UKH

hi all, so i’ve got the chance to spend a bit of time in croyde, my mate lives ludicrously close to baggy point so desperately want to climb whilst i’m there. ive not been but it seems there’s no bolting at all (fair enough). we’re keen sport climbers but have no trad experience. is it possible to climb in that area at all? i’m thinking along the lines of setting up a top rope and chucking it off the edge on top of a 6b or something and having a play. am i being a wally for thinking this is possible? i’ve really got no idea what it looks like down there.

on the other end of things i remember reading somewhere there’s some bouldering - can definitely borrow a mat from somewhere, would appreciate any tip offs on that front 

don’t rip me too hard on this one - to clarify, my default position here is NOT doing this unless anyone says otherwise, not the other way around! 

Borrow a rack, lower your technical ambitions and you'll have a great time.

I generally wouldn't recommend sea cliff climbing for people with no trad experience*.  So much can go wrong and, without the (a lot of) trad experience to get you out of trouble, you could be in for an extremely worryingly dangerous time.

The climbing around Baggy Point is rather good but a little on the adventurous side for "sport climbers" without a wider CV. It's definitely worth branching out and getting the trad experience under your belt.

* exceptions apply of course and I can think of crags which pretty my fit the full remit of the SPA except for the tides.

What are you going to attach your top rope to? Remember there are no bolts.  

If you can build a top rope anchor then of course you can top rope some routes, but do you know how to do that?

The single pitch slab known as The Promontory will possibly suit depending on your skill set. The other areas have quite tricky access.

    As Toby asks, do you know how to set up a top rope? The anchors at the top of the Promontory are old stakes, do you know how to attach safely to them and how to equalise your anchors? Do you know how to bring up a 'second' from above? It may be possible to lower someone down the slab and they can climb back up but watch out for the rope over the top edge. Probably safer for the climber to abseil down ( do you know how to abseil safely? ) and then top rope climb back up.

   The best lines are quite easy, around severe / hard severe. However, apart from the route In Her Eyes the main routes follow natural diagonal lines rather than straight up and down. It is possible to take a direct eliminate line on most of the slab at around VS / HVS  ( French grade approximately 5b / 5c ).

   Also be aware that there is some loose rock in the last few metres of the slab and lots of loose stones at the top of slabs, easy to knock onto people below. There is a big long ledge at the bottom of the slab but, depending on the swell and tides, it is usually only clear around three hours either side of low tide. 

    As others have said, I generally wouldn't recommend sea cliff climbing for people with no trad experience. I also wouldn't recommend Baggy for your first trad lead unless you are with a competent trad climber.

Why not take advantage of your situation and get an instructor. MIA. Could be a good day and tbh, set you up for the future of trad adventures.

There are some lines you could top rope. Thre are a few stakes about, but it still requires some skill to set them up. 

Have fun whatever. 

I asked a similar question when I'd just started trad climbing. I think I'd had a couple of days on the grit  and asked if I should try some routes at Baggy Point. People were generally very positive about the idea.

Luckily some other climbers were nearby to give me and a similarly inexperienced friend a top rope back to the top - otherwise we would have been swimming! Go somewhere single pitch with no access issues, and take some one with experience. I wish I had! 

As others have suggested - it's doable if you know what you are doing, but not ideal. Access to the top of the at least one of the crags really needs an abseil or safety rope to even get you to the top of the cliff , so you are looking at a 50m static rope, plus another 40m static to abseil the main cliff and a 40m climbing rope plus enough slings,  gear and importantly competence to rig an anchor - and you are pretty limited in routes that close enough to straight up.  

My first outing at Baggy I hired a guide. I used Stu Bradbury who is an absolute legend and if you do that you will get a hell of a lot more out of it than dropping a top rope as there are some fantastic routes.

http://www.wall-crawler.co.uk/

other guides are available of course 

Jeez, if you can manage 6b+ just ignore the above bedwetters and go solo Scrattling Crack and Moonshot. If you can't do that trad climbing isn't really going to be for you anyway.

jcm

I bet you were one of the people who encouraged me to have a go too! No complaints, taught me a valuable lesson :-D 

At least that way you've done both so you don't have to worry about the "which is which" uncertainty.

Rubbish, many or most trad climbers keep at least one piece of gear between themselves and the deck

You're advocating boot-width crack jamming with zero experience implied by sport climbing. You haven't specified approach and tides, so advocating abseiling and climbing with no escape available. It's all been done by beginners but I wouldn't want that blood on my hands

Why not pick somewhere, where you don't have to abb into?

Have a look at Blackchurch Rock. Blackchurch no need to abseil as you can scramble up and down the back of it.

Post on here for a climbing partner with trad experience and get turned on to trad. You won't regret it!

