Old Man of Hoy

First ascent: Tom Patey, Rusty Baillie, Chris Bonnington 1966.
Original Route on the East Face (460 feet) (E1 or 5b)

This is one of the most famous sea stacks in Britain and it is composed of rather decaying Orcadian sandstone standing on a granite plinth and features five climbs ranging from an acceptable El right up to E6. The stack is found just to the north of Rora Head which is east of Rackwick on the small island of Hoy which can be seen from John O'Groats.

The plan is for a small group of friends to travel up sometime at the beginning of the summer; in time for the good weather. We shall most likely wild camp somewhere on the cliffs. I read about this climb years ago and promised myself that I would one day give it a go! It looks like a wonderful challenge...

Skydiving - September 2007

What next...?

My buddy Karl, has invited me to Spain where we want to jump together. The plan is that I will learn to skydive by doing an Accelerated Free Fall course. He will join me for the fun as he has over 500 jumps to his name. That is him in the yellow suit jumping in Arizona from a balloon! Nice...

RGS Lecture: SOLD OUT

We have completely sold out of tickets for the lecture at the Royal Geographical Society on 7th December, 2006. Over 700 tickets have been sold. Please do not apply for any more tickets because we don't have any left! Thank you to all those who are coming. We hope you will enjoy it!

View from the summit of Everest

I took this photo on May 18th, 2006 at about 7.45am. It looks directly towards Base Camp on the Tibetan side (to the middle of the photo just beyond the glacial lake) The photo below, taken from Outer Space, is taken looking the other way!
We were lucky to have such a clear day.

Everest from Outer Space!

This photo really blew me away. Mount Everest and Lhotse (4th highest mountain) can clearly be seen in the upper right hand part of the picture with clouds whipping off the top, with Makalu (5th highest mountain) out to the left. The vast Tibetan Plateau can be seen in the foreground and one can even make out where Everest Base Camp is in Tibet together with the Rongbuk Glacier. The Nupste Ridge can clearly be seen to the right of Everest! Wow!