UKH

While the working classes were trespassing on the grouse moors of Kinder, the sons of the grouse-shooting set were busy illicitly clambering up the dreaming spires of Cambridge (and they were probably at it in Oxford too). Put a group of adventurous young people in an environment consisting of buildings, says Ronald Turnbull, and they are bound to climb them. This entertaining 1930's book by 'Whipplesnaith' is the buildering classic of the pre-parkour era.

It's a great book!

I have hazy memories of being taken on a tour of some college rooftops & the like when visiting some friends who were undergrads at Cambridge in the mid 70s and climbed a little on some university buildings at Oxford when I was a student there briefly the following year. Given that the local alternatives at the time were railway bridges its not surprising that climbers turned to the buildings.

But given the proliferation of climbing walls, do todays Oxbridge students keep up the old traditions of roof climbing ?

Nares Craig (the guy on top of that spire) was a cool guy in real life as well, did loads of work to improve 3rd world buildings and housing. Worth a google. When this book was republished in ~2007 my father saw that photo and managed to track Nares down to a nursing home in North London, said he had a fascinating afternoon chatting to him about his life.  I think he was even kicked out of Cambridge before his finals, some story about trying to escape the university authorities by swimming down the Cam at night (in February) but being caught.

He thought the experience of WWI led students to greater risk taking and frivolity and felt sorry for the current crop of students that had to take things more seriously... he also very sweetly signed a copy of that photo saying he hoped I had as much fun at uni as he did, which I'm not sure I managed!

The other cool thing about this book is an opening passage that invites you to open your window and sit on the edge of the sill with your bodyweight hanging over the edge. If you can do that you apparently have the minimum requirement to be a climber, and that further appreciation of heights can be trained. 

Final point which I'm not sure is clear from this review - all the climbs were done without ropes using gym shoes. Big balls!

St John's Chapel solo in gym shoes must have been pretty bold!

I don't have the book in front of me but I think they hadn't managed to find a route up it that didn't use gear... it was certainly one of the harder climbs if they did get up it.

Fair enough. Still a massive achievement though. I think I would rather have done the King's Chapel climb. 

Given the risk of being caught by the proctors, I couldn't possibly comment.

I remember Alan Rouse telling me how he had climbed right past Rab Butler's window in the middle of the night. As he was going past, Rab came up to it on the other side in his dressing-gown, pulled the sash window up, leaned out and said "Would you mind keeping the noise down?"

I loved reading this. Wasn't there a description of how they got a top rope on one of the more difficult spires? I think they had to tie a length of string to a tennis ball and throw it up at the top of the spire and get a lucky bounce that saw the string threaded around the top of it. They then tied a rope to the string and hauled it up and around to "thread" the anchor.

(...) the Proctor, splendid in his night-coloured academic gown (...)

Was this before or after he popped his tendon on Circe? 

The sequel to this, from the 1960s is fully available online here: http://insectnation.org/nightclimbing/camnightclimbing.html 

It's pretty entertaining and ends (spoiler alert) with the two protagonists being expelled from the uni..

That was my concern. Its all well and good for the kids of the rich to get expelled but not for the likes of me, so I declined an obvious invitation to join such interesting escapades. I did discretely climb into college after gates closed a few times, once with my unicycle (I guessed someone saw me, explaining the invitation). I also unicycled the walls of some road bridges over the cam when they were quiet.

I did a few routes in the early '80s. There were a few people doing stuff. I don't think we really worried too much about getting caught (maybe assumed we would just get a warning the first time and I didn't entertain thoughts of Kings or St Johns chapels). I remember the Lion Chimney on the Fitzwiliam Museum being good and we did the classic S. Face of Caius with the Senate House leap. A police car went past while I was leading Caius but they didn't look up (we had been told they never did). The Senate House Leap was exciting because the metal covered ledge you land on turned out to be icy! My partner fluffed the leap and arrived at the other side with the ledge at waist level and ended up hanging from it by his hands. As he squealed for "tight" and I hauled him up it was quite a challenge not to laugh out load and attract attention.

I did the Bridge of Sighs traverse twice in the late seventies (and several other of the climbs mentioned). The first time, when stone-cold sober, was by far the most memorable. The initial fall across the gap was truly terrifying - you have to completely commit, with no handholds to save you if it doesn't work - it's very difficult to judge the distance, and the fear is of the outstretched arms failing to reach the other side of the chimney, leading, at best, to a swim, at worst, to smashing one's head on the slab at the base and drowning. Technically VD, mentally MXS. On the second occasion, a year or so later, and with a couple of pints inside me, I couldn't see what the problem had been. My understanding is that these days the college authorities are much less tolerant, no doubt due to the change in health and safety culture. I also suspect security is much tighter - we regularly climbed in and out of an area known as the New Museums Site which was then full of labs conducting animal experiments. I'm pretty sure you wouldn't be able to do that today.

I'm a current Cambridge student and Night Climbing is still very much alive but now the risk of getting caught massively outways the risk of falling. The New Museums Site route is still a partially good route we take new people up (not the left side). Collage's officially condemn night climbing but some porters have a bit of a soft spot for it and may be more lenient.

Do they teach you how to use apostrophes at Cambridge :p

One thing I always wondered about the book: presumably they were using huge magnesium flash-guns to take the photos? Wouldn't this be a massive giveaway; it's hard to imagine brilliant flashes of light on the buildings going unnoticed. 

Or, indeed, how to spell Cambridge.

I recall a conversation a friend had with his college porters around the year 2001:

Porter: "Ah, Mr X. We have received reports of people climbing on the roofs of the college last night. Would that have anything to do with you, perchance?"

Friend: (professes ignorance)

Porter: "You see, if it were an intruder from *outside* the college, that would be a serious matter of which we would need to inform the police."

Friend: "I, uh, don't think there's any need to contact the police."

Porter: "Very good, Mr X."

Or even how to spell college, or outweighs.....

Yea, as you can probably tell I'm definitely not a humanities student. About the flash, I think they simply were not too worried about getting caught. They were also climbing late at night when most people are already sleeping.

A small group definitely did whilst I was there (2012-16). I didn’t personally think it worth the risks - perhaps I could have sweet-talked the Catz porters if caught, but my guess was that the unfamiliar porters of other colleges would be less lenient.
 

Hey!

I can confirm that the Night Climbing society here in Oxford is as active as ever, consisting of a team of six Parkour practitioners and climbers, with several additional recruits learning the ropes. We are now in the process of writing our own guidebook to Night Climbing in Oxford.

If you wish to share any routes/experiences you had whilst climbing in Oxford, do feel free to message us. 
You can find us here!

https://www.facebook.com/oxnightclimbers/

We were asked not to climb the old buildings at Cambridge because of the damage it was causing. Spikes appeared atop King's College spires in the late 90s because of this. We did the odd route, more trying to find routes between colleges so we could crash May Balls than any real climbing ethos. Then an acquaintance was sent down having been caught on the Senate House and that was that.