Boswell, Mercier and Frost make first ascent of Flyby on Cùl Mòr
- Friday 19th January 2024
Greg Boswell, Jeff Mercier and Hamish Frost have made the first ascent of Flyby on Cùl Mòr in the far northwest of Scotland after Hamish Frost took a massive whipper.
As we reported previously, Greg Boswell and Jeff Mercier, are on a two-week-long winter road trip around Scotland at the moment. Their first three days of activities contained some exciting ascents including the second ascent of Guy Robertson’s Black Spout Wall which Greg upgraded to IX 10; click here for that report.
Subsequently, Greg and Jeff were joined by Hamish Frost and the trio headed to Cùl Mòr in Greg’s words “in search of some adventure”. It seems that the team got exactly that, although in this case, perhaps even too much?!
Greg explains, “So Tuesday was pretty involved! @hamishfrost, @jeff_mercier_ and I braved the storm and headed into the wilds of the NW in search of some adventure! This is always easy to find in the north of Scotland, with its beautiful remoteness for miles and even more spectacular mountains! I wanted to show Jeff Cùl Mòr, as this cliff is one of the craziest places I’ve climbed in winter. Its vast steepness and the amount of unclimbed terrain is mouth-watering. The problem with this place is that if it looks easy it will be hard and if it looks tricky, you’d better be wearing brown pants!”
Continuing with the detail Greg explains, in some depth, how the day unfolded and their new route: “Long story short, we battled our way up three hard and bold pitches, all the time getting pummelled by wind and spindrift, to eventually find ourselves below the last pitch. With spirits high we looked up, this pitch with its three overhanging roofs looked like it could potentially be semi-amenable and at least it looked like there would be good protection.
Hamish voiced his eagerness to have a look and as it was his turn to lead, Jeff passed him the rack and he set off into the impending steepness. He made good progress and was cruising up to the first roof where it was obviously going to step up a notch. He got a handful of protection and was happy to move on. He probed upwards but his progress slowed. He had a good look but decided it wasn’t for him. He made the correct and safest decision to reverse the climbing and pass the ropes over to me.”
So far, so good. Then things got tricky. Greg, again, “As he was down-climbing an axe ripped due to the major technicality of the ground he had already climbed and he fell. Not a big deal, these things happen…but the gear he had was in icy cracks and his upper pecker ripped, not a big deal…but, as he fell the crab on the Alpine draw which was clipped to a very good hex had spun and the rope became unclipped, this was a big f**king deal! Hamish then flipped upside down and I proceeded to watch one of my best friends take a 15+ metre fall ripping more gear as he went. Instant sickness hit my stomach, and as Jeff was belaying I thought the rope was ripping through the device. Why was he still falling, I thought!
Instinct made me grab the rope as I HAD to stop him falling! But it wasn’t that, it was the gear ripping! He stopped below the belay and we all took a second to breathe and assess the situation. We got Hamish back to the belay ledge. He knew he’d hurt his ankle, but as the true Hard Bastard that he is, he blurts out “one of you needs to finish the route”! Not even contemplating leaving all the gear (what was left of it) and the route unfinished. LEGEND!"
"I took the sharp end and proceeded to move up the pitch. It was hard! The adrenaline was wearing off and I felt sick and shivery from the cold. I pushed on and after some grunting and stern words with myself, I was above the third roof and stood on top of the buttress, the route was done!
We rapped down and as I was stood at the base of the buttress with Hamish, we both were still a bit shell-shocked! We hugged it out and Hamish proceeded to hobble the 7km back to the van through the newly deep snow. Back at the van we swapped stories and drank beer, whilst Jeff and I made plans for returning the following day for more action! Hamish took a load of painkillers and made plans to recover! The stuff we do in the name of fun eh?!”
Finally then, the name of the new route that they climbed? “We called the route Flyby in homage to Hamish’s Top Gun style inverted passing of Jeff and I at the last belay. 😆”