http://thebmc.co.uk/News.aspx?id=4306A new climbing season has been agreed for Hoghton Quarry. We need your help at a major clean-up day on
Sunday 26th June to restore Hoghton to its former glory. Hoghton Quarry is one of the North West’s best gritstone venues. This year we have a reasonable climbing season agreed with the Hoghton Estate (mid-June to end August).It’s still not the year-round climbing we want but it’s a significant improvement.
We need your helpTo help restore Hoghton to its former glory, we need your help. A major clean-up day is planned for Sunday 26th June and we hope as many as possible will attend. People will be arriving at the crag from about 9.30 am. Free brews and cakes will be provided.
How to get involvedTo give this event a bit more structure we are asking people beforehand if they'll volunteer to restore a single agreed route. We’ve uploaded a
list of all the starred routes that we want adopted.
To adopt a route, just email Colin Struthers (NW Area Chairman) at colin@newfoundations.co.uk or Martin Kocsis (BMC Volunteer Co-ordinator) at martin@thebmc.co.uk.
A few things to rememberNo visits to the crag (cleaning or routing) will be possible until the peregrines have fledged (anticipated mid-June). As soon as this happens there will be notices on UKC and the BMC websites and all individual BMC members in the NW will be emailed to let them know that Hoghton is open. It is vital people stick to this as the birding interest at this crag is well organised and vociferous.
People who are volunteering to restore a route can do so at any time that suits them and don’t have to be there on the 26th of June if they’ve got other arrangements for that day. But we do want you to tell us how you are getting on with cleaning the route so that we can let other climbers know if it is good to go. This initiative is about getting the routes climbed!
To view an
online guide for the quarry click here A few of the routes rely on belay or protection bolts. Arrangements are in hand to replace these on a like-for-like basis
A fair few routes also use pegs. The May NW area meeting agreed that the future of these should be considered on a route-by-route basis. A set of notes to guide people restoring routes is available
here.
By Colin Struthers