UKH

Hi, never been to south stack before and just looking for some general advice on Castell Helen abseil.

- Is it possible to reach the belay for lighthouse arete at high tide?

- Is a 60m mandatory for the abseil or is 50m ok? I've got some rigging rope for the belay...

Thanks in advance!

Luke

1. The belay is reasonably high up from memory.

2. You would probably be 5m or so short. 

It's cursed.

Someone will come along and trash your rope. Dunno what it is about the place, but visiting seems to cost exactly one ab rope. I had mine sheathed. I know of one being found cut. Just.... Say a prayer for your ab line I guess, and expect to end the day with a shorter one than you started with.

From memory, I've always abseiled in in two abseil pitches.  I'm pretty sure you can access Lighthouse arete at high tide if you don't mind traversing across at easy/mod standard.  Don't take this as gospel - its probably 10 years since I've done it !

50 gets you to the Lighthouse belay ledge if you use a long sling to rig the ab with.

It’s above high tide, it’s not above certain waves…!

Thanks for the responses, really helpful!

I've got the dilemma of an old 50 or a nice sporty 70m that will bring me to tears if trashed.... hoping 15m of rigging rope will help...

The high waves challenge is a tricky one... high tide is at 10.53 on Saturday, so I guess maybe a slowish start to the day would be best...

Your abseil will need to take quite a diagonal line, especially to reach the upper end of the sloping ledge when the tide is in.  There's a good chance others will want to abseil on your rope, which will be inconvenient for them (and you) if you decide to use the end of the rope to supplement your belay until the second leaves the stance

I prefer a slow start to the day there as gives a chance for sun to come around and for the rock to dry off.  Start late, finish late in the evening sun.

If you are (un)lucky, there will already be an abseil rope or two in place. Jezb1 knows the craic, so sounds like you'll get down on a 50m if you use the rigging rope. Lovely spot and other VSs to go at if LA is occupied. And no one trashed my rope or anyone else's whilst I've been there (three times?). Everyone was quite cooperative!

I' ve used an old 150ft half rope followed  by short ab on the climbing single (doubled through a krab on the half at the big ledge) which could be pulled through to climb. Exciting amount of stretch on the half when starting the second ab. Moo 

Belay down there is super solid so no need to use the ab rope as part of it.

I prefer a 60m as this gets you down to the bottom of Atlantis, Rap, NWP etc. Gives more options if the crag is busy. Abbing in 2 pitches is doable but I would never recommend it. 50 m will get you to the niche for LA as long as you don't use much of it to rig  with.

I would wait till midday unless it's very calm. Also gives the sun time to come round.

It's tricky to get more than 2 ab lines in with independent anchors from the usual ab point so you may need to share ropes.

Your rope,your choice surely.

No guarantees of course, but the current forecast is for a calm sea on Saturday, very light winds and little swell.

The two forecasts I use for predicting the sea state around there (for sea kayaking) are Wind Guru and Magic Seaweed. Between the two of them you generally get a pretty accurate forecast of what's going to be going on.

https://www.windguru.cz/70
https://magicseaweed.com/Anglesey-Ynys-Mon-Surf-Report/37/

A 50m will get you down no problem, tied directly into the belay at the top. Routes like Rap, Pel, Blanco, Lighthouse Arete are then accessible from the stance. Advantage being is you don't then have 10m of rope swirling in the tide as it come in and then gets stuck. If someone else uses your rope they may have good intentions, but have had someone put a knot in the end of mine before which then got stuck (good practice, but they would have been in the sea anyway).

Don't be surprised if someone else then uses your abseil ropes or return and find 2 or 3 more ropes rigged there, this can make stripping your own gear out interesting.

End of the day a few extra meters of traversing on big holds is not an issue as you tend to abseil in a straight line to gain access to the routes.

Very long prusik to the top of the crag when you have to abseil down to unjam the rope!

It doesn’t always work out like that

I found a 50m got me down to the lighthouse arete belay, but not to the Rap ledge - had to down solo a couple of metres.

but with a bit of care a 50m works fine. I won't be bringing a 60 there in future.