; until they don't!

Ex-pupils help out at our Outdoor Education weekends.

Melissa gets a treetop view of the group's new-found skills.  

Iceland expedition, the final phase: to the ice

Today we hiked up to the foot of Europe's largest glacier. It was a 6hr round walk and the lagoon at the end had pieces of the glacier floating in it (James Clark decided to go for a wee swim). It was a great day with clear skies!! Scott Duffield:

Iceland expedition, the start of the final phase

After driving from Isafjordur to southern Iceland the group set up camp next to a waterfall before driving to skatafell for climbing our first Icelandic peak - Scott Duffield:

Iceland expedition, phase two

The second week of the expedition the group headed via Reykjavik, and the football final watched en masse, to the northwest of Iceland. The group headed out on a walk in the remote mountains of the West Fjords and then met Andy (Sea Kayak Cornwall) for a pre-trip brief and a paddle around the bay to allow Andy to set the course of the four-day trip ahead of them. The group then packed their kayaks and headed out to sea. Photos by Mark Davidson & Scott Duffield