Chromosomes with wings

Had a bit of a shock over the past week going from the hilliest place in Europe (Chamonix) to the flatest (Cambridge). And from very rarely thinking about fly genetics to thinking continuously about fly genetics. I was on a Wellcome Trust Genetics and Genomics course which was very good and worthwhile if you are into that sort of thing!

It was based at Downing College which again is about as far as accomodation can get away from a Quecha pop up tent, so I had to remember to do things like keep off the grass and eat with table manners. By the end of the week I think I had managed to re-educate myself back into being a socially acceptable person (maybe), which can only be a good thing.

Kings college appearing from over the riverbank

Other good things were meeting fellow friendly Drosophilists, learning lots of potentially very useful information that I am trying hard to remember and being able to get enough exercise in so that I hadn't totally lost my alpine fitness. Training activities included going for long very flat runs, occasionally experimenting with going fast just to mix it up a bit, bouldering at the Kelsey Kerridge centre where some friendly locals (thnaks) showed me some of the problems and punting which is a prime cross training activity. Another highlight was being fed custard most nights (essential training food!).



Girls punting day out





More punters...



Me at the helm

Extreme running terrain along the River Cam, if I lived in Cambridge I would live on one of these

Really tasty blackberries!



One of my favourite kids books was called 'The Cow that fell in the Canal' and it ended up in a cheese market in Amsterdam. I wonder where this cow has been?



Vite et leger le part trois - wacky races on the cordier pillar

Clare 'Emergency veterinarian' Muir and well known car mechanic Hazel Findlay perform complex mechanics with wire and tin foil

Our next objective was to be the Cordier Pillar, which is evidently quite a popular rock route reaching the summit of the Grand Charmoz from the Plan des Aiguilles side. Despite its popularity it seems to be a difficult task to find any decent information on the route and Office de haute Montagne were even pretty vague as to which guidebook or even what mountain it was on. Eventually we found the topo (in the old Piola book) which was pretty basic and lacked any written description. We also scoured the internet where several people suggested the need for one or maybe even two (!) No. 4 Camelots. This was a problem, as we didn't have one and we definitely like placing gear above our heads, especially on offwidths.

Our efforts to find said piece of gear were successful and not only did we get a cam but a fab girly night in too (thanks Sandra, Hazel and Maddy!!) and a crash course in improvised car mechanics. And so we set off on our last foray into the mountains. We thought that maybe as there was no info on this route that maybe no-one did it except maybe british people. We were wrong. There were three teams already insitu at the bivi situ on the Plan des Aiguilles (all wanting to look at our topo then realising it was the same crap topo that they had). A much more worrying problem was the constant stream of rocks falling down the Nantillons glacier. It would have made a pretty good geography video 'Erosion in action' or something like that....

We swapped the tent for giant silver blankets this time....

Climbing! On the pillar

Surveying

One team decided to pack it in after watching the rocks but the other two thought it was fine and there was a relatively safe route to the base. We were pretty anxious about it but decided to stick to the plan; most of the rocks stop short of where you cross and in the morning it would be pretty stable so we would just have to do one 'dodgy' crossing.

Abseiling!!

Clare climbing up to our highpoint.... this time in the sun

So we made it and started climbing out of the chilly bergshrund with some spanish guys infront and some friendly poles behind. The climbing was totally ace and certainly the hardest pitches we had climbed so far. Hence, we didn't make it to the top because we just couldn't climb fast enough and we had a bit of route finding faff but it was great fun anyway and a good recce for next time! We packed it in the evening and abseiled back down and then had the totally gripping trek across the glacier. Arriving unscathed back at the bivvi site was a big relief, especially after watching some impressively large blocks tumble from really high up on the blatiere. Despite not reaching the top again we both felt like we had learnt alot from the experience and are totally keen to come back and do it again! Also, our sagely route finding wisdom that we dispensed to the new arrivals at the bivvi site obviously stood them in good stead, as 10 the following morning they had already embarrassingly reached our highpoint.....

After surviving the nantillons crossing

Looking up at the monster glacier

Our sagely route finding advice is (obviously this only applies to the bottom third of the route): At the start its very easy route finding as there is a fixed rope up the first two pitches (tied off to the second belay). After about 5 pitches you arrive at some broken ledgey ground. Here if you want to keep to the good rock and fixed belays go up and right. If you want to climb an easier but loose gully with no belays go up and left. Both  ways are possible but the righthand way is probably more desirable. Then after maybe 4 pitches up the righthand way at some point the route then goes left (after a stuck cam I think) and that is as far as we got. Losing the route is quite possible, one team went into the gully and made it to the top but chucked quite a few rocks down in the process and the other guys missed the left hand turn and climbed into no mans land and retreated a little before us. The only other piece of advice I could hope might be useful is if you are planning on rice and tinned fish as bivvi dinner do not choose fish in an 'ancient mustard' sauce and if you do try very hard not to spill it on your trousers.

