A fantastic 2012 in 100 Photos

Well its coming up to the end of the year and with no trips planned until new year this seemed like an appropriate time to summarise my 2012. I have done so much this year, taken up two new hobbies which have taken over my life, rock climbing and ice climbing.

Rock climbing very quickly became my hobby of choice this year, I have progressed very quickly and within a year have gone from never having lead trad climbing to beginning to consolidate climbing at E1, this year I have done:

• 109 trad rock climbs
• 87 of which I have lead
• 36 of those leads were HVS or above

I have had a few lucky moments though with a 25 foot fall in Pembrokeshire on Manzoku and a ground fall from 6m at Haytor on Haggis but thankfully I walked away from both with only bruises. I am looking forward to what next year brings and am currently training hard in indoor climbing gyms over the winter months to ensure that I enter the next climbing season as fit as possible.

As well as rock climbing this year I also have started ice climbing. I got into ice climbing in a weird way as I lead my first winter climb before I had lead a rock route outdoors which meant the first time I placed trad gear, first time I lead outdoors and first time I setup a belay was all in winter on the north face of Pen-y-Fan. I had a fantastic time climbing the north face of Ben Nevis up Gardyloo gully which involved an ice cave and last week I enjoyed climbing up Trinity Face on Snowdon which included my first grade 3 and first grade 3 solo.

As well as taking up new hobbies I have carried on old ones and headed out to the alps with some friends in August which was a fantastic two weeks where I managed to do everything on my ticklist and more. There are two routes which I will remember for a long time, the first being the Aiguille de la Grande Sassiere which I soloed up and it was just fantastic, I have never had views so good in my life and struggle to see how I will ever beat that view! The second was the traverse of the Weissmies which had everything a great alpine route should have: beautiful sunrise, an amazing cloud inversion, a snow slope, a rock ridge, a sharp snow arête, great descent, glacier crossing and a different descent to ascent.

This year I also graduated from the University of Exeter with a 2:1 in Mechanical Engineering and started work as an engineer for Rolls-Royce, the job I have wanted for as long as I can remember so have been very lucky. The job is going really well but it is a bit of a shock after four years of university life! I am looking forward to what adventures next year brings and am already adventurous trips away.