Gwilym's Adventure Blog

Today, I was back at a very sunny (and less windy) Hound Tor for the first day of a Rock Climbing Instructor Training course with 4 candidates It was all about going up today with top ropes, bottom ropes and lead climbing. They will all be in the climbing wall tomorrow with Mark and then it looks like we will be having a going down day on Thurs!  

 Today for the second day of the Mountain Training Rock Climbing Instructor Assessment we were at a sunny but chilly Hound Tor for lots of different group sets up for both climbing and abseiling as well as a few more routes.

I was at The Quay Climbing Centre and the Chudleigh Rocks today directing the first day of a Mountain Training Rock Climbing Instructor Assessment. Chudleigh lived up to its reputation as an afternoon sun trap making it a very pleasant place to hang out and watch the candidates climb.

Today I was down on The River Dart at Totness working with U6 BTEC students from Plymouth College.  

After an early start and a long 3 hour ride up to Sweet Lamb Adventure Bike Centre in Wales, I parked up the Explorer and jumped onto the KTM 790r for a day of 1 : 1 coaching with "Moly" the owner and lead instructor. I haven't ridden much this year (on or off road) for obvious reasons. I normally do around 10000 miles a year and since lockdown, it is more like 700 miles. I was a bit concerned about my skill fade but after a quick refresher training on riding position and corning (and getting to learn a bike I had never ridden before) it was off to ride around the Sweet Lamb complex and I was not as rusty as I expected. Today's particular skills we looked at were riding through water, riding ruts and ditches (up and down), skid turns, riding grass (some of it very lumpy and bumpy), pushing the the bike out of a marsh.  

 Yesterday I was on Dartmoor  running an efficient rigging course for a couple fo RCIS who wanted to know how to use their set ups systems more effectively and also how to minimise the impact on the popular routes at Hound Tor Last night, I was out wild camping assessing an instructor in his skills to camp, cook and manage a group away from the comforts of a campsite. Lovely day yesterday followed but a wet and misty morning for the walk out.

 Great day down in sunny Dorset completing some Coasteering Inductions/Risk Assessments with Jack followed by a few hours SUPping off Chesil Beach. Jack is on the Wet and High Adventures Ltd Instructor Development Scheme