Peak Puntering - Same as it Ever Was

10 Days back in the UK - life goes on much as normal, a pleasant mix of jobs, climbing and work. The weather has been the usual frustrating British summer, unpredictable enough to ensure we have managed to get wet on several occasions.  The forecasters would have you believe that it has been unusual for August - but I don't think so: showery and cool much of the time, and horribly midgey out on the Grit whenever the wind dropped - just what we expect from a 'Normal British Summer'.

Above: Colin tiptoeing up Concave Wall

Climbing with the standard team has been fun, some social times, lots of banter and some great routes - on the Grit when the weather allows - and bolt clipping on the Limestone when not - at least we have managed to avoid going 'Indoors" so far.

Below: Sherri heading for Skinningrove 

In reality we are both waiting for the Autumn to arrive so we can head away south to our other life. In the mean-time we drove 'up North' for a few day, to stop in Sherri's mums flat in Saltburn. A change is always as good as a rest and we had an excellent few days including a day's climbing at the Wainstones and some great walks exploring the coastline, escaping the poor weather that everywhere else suffered. Back in Sheffield and we have booked a flight to Santorini for mid-October - winter is calling.

Normandy Wisdom

 As the summer rolls on we thought we would try somewhere different so we loaded up the car and caught the ferry to Le Havre to spend a bit of time in Normandy and possibly Brittany. In the event Hurricane Bertha had other ideas and camping proved to be a bit of a challenging, with high winds and some pretty impressive rainstorms.
We did some climbing on some interesting cliffs and explored the area around the delightful town of Domfront. We thought we might press on towards Brittany but the forecast remains very unsettled, so we have about-faced and headed back towards Calais and the UK. No rush to get 'home' - we will have to see what the weather throws in this direction.