Le bon sunset

Bivvi site

So we had a sad final descent back to the valley the following morning for a poco loco and ice cream breakfast. I finally got a bit of triathalon training in, doing 10 widths of Lac du Passey, where the water is way clearer than padarn (so you can see the fish, big fish!) and then we had the roasting drive home....

Triathalon training Lac du Passey - big pikes watch out!

New feature - Holiday Recipe of the week (courtesy of Sandra)

Ingredients
semi thawed frozen raspberries
sugar
yogurt

Method
Mash together!!!

Vite et leger le part deux

Another weather window meant a quick turn around, shower, visit to the laundrette and back up the hill! The next scenic camping location was to be lac blanc on our own little private beach! Perfect location for attempting the Aiguille de Perseverance the next day and near to the refuge that offers proper man size hot chocolate.

The amount of wildlife on show in the Aiguilles Rouges is fab, especially if you are around early mornings and evenings. Lots of really tame bouquetin showing off their horns and cuddly looking marmots. Anyway, enough fauna, back onto climbing.

Sexy bouquetin

Funky chamois

The Aiguille de Perseverance is pretty different to the climbing in the Envers, where the rock and climbing is good right from the bottom. There are 3 interesting pitches on the Perseverance, inc one lovely exposed pitch, but you have to climb alot of choss to get there. We found that we were much more efficient at climbing proper rock than we were at climbing easy choss and it took us quite a while to get to the climbing. Nevertheless we got to the top which was pretty windy and cold and quickly found the ab points to go back down the other side. The descent is a scree slope that is probably twice the height of the peak and about as fun as soul destroying glacier descent that we did the other day.

Clare coming up first nice pitch on the Perseverance

On top, not my best angle....

Looseness on the descent

The next day we got up early, but not early enough to beat two other teams to the foot of the Chapelle de la Gliere (near the index telepherique). This is an interesting ridge with plenty of good solid climbing on it. There is a really lovely pitch up some corners and then a novelty rasoir edge pitch! It ends at a funny rock finger that is the Chapelle (chapel, not hat as we originally thought - it doesn't look like a hat). And despite some frustrating waits for the people in front we managed to make it back to the cable car and so could eat in Poco Loco again and not have to suffer another night of seafood rissotto.

Mmmmm savagely yellow rissotto

Some welcome rain was due the next two days, giving us time to consume much needed burgers and pain au chocolats. We also had time to pop over the border into the Rhone valley and do some catching up, (as well as purchasing some amazing Valais roadside apricots).

Mmmm fresh swiss apricots

Fast and light - Part 1

Bonjour from Chamonix!!



Clare- fast and light

Been out here for a week now and there has been some stonking weather! I haven't really been rock climbing around Cham much before and have been totally shocked this time by how much there is and especially how much trad there is around. Our first expedition was up to camp by the Envers des Aiguilles refuge and after trying to pack as light as possible we still looked like students on a D of E training expedition....

Adjacent scenic camping spot

After pitching our tent in the most scenic location possible we went for our warm up route - the Magie d'Orient, which might be one of the best routes in the world (according to select guide to the world 'Parois du Legend'). It was predictably pretty good! However, holdless granite slabs came as a bit of a shock... we have discovered we climb about 3 grades harder on cracks than we do on slabs. Anyway we sucked it up and enjoyed all the crack pitches and whimpered and cried our way up the slabs to reach the pointy sommet du pointe orient. We pretty much styled the abseils, only getting the ropes stuck once (everyone we spoke to got their ropes stuck also on the penultimate ab due to an inconvieniently positioned spike). Ate some awesome tart at the refuge and listened to a totally wacky world war II style weather broadcast.

Clare arrive au sommet du pointe orient

After finding our 'warm up' pretty absorbing we then scoured the guide books for routes without hard slabs, settling on a route no one has ever heard of 'Desir du Alain' on the 3rd pointe of the nantillons ridge. A perfect place for adventure aparently! It didn't disappoint, with an ardous approach up a steep very sloshy glacier where I got to use my ice axe arrest in anger (and it worked hooray!), then a bit of a struggle to find the start of the route and then a struggle to find the first belay. It was definitely looser, grittier, more vegetated than Magie but really fun steep climbing (and no slabs). We reached the second belay (in four pitches) and decided to bail as we were super slow and the belays were not equipped as promised by the guide book. Although this would not be classicly termed a success we irrationally felt pretty successful and celebrated with another piece of tart after a soul destroying slush descent down the glacier.

Me after soul destroying slush descent

The next day was the day we ran out of food, but we managed to squeeze in a route Petit Nicholas before the grand descent to the valley. This was one of the bolted routes under the refuge which are toatlly different in character to the higher routes and we managed 5 pitches (inc. a slab) in under 2 hours to our immense suprise. Shows a big difference between following a line of bolts in a non-serious situation and questing around with a trad rack trying to follow a vague topo....

More to follow if i get my blogging act together.....