Not to listen to people on the Internet? 😀

Chris

Having been in your position in the past, and having since climbed at Baggy with a few years' trad experience, the answer is simply: no

Attempting this will not end well. Like others say, consider hiring an instructor. Frustrating when you want to get out and climb, but this is not a good plan!

it’s a great venue for a day of intro to sea cliff trad... if you’re with someone who knows what they are doing.

if you’re new to it (and I don’t mean this in nasty way) then you don’t know what you don’t know... tides, swell, abseil only access, fragile rock, serious top-outs, and trad gear all add up to make Baggy Point a serious venue - which isn’t always obvious when you see blue-sky photos of people who know what they are doing there. 

Take the opportunity whilst you’re there to book a guide for the day - look for a member of the Association of Mountaineering Instructors. There’s a fair few of us about...
 

Stu at Wall Crawler has already been mentioned and you’ll have a great day with him, you’re also welcome to drop us a line at info@climbcornwall.com but I don’t mean this to be a advertising pitch - rather you got out and just had a good, safe day!

Exactly! 

Do you have access to a trad rack?

Are you reasonably competent with simple mechanical things (say replacing a chain / cassette on a bike), and would you be happy to place gear on the lead?

Can you build a belay?

Do you have access to an abseil rope, and know how to rig it (and climb up it, should it all go runny)?

Assuming the answer to all the above is yes, and you have a guide book and tide tables etc then proceed with caution. If not, I would start off on an inland crag.

thanks guys, some good info here.

so i think there's a good plan forming here:

hire a good guide - might well email you @jayjackson, or make a post on here. funds are a bit tight atm so will see if any locals want to trade skills if i can't afford a guide.

will ask to go through a few trad bits, but mainly a general overview. i'd love to "properly" be able to abseil / set up a top rope / understand the lay of the land for sure.

hopefully after that i'll have a better sense of things and perhaps be able to set up my own top ropes - no way i can afford a rack at this point, sadly.

gonna reply to a few messages individually, but thanks all!

Drop me a line with dates and times might be able to help you out?

Cheers

Is anyone else getting flashbacks to that trainwreck of a thread about safely jumping to the ground from the belay stance at the top of the first pitch of Valkyrie at The Roaches?

Well remembered, John can be a complete c*ck at times on perfectly reasonable safety issues. I'd hoped the Crowley school of safety advice closed nearly a century ago.

I think there's a world of difference between suggesting the Valkyrie jump and putting forward the idea that someone climbing at 6B might be able to to solo a couple of slabby V Diffs ( as JCM suggested) or lead a few Severes, as I suggested. A lot of people I know started their climbing careers ( there was no trad then, just climbing) tackling things of a similar grade with Army Stores boots and the most basic protection devices. I'm pretty sure that their technical limits at the time were neare to VS then 6b. 

True to form on this Forum ask a question and get lots of conflicting advice. 

I'm in the "Hire a guide camp", It's what I did many years ago when I found myself without a partner in Cape Town. As a result I had a quality day on Table Mountain crags doing uncrowded excellent routes which were in condition, and importantly for Africa, in the shade, without frigging around trying to find the starts and route finding. By the end of the day he was happy for me to lead pitches. Worth every penny (Rand)

life would be boring if everyone was the same. and life would be bloody difficult if everyone was the same as me

Have you really just advised a trad beginner to ab into a sea cliff, unclip from the rope and then solo out? Maybe you should have a little think before replying to threads like this one.

For what it's worth, I ran into Jay Jackson at Haytor a couple of years ago. His clients seemed to be having a great time and he seemed like a thoroughly nice chap.

After seeing all other replies here you presumably not planning to try trad for first time on a sea cliff with less than perfect rock. If you drive a bit you could go to Chudleigh for trad limestone, Dartmoor for trad granite and bouldering or Brean Down for tidal sport climbing 

Really? I wouldn't do that on those routes onsight with all my trad experience and having also led F6b Sport. In fact I usually take my rack of small gear (RPs and microcams) as I've been sandbagged on lower grade routes so often.

I'm hardly a soft touch merchant in my grading (for instance I think Wrecker's Slab should be downgraded to a top end HS for modern pro).

Actually, it isn’t quite as crazy as it sounds on the routes John is referring to.  It’s very easy angled and the climbs are often used as straightforward descents.  They really are piss easy for anyone who can lead 6b+.  And they still have the rope in place if it’s all too much.

I think its a fair enquiry you make but also that if you have to ask the answer is don't.

Never climbed there so didn't know. My point still stands however - the JCM post assumes that the OP knows how to both abseil and prussik. 

The angle of the two routes suggested  by JCM is so gentle that a hand over hand swarm up the ab rope would get you out of trouble and actual prussiking wouldn't be necessary.  If that seems too bold you could clip your abseil device onto the rope and do a reverse abseil.

The Op seems happy enough with "chucking  off a top rope" so I assume he can set up an ab rope.